The Constitutional Right to a Press Pass
I get asked about press passes a lot–I guess because I once had one. And the more I think about it, the more I’m raring for a constitutional challenge to the way many press passes are assigned in this country.
You see, historically, just about the only meaning of Freedom of the Press that would have made sense to our founders was freedom from having the government choose official reporters by licensing or fees or some other means. The whole reason we have Freedom of the Press is because stodgy countries in Europe were ensuring a tame press by either picking official printers, only giving licenses to their favorites, or charging a lot of money for the kind of press they didn’t like. And when those Dirty Fucking Hippie colonists rebelled against the Stamp Tax, they determined never to see something like it or the more onerous licensing on their watch.
Currently, many government agencies are discriminating against citizen-bloggers like me–or even plain old online reporters–because they don’t kill trees to circulate their work. This is changing (one of MI’s bloggers has a legislative press pass, apparently some DFH bloggers have been allowed into Federal courthouses). But not everywhere. For example, given Read more →