You hope a federal judge will be reasonable and forthright in dealing with your adult business, but does he or she have a known sense of selectivity? Say, with financial disclosure? A request from an online news service for federal judge's financial disclosure was turned down - but a request from a print newspaper for the same was granted several months earlier.
APBNews says it has received records from the Administrative Office of U.S. Courts granting USA Today's request and then some - the online crime news service says the publication often nicknamed McPaper got an even larger amount of information than APBNews had asked for.
APBNews reporters learned of the USA Today request this week, after court officials granded an APBNews request for copies of all applications filed last year asking for federal judicial disclosures. Seventy-one requests were approved.
USA Today executive editor Bob Dubill tells APBNews the paper got everything they wanted but it "should be released to everybody. If it's a public record, it's a public record." But Dubill says instead of getting copies made of the reports, the paper sent reporters to Washington to see them and make notes on site instead of paying substantial copy fees.
APBNews had sought the 1998 financial disclosures on all judges and magistrates, but a committee of fifteen federal judges turned them down. APBNews later filed suit in federal court to force disclosure, a case that is still ongoing, the crime news service says.
A University of Southern California law professor has added to the debate, telling APBNews treating one news medium differently than another raises serious First Amendment issues. Professor Erwin Chemerinsky says the government can't decide selectively who does or does not get information that is considered in the public domain, APBNews reports.
"The Supreme Court has said that the government cannot discriminate among media. They cannot treat newspapers differently than TV," Chemerinsky tells APBNews. He cites two U.S. Supreme Court rulings in which the high court found regulations which affect only the press or portions of the press unconstitutional.
One, a 1983 case involving the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, saw Justice Sandra Day O'Connor write for the majority, "Differential treatment, unless justified by some special characteristic of the press, suggests that the goal of the regulation is not unrelated to suppression of expression, and such a goal is presumptively unconstitutional."
And George Washington College of Law professor Herman Schwartz tells APBNews likewise in more blunt language: "I think you were unconstitutionally screwed. "That's outrageous. The (Supreme Court) has said you cannot distinguish between media. You can't favor one medium over another."
A spokesman for the Administrative Office of U.S. Courts, David Sellers, tells APBNews that USA Today saw judges' financial disclosures in his office but the paper made no copies; otherwise, APBNews says, Sellers refused further comment.
APBNews isn't the only interested party in the controversy - it says Congress is keeping a wary eye on it, including House Judiciary Committee chairman Henry Hyde. Committee communications director Sam Stratman says, "a number of members (of Congress) are very interested in this issue," with hearings or legislation still under consideration, says APBNews.
