One of the founding
principles of the United States of America was the freedom for individuals and
journalists to criticize the government. It’s not by coincidence that the first
amendment made to the U.S. Constitution guarantees freedom of speech and of the
press. Basically, journalists are to be free to cover and critique officials
and their actions without fear of censorship or retribution.
That’s why it was
alarming when an arm of Kentucky state government tried two years ago to stop
the Lexington Herald-Leader from publishing a syndicated column written by
North Carolina-based psychologist John Rosemond. Rosemond’s columns generally
deal with parenting, and some advice he gave to parents of a recalcitrant child
sparked this controversy.
Rosemond didn’t
take that demand lying down. He filed a suit in federal court, and earlier this
month he won his case in a ruling handed down by U.S. District Judge Greg Van
Tatenhove, based in Lexington.
This decision is
nothing short of a major victory for the First Amendment and for advocates of a
free, unrestrained press. The idea that a state agency would try to silence a
columnist or a paper that publishes the columns he writes is a direct affront
to one of the basic tenets of this country.
What’s next? Should
the state try to censor Ann Landers or Dear Abby? What about Miss Manners or
relationship columnist Carolyn Hax? Should the government try to take Dr. Phil
off of television or Dr. Laura off the radio? Shall it become illegal for
experts to offer advice on gardening, car care, cooking or interior decorating?
There’s a special
term used when a governmental body tries to regulate what appears in the press.
It’s called “prior restraint” and it’s generally frowned upon.
As a student
journalist at Morehead State University, I had my own run-in with an attempt at
prior restraint. Late in my scholastic career, a local option election was held
in Morehead. Rowan County had been dry since Prohibition, and a student leader
sought to change that. The requisite petition was filed and the wet-dry vote
was scheduled.
The board governing
student publications, made up mostly of faculty members and administrators,
issued an edict that the student newspaper’s editorial page was forbidden to offer
an opinion in favor of or against the wet-dry vote. Given that MSU is a state
school, a number of student journalists felt the publications board was
overstepping its bounds by imposing an agency-mandated restraint on the
newspaper. I joined some of my fellow journalism students in writing to
Kentucky’s attorney general, asking if the board’s action was legal. The
resulting attorney general’s opinion ruled that the board’s edict was an act of
prior restraint by a government agency, and thus illegal.
The attempted
censorship of Rosemond was done after someone complained to the Kentucky Board
of Examiners of Psychology about one of his columns, in which he recommended
that parents take away a teenager’s electronic devices and employ other
disciplinary actions to deal with the child’s unruliness and bad grades. One
component of the complaint was that Rosemond is licensed in North Carolina but
not in Kentucky, and because of that his column should not be published in the
Bluegrass State.
One big issue here
is that Rosemond takes a more traditional view of parenting than a lot of
new-age thinkers. He actually believes in discipline. He doesn’t think children
should be spoiled or coddled. And that’s bound to upset those on the left who
tend to populate the social science fields in governmental agencies. What could
possibly be “unprofessional and unethical” about someone advising parents to
ground their children if they misbehave or do poorly in school? Where I come
from, that’s called “common sense” and “responsible parenting.”
This seems to be a
classic case of someone trying to shut down the messenger because they don’t
like the message. But fortunately for the concept of a free exchange of ideas
in America, the government doesn’t get to decide who can say something and what
they can say.
State officials say
they are considering appealing Van Tatenhove’s ruling. The state psychology
board was represented by Attorney General Jack Conway’s office in their
attempted censorship of Rosemond and the Herald-Leader. The psychology board
and Conway would be wise to take the spanking they got in court and move on.
The First Amendment is not on their side.
