Dealing the final blow to the Communications Decency Act, the Supreme Court last Friday again ruled the law was unconstitutional. In a one-line order, the justices summarily affirmed the ruling of a New York federal district court that struck down the law last July. Joe Shea filed the lawsuit in February 1996 on behalf of his online publication, the American Reporter. Since the court did not write an opinion, however, the Shea v. Reno case does not have the same hefty precedential value as the ACLU v. Reno lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union and American Library Association plaintiffs. "Since in practice ACLU v. Reno is the law of the land, that preempts any binding force that Shea v. Reno might have," says UCLA law professor Eugene Volokh. Shea challenged only part of the CDA and didn't win as broad a victory at the trial court level as the ACLU and ALA coalitions did. Still, Shea is celebrating. "What it really means to me is that other countries aren't going to get the support they hoped for when they start or continue to suppress the Internet," he says. "The Net is going to be an important vehicle for new democracies around the world. People are going to voice on the Internet what they can't voice on radio or TV. Governments are going to find it harder to regulate because the U.S. Supreme Court stood behind the First Amendment in both of these cases." Shea filed the case with the pro bono help of Arent Fox, Kintner Plotkin & Kahn, a Washington law firm. Shea recently signed a partnership with nando.net, which now will publish the American Reporter online. It'll go live in July at http://american-reporter.com -Declan More info: http://www.eff.org/pub/Legal/Cases/Am_Reporter_v_DoJ/ http://www.newshare.com/Reporter/3097/3097-6.html http://www.newshare.com/Reporter/3097/3097-8.html ------------------------- Declan McCullagh Time Inc. The Netly News Network Washington Correspondent http://netlynews.com/