Americans have a long tradition of anonymous political discourse. The Publius essays were collected in a volume for debate in state legislatures considering ratification of the Constitution and are today called The Federalist Papers . There is nothing unsavory with anonymous political speech, contrary to what defenders of incumbency in the Washington, D.C. beltway would have Americans believe. Even after the Constitution was adopted and our political freedoms had been secured, many of the Founding Fathers continued to author anonymous political tracts. By way of contrast, the Communist Chinese government is very much in favor of disclosure of political opinion authorship.
Dictators know that disclosure is the first step to abolition of open political discussion.
Disclosure, like gun registration, is the first step toward abolition because conceding to government the power to impose some restrictions on political speech concedes the principle of government dominion over political speech. Once a regime has the power to impose a light burden on speech or the press, in principle it has the power to impose a heavy or even a prohibitive burden. The legislation itself doesn t go nearly as far as that, though it does take a step in principle toward the position of the Chinese Communist Party. It is highly probable that federal regulation of personal web pages will not immediately commence upon enactment into law of one of these bills. The First Amendment, America s premier political reform, was not written for pornographers and flag burners.