First Amendment Applications of the First Amendment

First Amendment Applications

Applications of the First Amendment

The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution protects the American people against laws made by Congress that would restrict the right to free speech or a free press, however, with the advancement of technology Americans have created new mediums of communication and the rights guaranteed in the Constitution have had to be applied to these new mediums. As a result, the Supreme Court has determined that the different types of medium involved in communication are protected in different ways. Therefore the freedom of speech and press, guaranteed in the Constitution, has been applied to legal cases involving these differing mediums of communication in quite different ways.

When the Constitution was written the main means of communication in the public arena was the newspaper, and the founding fathers wanted to ensure that these newspapers had the freedom to print what they liked. In 1974 this freedom was tested when a political candidate demanded that a Miami newspaper, which had recently printed a critical editorial of him, print his written reply. When the paper refused, he sued and the case eventually made its way to the U.S. Supreme Court in the form of the case of Miami Herald Publishing Company v. Tornillo. The law that the candidate relied upon for the basis of his legal case had been enacted in 1913 and required that any newspaper printing an article critical of a political candidate offer equal space for a reply from that candidate. However, the Supreme Court determined that this "right of reply" was a case of government interfering in the freedom of the press and the law was unconstitutional.

In his opinion, Chief Justice Burger stated that "The choice of material to go into a newspaper, and the decision made as to limitation on the size and content of the paper, and treatment of public issues and public officials-whether fair of unfair-constitute the exercise of editorial control and judgment." (Miami Herald Publishing v. Tornillo, 1974) In effect, the court determined that forcing a newspaper to print a political candidate's reply to a critical editorial was too much interference on the part of the government. In the case of newspapers, which are the oldest and the most traditional means of communication, the court found that they have the greatest of protections from government interference.

In an another case, in 1969 a Pennsylvania radio station aired a segment in which a writer was personally attacked on air and the writer demanded equal time to respond. When the FCC sided with the writer, the station appealed all the way to the Supreme Court in the case of Red Lion Broadcasting v. FCC. But unlike newspapers, which the court would later determined to have almost unlimited freedom, the Supreme Court determined that the government could interfere with the station and force it to allow the writer time to reply to the attack on him.

The Court found that the airwaves which carry the radio signals were finite and because of this, the government had the right to regulate these finite airwaves in the public's interests. In effect, the broadcast frequencies belonged to the people of the United States and could be regulated by their representatives in the government. The second issue the court determined was whether the "personal attack doctrine," part of the "fairness doctrine," violated the Constitution. The court stated in it's unanimous opinion that "the fairness doctrine and its specific manifestations in the personal attack and political editorial rules do not violate the First Amendment." (Red Lion Broadcasting v. FCC, 1969) Unlike the later case of Miami Herald v. Tornillo, because radio broadcasts were going out over frequencies owned by the people, the government had a right and duty to ensure that these airwaves were used for the benefit of all the people. While newspapers do not use public airwaves to transmit their information, they can have nearly complete freedom from government interference, but public airwaves demand government regulation. The technology involved and the use of public airwaves was the basis of the acceptance of the fairness doctrine in one case but not the other.

Because the airwaves are the people's, the government has the duty to regulate them for the benefit of the people, and this includes protecting the people from obscenities and offensive behavior. When a radio station broadcast a show which included a "Filthy Words" segment, the Supreme Court found in the case of FCC v. Pacifica Foundation, that "of all forms of communication, broadcasting has the most limited First Amendment protection," and decided the case in favor of the FCC. (FCC v. Pacifica Foundation)

While the broadcasting company argued that the specific words were not obscene, as required by the law, the Court disagreed and found that the medium, time of day, potential audience, and method of transmission were all relevant factors in determining whether something broadcast was patently offensive or not. Because the station chose to broadcast its segment at a time of day when children were most likely listening, and because radio broadcasts are almost impossible to avoid in modern life, the station's broadcast violated the law against obscene, indecent or profane use of the public airwaves. Once again technology seemed to be the determining factor as the Supreme Court used the public's control of the airwaves as the basis of their decision to regulate the freedom of speech of the radio station.

Finally, a case involving the latest technological advancement in communication, the internet, came before the Supreme Court when a 1996 law, the Communications Decency Act (CDA), was challenged in court. The act made it illegal to transmit indecent information through the internet because children could be exposed to it. However, the Supreme Court decided, in the case of Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union, that the law was too broad in its regulation and "does not allow parents to consent to their children's use of restricted materials, is not limited to commercial transactions, fails to provide an definition of 'indecent' and omits any requirement that 'patently offensive' material lack socially redeeming value…is punitive, [and] applies to a medium that, unlike radio receives full First Amendment protection." (Reno v ACLU)