MEDC 5350
MEDIA REGULATIONS
AND ORGANIZATION
Week 2
“Almost all human beings have an infinite capacity for
taking things for granted.” — Aldous Huxley
Why was the First
Amendment created in the
first place?
Why was the First Amendment created
in the first place?
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The invention of the printing press by Johannes Gutenburg in
1450 in Germany is hailed as the key event that brought
about modernism
Printers afterwards had to be licensed as the Crown felt
threatened. All presses had to be registered and those
caught operating illegally were faced with punishment and
fines or death if they printed or distributed outlawed text
In 1643, the power of prior review shifted from the king’s
officers to the British Parliament
However, in 1644, English poet John Milton argued that an
open marketplace of ideas advanced the interests of
society and mankind… so where did he get his ideas from?
The state of nature
Thomas Aquinas - Brought attention to
a statement of the Apostle Paul made in
his Letter to the Romans states that
"natural law” contrasted with the Mosaic
Law posited on Mount Sinai followed by
Jews as a moral code to live by.
 While the Christians did not follow the
Law of Moses there is virtue of
knowing it (some of its central
commandments) and obeying it
(partially) "by nature.”
Thomas Hobbes
Thomas Hobbes
“During the time men live without a common
power to keep them all in awe, they are in that
condition which is called war; and such a war
as is of every man against every man".
Therefore every person has a natural right or
liberty to do anything one thinks necessary for
preserving one's own life as it is "solitary, poor,
nasty, brutish, and short”
The state of nature exists at all times among
independent countries, over whom there is no
law except for those same precepts or laws of
nature (Leviathan, Chapters XIII, XXX end)
John Locke
Late 17th century – John Locke argues
government censorship was an improper
exercise of power
 People have fundamental natural rights,
including life, personal liberty and selffulfillment
 He was an empiricist who advanced the
“social contract” theory
The Social Contract philosophy questions the
origin of society and the legitimacy of the
authority of the state over the individual.
Individuals agree to surrender some of their
freedoms and submit to a ruler or magistrate
(or to the decision of a majority), in exchange
for protection of their remaining rights.
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John Locke
“The natural liberty of man is to be free from any
superior power on earth, and not to be under the will or
legislative authority of man, but to have only the law of
nature for his rule.”
-The Second Treatise of Civil Government, 1690
“The rule and standard for all law-making is the public
good. If something isn’t useful to the commonwealth then it
may not be required by law, however indifferent it is.”
-A Letter about Toleration. 1689.
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Rousseau, a French political philosopher
said all people are born free and equal
but, unless constrained by morality and
law, would become uncivilized and
violent
People accordingly form a social
contract in which they exchange some of
their freedom for a limited government
that advances the collective interest.
Because the people remain sovereign
and do not surrender their rights,
government censorship violates the
fundamental social contract and can
never be justified
The state of nature
“The natural man lives for himself; he is the unit, the whole,
dependent only on himself and on his like. The citizen is
but the numerator of a fraction, whose value depends on
its denominator; his value depends upon the whole, that is,
on the community. Good social institutions are those best
fitted to make a man unnatural, to exchange his
independence for dependence, to merge the unit in the
group, so that he no longer regards himself as one, but as
a part of the whole, and is only conscious of the common
life.”
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
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Presses in the colonies were licensed, and government censors
previewed publications until the 1720s. The crime of seditious libel
was imposed on those who published dissenting opinion opposing the
government.
British common law traditions also came under attack. The most
renowned case is that of John Peter Zenger, the publisher of one of
two newspapers in the colony of New York. Zenger, a German
immigrant, clearly had broken the sedition law by printing criticism
of colonial Gov. William Cosby. Cosby jailed Zenger to stop the
attacks. In Zenger’s defense, attorney Andrew Hamilton argued that
no one should be jailed for publishing truthful and fair criticism of
government. The jury agreed and acquitted Zenger in 1734.
It seems clear that the authors of the First Amendment intended to
provide a ban on prior restraints but not as clear regarding sedition,
blasphemy and libel.
Once again, the First Amendment
CONGRESS SHALL MAKE NO LAW RESPECTING AN
ESTABLISHMENT OF RELIGION, OR PROHIBITING THE
FREE EXERCISE THEREOF; OR ABRIDGING THE
FREEDOM OF SPEECH, OR OF THE PRESS; OR THE
RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE PEACEABLY TO ASSEMBLE, AND
TO PETITION THE GOVERNMENT FOR A REDRESS OF
GRIEVANCES.
The Bill of Rights to the U.S. Constitution was ratified on
December 15, 1791
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But there are exceptions and interpretations…
How much protection does the First
Amendment actually give us?
The Supreme Court has interpreted it to mean different
things in different situations and is not absolute, for
example:
 The Supreme Court can determine who the media is
and what “abridging” means.
 The Supreme Court has held different doctrines with
regard to freedom of speech from “the “bad tendency”
doctrine (Patterson v. Colorado, 1907) to the "clear and
present danger” doctrine (Schenck v. United States,
1919) which was replaced in 1969 by Brandenburg v.
Ohio, and the test to determining whether the speech
would provoke an "imminent lawless action".