A Chat With T.L. Wahl- St. Louis' First Amendment Advocate- Rob Black Ain't the Only Porn Guy to Have Run for Mayor Vegas is going nuts trying to legislate lap dancing, and a bunch of right wing religious goofballs in Cincinnati got the Marriott Corp. to cave in on the showing of pay-per-view movies in a Marriott. This of course prompted us to give TL Wahl a call and see what was doing in St. Louis. Wahl along with his wife Suzie was a recipient of the Hal Freeman Freedom Isn't Free Award at the recent Night of the Stars. [Ironically the "Stars" have to pay to go to a benefit honoring them.] Wahl likes to say he's the only guy in America convicted twice of prostitution for having sex with his own wife. Wahl runs openly advertised $200 "educational seminars," but the cops in St. Charles County saw it another way and figured Wahl's brand of Tupperware party was more like hooking. Having lost at the appellate level, Wahl asked the Missouri Supreme Court to hear his case but as yet hasn't received an answer. Wahl also writes and comments on First Amendment issues. Gene: Anything new on your legal front? Wahl: Oddly enough, we have not heard back from the Missouri Supreme Court as to whether or not they will hear our case. It's taken quite awhile. That's unusual. Otherwise things here are kind of quiet. Gene: Are you still doing your educational seminars. Wahl: We're not doing performances at this moment. They told us in St. Charles County that if we did the show again, we'd get 30 days in jail. And they use the word "show". Thirty days in jail would be pretty hard for me to take financially. Gene: You're pretty active on the local political scene. Wahl: Yeah. I've run for state representative. I've run for alderman here in St. Louis and I ran for mayor of Lake St. Louis. Suzie applied for the job of police chief back in 1991. When I ran for mayor I put together a booklet listing the issues that I thought were confronting the city. And I walked on foot every street in the city and knocked on every door of every resident in the city. I didn't win the election but that booklet was well regarded. But a lot of people used and referred to that booklet as far as the issues that would have to be dealt with. They did come to a boil and did have to be dealt with. A lot of the times the solutions I had proposed were the ones they ended up using. Gene: I think Cincinnati's going to be the start of some pesky little First Amendment mosquito bites Wahl: It goes back and forth. This being basically a theocracy in disguise, whenever they get a chance with a national threat or a national emergency they take that opportunity to swing the pendulum their way. But that's okay. We're not quitting. One of the things that we've considered doing in St. Louis is offering our performances for free. The problem with our performances is that there's sex and there's money. They consider that prostitution. Thereby we'd circumvent the whole prostitution aspect of it. We haven't worked real hard on that in finding a location, but that is a possibility and we'll see what the court rules. One day we may put the seminar on for free and see what they come up with next. I don't think they'd ever get us on obscenity because we offer scientific value in our presentation. Gene: What are your feelings about receiving the Freedom Isn't Free Award. Wahl: I was really genuinely honored. I remember when I heard about that award many years ago I really did think I'd like to have that some day. At the same time I'm kind of embarrassed because there I am in the room with the previous award winner who took a bullet in the back and is paralyzed for life. I got the award without being physically attacked, permanently attacked or spending any real time in jail. I haven't been through what some of those guys have been through. Gene: How long have you been active as far as First Amendment issues. Wahl: We were outed by our controversy in September 9, 1991 when the cops came in with a bogus search warrant [the Wahl's had an amateur video company] in honor of the local police chief's political campaign. They came in with a bogus search warrant, had a very public parade and we blew it all up in their faces. That's when we decided the best defense was a good offense. We've been very vocal about every issue, particularly censorship issues ever since then. When the local county prosecutor held a sideline job teaching law courses at the community college and told those people in the classroom that his opinion making an X-rated video was an act of prostitution, I sued him for libel. I also sued him for having a part time job. I sued the prosecutor on and on. I filed five or six lawsuits against him. His name was Tim Braun. None of the suits went anywhere. They were more of nuisance suits than anything else but they got in the newspaper and got us press. It drew attention to issues and we helped get him beat finally. A couple of years ago he publicly announced that at the behest of a local censorship group, Citizens Against Pornography, he was going after local video stores. They sent letters to the local video stores telling them they had better get rid of their stuff or face prosecution. I went around to the stores and said we need to have an organized effort to get this guy out of office. They trusted me with their mailing lists. Here I am, a mail order guy but I promised them I wouldn't use their mailing lists for my own purposes. I didn't. I printed up flyers