Two federal judges in the past two weeks have ruled unconstitutional the government's policy of forcing U.S. health groups to denounce prostitution as a condition for receiving funds for international AIDS work. Both judges said the requirement violated the First Amendment right to free speech. The most recent ruling, issued yesterday in Washington by U.S. District Court Judge Emmet G. Sullivan, found that the regulation "casts too wide a net and is not narrowly tailored," forcing aid organizations to "parrot the government's policies" and preventing them from using even privately raised funds to assist sex workers with AIDS prevention.
On May 9, U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero issued a similar ruling in New York. The government's "somewhat cavalier take-it-or-leave-it answer to an infringement of speech -- which can more or less be characterized as 'if you don't like it, lump it' -- is simply not in keeping with the expectations our society derives from First Amendment freedoms," he wrote....
It will be interesting to see what the administration and Congress do with this decision. In general, courts have usually held that, when it comes to receiving government funds, the government is entitled to set almost any requirement, as long as the restriction only applies to the receipt of funds. So, for example, the government is allowed to withdraw government funds form universities barring military recruiters because of the military's antigay policies; they don't prevent the universities from saying what they will or doing what they will -- they just say that if the universities don't allow the government access, they don't get government money. To ve sure, a very fine distinction, but the university is at least allowed to say, "We hate this, we hate these policies, but the government is making us do this."
On the other hand, this was truly a specific speech restriction and requirement, which was somewhat unique. This penalized not simply conduct, but speech specifically; if you didn't say what the government wanted you to say the way the government wanted you to say it, you wouldn't get funds for your work.
That said, you wonder if the administration and Congress will leave this alone. Neither are much interested in Constitutional rights and guarantees these days. The administration runs roughshod over the Constitution, and Congress lays down next to it and says, "Us next! Us next!"
I wonder sometimes how long it will take to recover from the damage done to the country by this administration, and Congress refusing to defend either the people or even its own prerogatives. I wonder if we can recover.
Posted by iain at May 19, 2006 06:48 PM
