Response to PFF's O'Donnell on the CDA and moralists

[Declan McCullagh]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sun, 3 Nov 1996 07:58:58 -0800 (PST)
From: Declan McCullagh <declan at well.com>
To: fight-censorship at vorlon.mit.edu
Subject: Response to PFF's O'Donnell on the CDA and moralists

Richard O'Donnell from the Progress and Freedom Foundation writes in an
essay attached below:

 > The strategic error of civil libertarians in the fight over the
 >censorship act was to lump together the statist moralists and the
 >anti-statist moralists. The latter are natural allies of the free
 >speechers (for the same reason the Christian Coalition and
 >Libertarians call the Republican party home). The ACLU crowd was
 >unable to create a free speech alliance with Christians because they
 >failed to acknowledge that attempts to limit the availability of
 >pornography is very American.

O'Donnell makes some good points elsewhere, but the above fails to
convince me. Trying to impose your moral code on others through the power
of law has a long history in America: Prohibition and sodomy laws. We also
have a long history of discrimination against gays, blacks, and jews. But
that doesn't make it right, or justified. 

Gutting the First Amendment though state action, which the religious right
did in passing the CDA, is indeed "unAmerican." It goes against the very
principles of free expression and tolerance for political dissent upon
which this country was founded. There is a difference between arguing that
people should decline to purchase erotica or read "indecent"  materials --
and calling for criminal laws to ban it.

I agree with O'Donnell that advocates of freedom need to work with
advocates of a reduced central government. One protection against future
threats like the CDA is to make the Federal government less subsceptible
to special interest lobbying. And certainly, House Republicans have
emerged this year as the staunchest defenders of civil liberties.

But I disagree with his assertion that "a small group of statist
moralists" supported the CDA. My question is: what major theocratic right
group publicly opposed it? Even PFF senior fellow Arianna Huffington
debated Esther Dyson and John Perry Barlow and defended the CDA. 
 
The Christian Coalition certainly supported the act. Enough is Enough! 
supported the CDA, with its leader Dee Jepsen testifing in favor of
Net-censorship. (Jepsen is on the board of regents of Pat Robertson's
Regents University and has impeccable religious right credentials.)  Bruce
Taylor's group did -- and though Taylor isn't exactly a religious
moralist, he rarely crosses swords with them. The ACLJ -- the religious
right's response to the ACLU -- supported the CDA and even cited Rimm's
study this year as support for its constitutionality. The organizations in
the umbrella group National Coalition Against Pornography supported the
CDA. The Family Research Council and Focus on the Family continue to argue
in favor of the CDA. Longtime Christian Coalition ally Sen. Charles
Grassley introduced a bill worse than the CDA. We all know what Rep. Henry
Hyde did with the final legislation. 
 
Now, this is from memory. Perhaps some groups have changed their position
after the June ruling. But I'd be interested in hearing the answer to my
question above. 

-Declan

----------
  
        Freedom to Pray and Sin
 
 The Internet is driving the ACLU and Christian Coalition Together
 
        Richard F. O'Donnell
 
 Prohibition became law because bootleggers, who stood to gain
 economically from outlawing alcohol, quietly supported the
 "religious" crusade against evil liquor. Today, the forces of state
 control who want the government to regulate Cyberspace quietly
 support the moral crusade against pornography on the Internet.
 This modern day "Bootleggers and Baptists" coalition has driven a
 stake through the traditional civil libertarian constituency and
 left the ACLU crowd completely bewildered.
 
 The Communications Decency Act, passed by Congress earlier this
 year and now being challenged in court, criminalizes the
 transmission and posting of indecent material on line. In the year of
 the Republican Congressional Revolution a Democrat (James Exon of
 Nebraska) was the prime sponsor of the censorship act. Opponents
 were never able to label it purely a move by "Newt Gingrich's
 radical freshmen" because so many Democrats supported it (and
 Gingrich did not). For instance, a recent WIRED magazine article
 entitled "The Rogues Gallery" that profiled "the legislators who
 helped make government censorship a reality on the Internet"
 didn't profile even one Republican.
 
 Liberal legislators and President Clinton, who normally have few
 problems with the ACLU and abhor the "radical Christian right,"
 went right along with them in attempt to increase state control.
 How is it legislators who voted against efforts to ban flag burning
 on the grounds of free speech suddenly voted to ban dirty pictures?
 
 Simply put, the Democrats saw in the censorship act a way to
 assert government regulation of the Internet, the first step in letting
 Washington bureaucrats regulate Cyberspace in the "public
 interest."  These liberal paternalists intuitively favor state control
 in the mode of Senator Bob Kerry, who thinks that, because the
 FCC regulates telephone and television transmission, it is a natural
 extension of its powers to regulate the Internet. These are members
 of an elite who believe that government is in a better position than
 parents to determine the programming content of television
 networks or in a better position than the market and to determine
 the standards for emerging technology.
 
 Defenders of free speech lost their battle over the censorship act
 because, when their traditional Democratic allies abandoned
 them, they were unable to get over their distaste for moralism and
 recognize their new natural allies. The key to victory for civil
 libertarians is understanding that moralists (e.g. "the Christian
 right") are not a unified, monolithic front.
 
 There is a small group of statist moralists who are seeking
 government power in order to impose their views on the rest of
 America. They may pose a threat to free speech. Yet most
 "Christian activists" are not interested in imposing anything on
 others. Instead, they are actively opposing a government that
 is abridging their rights to freedom of faith. Statist moralists
 advocate not just a silent moment in school but a school led prayer.
 Anti-statist moralists just want schools to stop distributing condoms
 because it undermines the lessons they are trying to teach their
 children about abstinence until marriage.
 
 The strategic error of civil libertarians in the fight over the
 censorship act was to lump together the statist moralists and the
 anti-statist moralists. The latter are natural allies of the free
 speechers (for the same reason the Christian Coalition and
 Libertarians call the Republican party home). The ACLU
 crowd was unable to create a free speech alliance with Christians
 because they failed to acknowledge that attempts to limit the
 availability of pornography is very American.
 
 The legacy of the Puritans remains strong in our nation. Throughout
 our history Americans have been ready to demand conformity and
 to impose through law moral standards (recall abolition - for
 which America went to war). Foes of the Internet censorship lost
 their battle by labeling their opponents "unAmerican." Steve
 Guest, a network consultant who is party to a class action suit
 against attempts to shut down on-line adult sites, summed up the
 civil libertarian attitude when he said such actions were
 "violating the basic principles on which this country was founded."
 
 Calling attempts to regulate pornography "unAmerican" does not
 sway many people - especially Congressmen. Moral crusades
 against sinful material are as quintessentially American as
 individual liberty. Civil libertarians need to acknowledge the
 natural place of moralism in American life. Otherwise, they blind
 themselves from recognizing their true enemy. Freedom isn't
 threatened by moralism - we are free precisely because we are
 moral beings. Freedom is threatened by the advocates of state
 control.
 
 Civil libertarians need to reach out to anti-statist moralists and
 show them that it is no better to let the government in our computers
 than our churches. The way to fight pornography is on individual
 computer screens, with technology that empowers parents to
 determine what their children see - not what some invisible
 bureaucrat or court decides is appropriate.
 
 
 -----------
        Richard F. O'Donnell
 
 Richard F. O'Donnell is Director of Communications at The
 Progress & Freedom Foundation. He serves as editor of all
 Foundation policy reports, books and articles. In addition, he is
 responsible for media relations and public outreach. His editorials
 have appeared in Investor's Business Daily, The Washington
 Times and Commonsense.
 
 Mr. O'Donnell is currently assisting former Congressman Vin
 Weber on his book about the new political majority emerging in
 American politics. He has also worked with columnist Arianna
 Huffington, author Marvin Olasky, and numerous policy and
 Congressional leaders in the telecommunications, health care,
 energy, environment and welfare reform fields.
 
 Mr. O'Donnell is a recognized authority on the nature and political
 ramifications of the transition from the Industrial Age to the
 Digital Age. Writing and speaking on the survivability of the
 American Idea in the 21st Century, he is a columnist for the
 cyberspace magazine Upside Online.
 
 He was managing producer of a weekly television show, The
 Progress Report , co-hosted by Heather Higgins and House
 Speaker Newt Gingrich, and editor of the American Civilization.
 Mr. O'Donnell has also worked at the National Policy Forum: A
 republican Center of the Exchange of Ideas and at the Archer
 Daniels Midland Company.
 
 A native of Colorado, Mr. O'Donnell is a graduate of the Colorado
 College, and has studied at Boston College and The London
 School of Economics and Political Science.

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