Source: http://www.techlawjournal.com/courts/kathleenr/19991104.htm
Timestamp: 2019-04-20 13:00:52+00:00

Document:
Document: Amicus brief of California cities and counties in Kathleen R. v. Livermore, 11/4/99.
Amicus Curiae Brief of California counties and cities.
Date Filed: November 4, 1999.
• Michael Traynor and Matthew Brown of the law firm of Cooley Godward kindly provided the word processor version.
• The Table of Authorities and Appendices have been omitted.
2. Plaintiff Has No Right To Protection From Harmful Materials On The Internet Transmitted By Third Parties.
The California State Association of Counties (CSAC), 48 California cities, the Palos Verdes Library District, and the Lodi Public Library Board of Trustees join this brief as amici curiae because the case before the court has important implications for government entities’ discretion in formulating policies governing access to information on the Internet. Plaintiff is attempting to hold the City of Livermore liable for alleged psychological and emotional harm to her son resulting from his accessing and downloading material from the Internet at the city’s public library.
CSAC is a non-profit corporation, the membership of which consists of the 58 California counties. CSAC sponsors a Litigation Coordination Program, which is administered by the County Counsels’ Association of California and is overseen by the Association’s Litigation Overview Committee, comprised of county counsels throughout the state. The Litigation Overview Committee monitors litigation of concern to counties statewide and has determined that this case involves issues affecting all counties.
The California cities joining the brief include: Albany, Benicia, Berkeley, Capitola, Carlsbad, Corcoran, Delano, Dinuba, Glendale, Gustine, Hollister, Huron, Lathrop, Lompoc, Los Gatos, Merced, Modesto, Monterey, Monterey Park, Moreno Valley, Mountain View, Oceanside, Orange Cove, Palm Desert, Palm Springs, Pico Rivera, Pleasant Hill, Pleasanton, Redlands, Rialto, San Bernardino, San Bruno, San Buenaventura, San Diego, San Francisco, San Luis Obispo, San Mateo, San Pablo, San Rafael, Santa Clara, Santa Cruz, Santa Monica, Santa Paula, Sunnyvale, Tiburon, Tracy, Walnut, and Wasco.
The Palos Verdes Library District is the second largest independent library district in California. Its three branch libraries serve 71,000 people residing in the cities of Rancho Palos Verdes, Palos Verdes Estates, Rolling Hills, and Rolling Hills Estates, and a portion of unincorporated Los Angeles County called Eastview. It is an independent district, not governed or controlled by a particular city or county. The District has an annual budget exceeding $3 million. It maintains over 283,000 items and 15 computer terminals with public access to the Internet. The District’s Board of Trustees has adopted an Internet use policy that provides unrestricted use of the libraries’ Internet connections for all adults and any minor with parental permission.
The Lodi Public Library serves approximately 80,000 people. The Library’s Board of Trustees is comprised of five members who establish rules, regulations and policies governing the Library’s operation. The Board is also a liaison between the community and the library and local governmental authorities. The Library’s annual budget exceeds $1 million. It maintains over 150,000 items and four computer terminals with public access to the Internet. The Board has an Internet use policy in place that is essentially the same as that of the Palos Verdes Library District.
Amici make two arguments in support of the judgment dismissing plaintiff’s claims. First, under 47 U.S.C. section 230, part of the federal Communications Decency Act, a government entity is immune from state-law liability arising from exposure to allegedly offensive third-party material on the Internet, where the government entity follows a constitutionally sound policy regarding use of the Internet services it provides. Second, plaintiff does not state a claim under the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. section 1983, in alleging that her son was harmed by material he accessed using the Internet at a municipal library.
The judgment implements the important principle that government entities be allowed to exercise discretion in setting policies governing access to information on the Internet based on local values expressed through democratic processes. A government entity cannot be enjoined or otherwise held liable for emotional or psychological harm to an individual caused by exposure to third-party content on the Internet, regardless of the particular Internet policy the government entity chooses to follow. Allowing injunction actions like this one to go forward would enable individuals to disrupt the democratic policy-setting process with civil litigation and would authorize courts to substitute their judgment for that of legislative and executive policymakers.
I. PLAINTIFF'S STATE-LAW CLAIMS ARE PREEMPTED BY SECTION 230 OF THE FEDERAL COMMMUNICATIONS DECENCY ACT, 47 U.S.C. SECTION 230.
Plaintiff’s state-law claims are preempted by section 230. Under the Supremacy Clause of the United States Constitution (U.S. Const., art. VI, cl. 2 [“the Laws of the United States . . . shall be the supreme Law of the Land”]) and the corollary clause in the Constitution of California (Cal. Const., art. III, § 1 [“the United States Constitution is the supreme law of the land”]), section 230 invalidates any conflicting state law within the section’s scope. Plaintiff’s state-law theories of liability are based on Livermore’s provision of Internet access and seek to treat the city as a publisher or speaker of third-party content, so the claims fall within the scope of section 230. Because plaintiff’s attempt to impose liability on this basis conflicts with the immunity Congress granted to providers of Internet services in section 230 and the purposes of that statute, her claims are preempted.
A. Plaintiff’s State-Law Claims Are Expressly Preempted Because They Conflict With The Language, Structure, And Purposes Of Section 230.
Plaintiff’s state-law causes of action are expressly preempted by the plain language of section 230 because Livermore is the “provider . . . of an interactive computer service,” the suit concerns “information provided by another information content provider,” and plaintiff’s claims seek to “treat [Livermore] as the publisher or speaker” of this third-party information. (See 47 U.S.C. § 230(c)(1).) The immunity provided by section 230’s plain language is reinforced by the statute’s structure and underlying purposes.
1. The Plain Language Of Section 230 Provides Livermore Immunity.
The statute defines “interactive computer service” to mean “any information service, system, or access software provider that provides or enables computer access by multiple users to a computer server, including specifically a service or system that provides access to the Internet and such systems operated or services offered by libraries or educational institutions.” (Id., § 230(f)(2) [emphasis added].) By the statute’s terms, the immunity provided by section 230(c)(1) applies broadly to any provider of Internet access, including any government entity. Libraries are expressly included within the definition. By providing access to the Internet using computers located at its library, Livermore falls squarely within the defined category of “interactive computer service” immunized from liability under subsection (c)(1).
The statute defines “information content provider” as “any person or entity that is responsible, in whole or in part, for the creation or development of information provided through the Internet or any other interactive computer service.” (Id., § 230(f)(3).) There has never been any allegation that Livermore created or developed the content at issue in this case. To the contrary, plaintiff’s complaint states that library “users can request text, images, and other computerized information from computers in other locations . . . .” (JA at p. 0002 [emphasis added].) The library’s policy also explains that “[t]he Internet allows users to connect to networks of resources outside the library” and that the library “does not monitor and has no control over the information accessed through the Internet.” (Id. at p. 0065.) The allegedly harmful material that Brandon P. accessed and downloaded originated with a third party, and is therefore the type of content for which section 230 immunizes Internet service providers such as the library.
c. Plaintiff’s Claims Seek To Treat Livermore As The “Publisher Or Speaker” Of The Information Transmitted By A Third Party.
By its plain language, [section] 230 creates a federal immunity to any cause of action that would make service providers liable for information originating with a third-party user of the service.
[Congress] made the legislative judgment to effectively immunize providers of interactive computer services from civil liability in tort with respect to material disseminated by them but created by others. In recognition of the speed with which information may be disseminated and the near impossibility of regulating information content, Congress decided not to treat providers of interactive computer services like other information providers such as newspapers, magazines or television and radio stations, all of which may be held liable for publishing or distributing obscene or defamatory material written or prepared by others. While Congress could have made a different policy choice, it opted not to hold interactive computer services liable for their failure to edit, withhold or restrict access to offensive material disseminated through their medium.
(992 F.Supp. at pp. 49, 53 [holding that “the statutory language is clear” and that section 230 preempted an action against AOL for providing a defamatory gossip column on its service, even if AOL did not “do anything whatsoever to edit, verify, or even read” the content].) As the courts examining section 230 have made clear, providers of Internet service such as Livermore have immunity from state-law liability, regardless of notice, in claims arising from content transmitted by third parties.
2. Livermore’s Immunity Is Reinforced By The Structure And Purposes Of Section 230.
Section 230 is structured to immunize service providers from two types of claims: those alleging inadequate affirmative attempts to block, screen, or edit offensive third-party content, and those alleging failure to take any action with respect to offensive content. Congress intended service providers such as Livermore to be immune under the bright-line rule of subsection (c)(1), even when they have notice of the allegedly offensive nature of the third-party content and do not attempt to block, screen, or edit the material.
This statutory structure in part reflects Congress’s response to the courts’ prior treatment of cases dealing with the responsibility and liability of intermediaries that provide access to third-party material on the Internet. One of section 230’s purposes was to overrule Stratton Oakmont, Inc. v. Prodigy Services Co. (N.Y. Sup. Ct. May 24, 1995) No. 31063/94, 1995 WL 323710, motion for renewal den. 1995 WL 805178 (Dec. 11, 1995). (H.R. Conf. Rep. No. 104-458, p. 4 (1996), reprinted in 1996 U.S. Code Cong. & Admin. News, at pp. 207-208; Zeran, supra, 129 F.3d at p. 331; Blumenthal, supra, 992 F.Supp. at p. 52, fn. 13.) The Stratton Oakmont court held Prodigy, a provider of Internet service, liable for a defamatory message posted on an electronic bulletin board by a third party. The court reasoned that because Prodigy actively screened messages to exclude content it deemed inappropriate for family audiences, it should be held to the same standard of liability as a traditional publisher. (1995 WL 323710, supra, at pp. *3-*5.) Congress eliminated such disincentives to “Good Samaritan” actions. (H.R. Conf. Rep. No. 104-458, supra, at p. 4; accord Zeran, supra, 129 F.3d at p. 331.) Section 230(c)(2) thus grants immunity from liability for specific affirmative acts.
Holding government entities liable for providing access to Internet content originating with third parties would also conflict with the express Congressional objective of “preserv[ing] the vibrant and competitive free market . . . for the Internet and other interactive computer services, unfettered by Federal or State regulation.” (47 U.S.C. § 230(b)(2).) In its statutory findings, Congress recognized that “[t]he Internet and other interactive computer services offer a forum for a true diversity of political discourse, unique opportunities for cultural development, and myriad avenues for intellectual activity.” (Id., § 230(a)(3).) The rule of immunity for third-party content enhances the interests of free speech and vibrant discourse, which would be chilled by the threat of litigation.
Consider a situation in which, much like here, an offended public library patron informs library officials of the purportedly false and defamatory nature of information which the library distributes but does not itself publish. Subsequently the patron attempts to hold the library liable in tort for continuing to provide the information.
[T]he potential for use of that tactic to turn financially vulnerable distributors into censors, combined with the ability of the publisher to answer for any actionable defamation, argues strongly for a complete distributors’ immunity from suit.
In the absence of the bright-line immunity rule of section 230, given the staggering volume of content that traverses the Internet and online services each day and the inevitable stream of complaints that some particular content was tortious, service providers would have little choice but to censor on demand or face potential liability.
(Carome & Jain, Immunity from Tort Liability for Online Services: Why the Decision in Zeran v. America Online is Good Public Policy (1998) 2 Cyberspace Law. 13, 14.) Placing local policymakers or library officials in the position of censoring on demand for fear of civil liability would fundamentally conflict with the federal objective set forth in section 230(b)(2).
The purpose of this statutory immunity is not difficult to discern. Congress recognized the threat that tort-based lawsuits pose to freedom of speech in the new and burgeoning Internet medium. . . . None of this means, of course, that the original culpable party who posts [harmful material] would escape accountability. . . . Congress made a policy choice, however, not to deter harmful online speech through the separate route of imposing tort liability on [Internet service providers] that serve as intermediaries for other parties’ potentially injurious messages.
B. Plaintiff’s Arguments That Livermore Is Not Immune Under Section 230 Are Meritless.
Although plaintiff concedes section 230’s “broad protection for online service providers” (see OBat p. 5), she contends that (1) the case of Mainstream Loudoun v. Board of Trustees (E.D. Va. 1998) 2 F.Supp.2d 783, “rejected library immunity,” (2) Livermore’s activities in this civil case fall under the statutory section disallowing immunity for behavior that is criminal, and (3) this case is somehow about “public exhibitor” liability, from which section 230 purportedly offers no immunity (see OB at pp. 5-8.) Each contention is meritless.
The Loudoun case does not support the notion that public libraries lack immunity under section 230 or that section 230 does not apply to plaintiff’s action for injunctive and declaratory relief. Loudoun involved different issues and is completely consistent with statutory immunity in situations where, as here, a city has adopted a constitutionally sound policy relating to Internet access.
Second, the court rejected the library board’s section 230 defense on grounds wholly inapplicable here. The essence of its holding is that section 230 cannot preempt or supersede the First Amendment or the injunctive remedies required to protect First Amendment rights. Thus, it is unsurprising that the court wrote that section 230 cannot “insulate government regulation of Internet speech from judicial review.” (2 F.Supp.2d at p. 790.) It was in this constitutional context that the court distinguished the immunity sought by the library board from “the ‘tort-based’ immunity to ‘civil liability’ described by [section] 230.” (See ibid. [citing Zeran, supra, 129 F.3d at p. 330].) Neither the holding of Loudoun nor any other principle precludes a government entity from immunity under section 230 when such immunity is consistent with the First Amendment.
Not only do constitutionally sound Internet access policies fall within the broad Congressional grant of immunity afforded by section 230(c), but plaintiff’s state causes of action do not fall within any of the narrow exceptions to that immunity found in subsection (e). For example, this case does not involve an expansion or limitation of rights and obligations under intellectual property or communications privacy law, and therefore the related statutory exceptions are not implicated.
[t]he gravamen of this suit is that the defendant library [sic] is knowingly soliciting, aiding the transmission of, and providing obscene and harmful images, transmitted from both within the state and from without the state, to minors.
[section] 230 is intended to have no effect on state laws consistent with section 230, it is clear that Congress did not intend to abolish federal or state actions and statutes which prohibited obscenity and lewdness. Thus, the state-law causes of actions [sic] in the complaint are entirely consistent with Congress’ exemptions.
Plaintiff’s reasoning is a transparent attempt to overcome the fact that section 230(e)(1) creates an exception only for federal criminal statutes, not state civil causes of action. Section 230(e)(3) cannot reasonably be read to mean that merely alleging facts involving obscenity in some way will turn a state civil cause of action into one falling outside section 230’s preemptive scope. At best, under plaintiff’s tortured statutory analysis (with which amici do not agree), only state criminal statutes prohibiting obscenity in a manner identical to a federal statute would be unaffected (assuming they are not themselves otherwise preempted). Plaintiff should not be allowed to make an end run around section 230’s broad grant of immunity by crafting strained causes of action or by framing civil actions as criminal. Courts must look behind the form of pleadings to determine the true thrust of the allegations, disallowing plaintiffs to evade legal principles that would prevent their success. (See Hustler Magazine v. Falwell (1988) 485 U.S. 46 [99 L.Ed.2d 41, 108 S.Ct. 876] [applying defamation law analysis to claim for intentional infliction of emotional distress]; Zeran, supra, 129 F.3d 327 [applying defamation law analysis to claim for negligence].) Here plaintiff has alleged what is essentially a tort claim, alleging that the City’s actions (adopting and implementing the Internet policy) caused harm to her son. Section 230 provides immunity from such tort-based liability under state law.
Amici are not committed to any such proposition. There may very well be liability imposed on an intervening library patron who, beyond merely “using” the Internet, takes active steps to locate obscene material and actively lures a minor into viewing it. An individual may be criminally or civilly liable for bringing children to his home and showing them pornographic images. However, these scenarios are far different from one in which, as here, a government entity enacts a policy simply allowing library users to access the Internet.  The government entity falls squarely within the terms of immunity, whereas plaintiff’s hypothetical individual does not, because the government is merely a passive intermediary – one of the very roles Congress intended to protect by passing section 230.
C. Holding The State-Law Claims To Be Preempted By Section 230’s Immunity Provisions Also Harmonizes With Related Constitutional Principles.
1. Immunity Harmonizes With The Separation of Powers Doctrine.
City library boards derive their authority to set library policy from state statute. The state legislature has delegated its authority to set legislative policy for municipal libraries to boards of library trustees, which must be appointed by each city’s executive branch with the consent of the city’s legislative body. (Ed. Code, § 18910.) “The board of library trustees may make and enforce all rules, regulations, and bylaws necessary for the administration, government, and protection of the libraries under its management, and all property belonging thereto.” (Id., § 18919.) The Livermore library board and amicus Lodi Public Library Board of Trustees adopted their Internet policies pursuant to this discretionary authority.
Likewise, the Legislature has statutorily provided for the formation of independent library districts. (See id., §§ 19600-19614.) A district’s board of trustees, appointed by municipal supervisors, is given broad discretion to set policy. (See, e.g., id., §§ 19611, 19645, 19652.) The Board of Library Trustees of amicus Palos Verdes Library District adopted its Internet use policy pursuant to this delegation of legislative power.
In keeping with this democratic structure, local legislative action is the appropriate vehicle for setting library Internet policies. Local citizens may exercise their rights to petition and to vote in order to influence local policy according to their values. Courts are constitutionally ill-positioned, and pragmatically ill-equipped, to make policy judgments about how much or how little Internet access or filtering is appropriate in municipal libraries across the state.
(City & County of San Francisco, supra, 13 Cal.3d at p. 915, fn. 7 [quoting Nickerson v. San Bernardino County (1918) 179 Cal. 518, 522-523 [177 P. 465]].) The choice among competing policy considerations in enacting laws is a legislative function. (County of Mendocino, supra, 13 Cal.4th at p. 53.) Failing to stop tort claims from moving beyond an early dismissal in the trial courts would enable individuals, via litigation and the threat of litigation, to shape the Internet content mix accessible to all library users, outside the deliberative and representative democratic process.
2. Immunity Harmonizes With First Amendment Principles.
Holding Livermore immune from liability arising from its Internet access policy also harmonizes with First Amendment principles. Government entities have discretion, subject to the First Amendment, to fashion a variety of policies affecting access to information on the Internet. The Livermore library board exercised its discretion by adopting a policy affording unrestricted access to all users of the Livermore Public Library. (JA at p. 0065.) This particular policy involves no governmental regulation of Internet speech and hence harmonizes with the First Amendment, which is only implicated if a government regulates speech.
Public policy considerations militate against requiring Livermore, by mandatory injunctive order, to embark on a policy of restricting access to Internet information. The superior court would find itself in the position of compelling a public library to abandon a policy clearly consistent with the First Amendment and to replace it with a policy subject to challenge as an imposition of government regulation on Internet speech, all subject to strict-scrutiny review in the appellate courts.
II. Plaintiff Failed To State A Claim Under The Federal Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. Section 1983.
Plaintiff’s allegations, however, do not implicate any right protected by substantive due process and, even if such a right were established, the City has not acted unconstitutionally. Despite plaintiff’s assertion that her son’s liberty interest is “fundamental,” which would subject Livermore’s actions to strict scrutiny under substantive due process doctrine, the Supreme Court has never recognized such a fundamental right. Brandon P. has no right, much less a fundamental one. The circumstances here are not even closely comparable to the limited circumstances in which government entities have an affirmative constitutional duty to protect individuals from third-party harm. Moreover, the library board acted not unconstitutionally but reasonably in providing Internet access for its patrons in pursuit of legitimate educational and civic goals. Even if plaintiff’s cause of action could survive these fatal flaws, her claim is further vitiated by the absence of facts showing that Livermore’s Internet policy or related customs proximately caused Brandon P.’s alleged harm.
A. The Facts Alleged Do Not Implicate Any Right That Is Constitutionally Protected Under Substantive Due Process Doctrine.
1. This Case Does Not Involve A Fundamental Right That Would Trigger Strict Scrutiny.
Plaintiff invokes her son’s purported “liberty interest of personal security and freedom from infliction of pain,” characterizing it – without citing any authority – as a “fundamental right.” (See OB at p. 15.) On this basis, she urges strict-scrutiny review. (See OB at pp. 14-16.) Her bald assertion is untenable. There is no precedent for recognizing freedom from exposure to offensive speech to be a fundamental right under the Due Process Clause.
First, we have regularly observed that the Due Process Clause specially protects those fundamental rights and liberties which are, objectively, deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition . . . and implicit in the concept of ordered liberty, such that neither liberty nor justice would exist if they were sacrificed. . . . Second, we have required in substantive-due-process cases a careful description of the asserted fundamental liberty interest.
The Court identified the fundamental rights it has recognized, and the rights to “personal security and freedom from restraint and infliction of pain” or to protection from offensive speech were not among them.
The [Due Process] Clause  provides heightened protection against government interference with certain fundamental rights and liberty interests. In a long line of cases, we have held that, in addition to the specific freedoms protected by the Bill of Rights, the “liberty” specially protected by the Due Process Clause includes the rights to marry, to have children, to direct the education and upbringing of one’s children,[ ] to marital privacy, to use contraception, to bodily integrity, and to abortion.
By extending constitutional protection to an asserted right or liberty interest, [courts], to a great extent, place the matter outside the arena of public debate and legislative action. [Courts] must therefore exercise the utmost care whenever [they] are asked to break new ground in this field, lest the liberty protected by the Due Process Clause be subtly transformed into the policy preferences of the [courts].
Because no fundamental right is implicated here, Livermore’s actions “need only have a rational basis to be upheld against a substantive due process attack.” (Kim v. United States (9th Cir. 1997) 121 F.3d 1269, 1273.) Amici argue in section II.B, infra, that Livermore has acted rationally. However, the court need not even reach the question of rationality in this case unless it first finds a protected interest. In the following section, amici demonstrate that plaintiff cannot establish even a non-fundamental right to protection from third-party speech encountered on the Internet.
nothing in the language of the Due Process Clause itself requires the State to protect the life, liberty, and property of its citizens against invasion by private actors. The Clause is phrased as a limitation on the State’s power to act, not as a guarantee of certain minimal levels of safety and security. . . . [I]ts language cannot fairly be extended to impose an affirmative obligation on the State to ensure that those interests do not come to harm through other means. . . . [It] was intended to prevent government ‘from abusing [its] power, or employing it as an instrument of oppression,’ [citations]. Its purpose was to protect the people from the State, not to ensure that the State protected them from each other. The Framers were content to leave the extent of governmental obligation in the latter area to the democratic political process.
The Court in DeShaney explained that only “in certain limited circumstances [does] the Constitution imposes upon the State affirmative duties of care and protection with respect to particular individuals.” The Court wrote that “when the State takes a person into its custody and holds him there against his will, the Constitution imposes upon it a corresponding duty to assume some responsibility for his safety and general well-being.” (Id. at pp. 199-200.) This is sometimes referred to as the “special relationship” exception. (See L.W. v. Grubbs (9th Cir. 1992) 974 F.2d 119, 121, cert. den. (1993) 508 U.S. 951 [124 L.Ed.2d 660, 113 S.Ct. 2442].) Some courts have also allowed section 1983 liability on substantive due process grounds when a government entity places the plaintiff in physical danger and fails to fulfill the resulting constitutional duty to protect the plaintiff from that danger, an exception known as the “danger creation” exception. A government entity’s provision of Internet services is not one of the limited circumstances that falls under these exceptions.
Similarly, Livermore did not incur any danger-created duty by virtue of making the Internet accessible and encouraging library patrons to use it because the alleged danger does not rise to the level of constitutional deprivation. The emotional and psychological harm alleged by plaintiff in this case is plainly distinguishable from the physical harm at issue in Wood and other “danger creation” cases.
The unspecified psychological and emotional harm Kathleen R. alleges is not of the same magnitude or physical nature as the harm suffered by the plaintiffs in these danger-creation cases. In a telling Ninth Circuit case subsequent to Wood and Grubbs, the court summarized the rationale for the “danger creation” exception: the government’s duty to protect an individual from harm attaches “because the individual has been placed in a dependent and helpless position . . . .” (United States v. Koon (9th Cir. 1994) 34 F.3d 1416, 1447 [emphasis added] [police officers inflicted physical injuries on plaintiff during arrest] revd. in part on other grounds (1996) 518 U.S. 81 [135 L.Ed.2d 392, 116 S.Ct. 2035]; see also Garcia v. Superior Court (1990) 50 Cal.3d 728, 740-741 [268 Cal.Rptr. 779, 789 P.2d 960] [distinguishing Wood from DeShaney because in Wood, “defendant physically limited the plaintiff’s ability to act on her own behalf” and “left her in a much worse position than before”].) Brandon P.’s alleged emotional and psychological injuries are, by definition, not physical. They did not arise from his being placed in a dependent or helpless position. Brandon P. voluntarily came to the library on 10 occasions to download sexual content from the Internet. (JA at p. 0003.) Plaintiff’s allegations are insufficient to create a duty on this theory.
Even if we accept as true that the County owned the bridge and knew the bridge was deteriorating but refused to provide any maintenance or repair, we must conclude that no constitutional violation occurred. Mere knowledge of danger to the individual does not create an affirmative duty to protect. [Citation.] Simply offering a location as a tourist attraction is not the type of affirmative governmental action that creates a duty to protect under DeShaney. Appellants allege no affirmative act on the part of government officials directly placing them on the bridge. Nor did the County appellees’ actions ‘create the danger’ causing the bridge to collapse. To the contrary, . . . the bridge cables broke because of internal corrosion caused by rust. . . . [N]either the County appellees’ actions nor inaction place these particular individuals in a position of danger. [Citations.] Instead, any action on the party of the County appellees was directed toward members of the general public. There simply was no constitutional deprivation under [section] 1983 in this case.
Because there is no identifiable substantive due process right implicated by Livermore’s alleged actions in this case, plaintiff fails to state a claim under the federal Civil Rights Act. However, as amici argue next, even if there were such a right, this claim cannot stand because the alleged facts do not support a finding that Livermore acted unconstitutionally.
B. The City Has Not Acted In An Unconstitutionally Arbitrary Manner.
Even assuming the existence of some substantive due process right – and, as amici have shown, there is no such right – the civil rights claim must fail. To establish a violation of substantive due process, “a plaintiff is ordinarily required to prove that a challenged government action was clearly arbitrary and unreasonable, having no substantial relation to the public health, safety, morals, or general welfare.” (Patel v. Penman (9th Cir. 1996) 103 F.3d 868, 874, cert. den., 520 U.S. 1240 [137 L.Ed.2d 1048, 117 S.Ct. 1845] [internal quotations marks omitted].) The Supreme Court has “emphasized time and again that ‘[t]he touchstone of due process is protection of the individual against arbitrary action of government[.]’” (County of Sacramento v. Lewis, supra, 118 S.Ct. at p. 1716 [quoting Wolff v. McDonnell (1974) 418 U.S. 539, 558 [41 L.Ed.2d 935, 94 S.Ct. 2963]].) Plaintiff has not shown that Livermore acted in an arbitrary or unreasonable manner in either its legislative or executive capacity.
1. The Library Board’s Internet Access Policy Is Reasonably Related To Legitimate Educational And Civic Goals.
[t]he Board of Trustees supports the idea that all members of the community have free and equal access to the entire range of library resources, regardless of content, approach, format or amount of detail. . . . Access to information . . . helps guarantee an informed citizenry.
to encourage the development of a lifelong interest in reading and learning by providing materials and services of popular interest, emphasizing and encouraging reading by children, supplementing the educational needs of the community and furnishing timely, accurate information.
Electronic information resources provide the library with an unprecedented opportunity to fulfill the library’s mission and to expand the scope of information available to Livermore citizens. Electronic databases and networks such as the Internet are supplementing and sometimes taking the place of the printed resources traditionally found in libraries. Electronic information research skills are increasingly important to students, workers and ordinary citizens.
Livermore’s policy is based on the important goals of education and citizen empowerment, and the policy is well-tailored to achieve those goals. Since the library board had legitimate reasons for adopting the policy, plaintiff is unable to overcome the presumption of the policy’s validity.
2. The City’s Executive Actions Do Not Shock The Conscience.
[L]iability for negligently inflicted harm is categorically beneath the threshold of constitutional due process. . . . [C]onduct intended to injure in some way unjustifiable by any government interest is the sort of official action most likely to rise to the conscience-shocking level.
Section 1983 was not designed to give parents a federal civil right to control how public libraries are run or how government entities choose to govern public access to the Internet. Indeed, in Collins, supra, the Supreme Court’s denial of the civil rights claim at issue “rest[ed] on the presumption that the administration of government programs is based on a rational decision making process that takes account of competing social, political, and economic forces” and that such policy choices “must be made by locally elected representatives, rather than by federal judges interpreting the basic charter of Government for the entire country.” (503 U.S. at pp. 128-129.) This court should abide by the same considerations here in affirming the dismissal of Kathleen R.’s claim.
C. Any Harm Brandon P. Suffered Was Not Proximately Caused By The City’s Policies Or Customs.
The Internet is a unique medium of worldwide human communication that is revolutionizing the way people share and receive information. Congress has addressed the issue of Internet service providers’ liability on a national level, providing through 47 U.S.C. section 230 immunity for material originating with third parties. Government entities cannot be held liable under state-law claims which, as here, fall within section 230’s preemptive scope. Neither can individuals interfere with local government policy regarding access to the Internet by repackaging state tort claims as federal civil rights claims. The Due Process Clause offers protection from egregiously arbitrary exercise of governmental power, not from local democratic policy choices with which individuals disagree. Because plaintiff’s state-law claims cannot trump conflicting federal law governing this matter, and her federal claim cannot trump local policymaking discretion, the judgment of dismissal below should be affirmed.
[*] For counsel’s addresses and phone numbers, see Appendix A, attached hereto.
 The abbreviation JA, used throughout this brief, refers to the Joint Appendix in Lieu of Transcript previously filed with this court by Appellant and Respondent.
 For economy of expression, amici refer generically to government entities throughout their argument. Cities, counties, independent library districts, library boards, and other public entities that provide access to the Internet all enjoy immunity under section 230.
 In 1997, the United States Supreme Court invalidated other sections of the CDA as unconstitutional. (See Reno v. ACLU (1997) 521 U.S. 844 [138 L.Ed.2d 874, 117 S.Ct. 2329] .) However, section 230 was not at issue in Reno and has been invoked as controlling authority in recent cases. (See Zeran v. America Online, Inc. (4th Cir. 1997) 129 F.3d 327, cert. den. (1998) ___ U.S. ___ [118 S.Ct. 2341, 141 L.Ed.2d 712]; Blumenthal v. Drudge (D.D.C. 1998) 992 F.Supp. 44; Doe v. America Online, Inc. (Fla. Ct. App. 1998) 718 So.2d 385, review granted (Fla. 1999) 729 So.2d 390.) A copy of the Doe opinion is included in the separately-bound Appendix of Authorities filed herewith.
 47 U.S.C. § 230(c)(1). A copy of section 230 is included in Appendix B, attached hereto.
 In amendments to section 230 passed in October 1998, Congress added a new subsection (d) and redesignated former subsections (d) and (e) as (e) and (f), respectively. (Pub.L. No. 105-277, Title XIV, § 1404(a), 112 Stat. 2681-739.) This brief cites to these statutory subsections in their current, amended form.
 The Stratton Oakmont case has since been overruled as a matter of state law. (See Lunney v. Prodigy Services Co. (N.Y. App. Div. 1998) 250 A.D.2d 230, 236-237 [explaining overruling as “being in complete harmony with the expanding body of case law,” including Zeran, supra, and Blumenthal, supra].) Copies of the Stratton Oakmont and Lunney opinions are included in the separately-bound Appendix of Authorities filed herewith.
 The abbreviation OB, used throughout this brief, refers to the Opening Brief of Appellant Kathleen R. previously filed with this court.
 As discussed in section I.A.2, supra, subdivision (c)(2) immunizes service providers when they attempt to block, screen, or edit offensive material, and subdivision (c)(1) immunizes service providers for offensive third-party material that the provider does not attempt to block, screen, or edit.
 Plaintiff’s treatment of Loudoun is such that a reader is scarcely able to divine the constitutional nature of the case. Presenting Loudoun in this relative vacuum allows plaintiff to make the misguided suggestion that the court held section 230 inapplicable to any case seeking declaratory or injunctive relief, as opposed to relief in the form of money damages. But section 230 provides immunity to tort-based civil liability regardless of the form of relief requested, and it defies common sense that courts would make it easier for plaintiffs to seek the more severe remedy of an injunction than to maintain a damages action. The only coherent reading of the Loudoun court’s holding is that section 230 was inapplicable there not because of the form of relief requested per se, but because the requested remedy was based on an alleged violation of the First Amendment.
 See 47 U.S.C. §§ 230(e)(1), (e)(4). In keeping with this statutory structure, Congress later dealt with the intellectual property exception by passing 17 U.S.C. section 512, which limited liability of passive intermediaries for copyright infringement in the online environment. Congress has not, however, passed any legislation in an attempt to hold cities liable for the transmission over the Internet of material originally provided by a third party.
 Even if plaintiff’s civil claims could be characterized in some way as criminal in nature, there is still no reason to allow plaintiff to exercise essentially public prosecutorial powers under the guise of civil pleading.
 For opinions examining the First Amendment implications of government regulation of the Internet, see, e.g., Reno v. ACLU (1997) 521 U.S. 844 (federal Communications Decency Act) ; ApolloMedia Corp. v. Reno (N.D. Cal. 1998) 19 F.Supp.2d 1081, affd. mem. (1999) 119 S.Ct. 1450 (same); ACLU v. Reno (E.D. Pa. 1999) 31 F.Supp.2d 473 (federal Child Online Protection Act); Mainstream Loudoun v. Board of Trustees (E.D. Va. 1998) 24 F.Supp.2d 552 (county library board’s Internet access policy); Mainstream Loudoun v. Board of Trustees (E.D. Va. 1998) 2 F.Supp.2d 783 (same).
 Ironically, while plaintiff complains that her son’s fundamental right was violated and notes “that parents have the constitutional right to direct the upbringing of their children” (OB at p. 16, fn. 1), it is the very abdication of parenting responsibility – which Livermore’s policy expressly addressed – that led to Brandon P.’s exposure to the material Kathleen R. finds so harmful.
 See, e.g., Grubbs, supra, 974 F.2d at p. 121. The validity of a broad “danger creation” exception is questionable in the wake of the Supreme Court’s opinion in DeShaney. Some courts have continued to develop the doctrine, the Ninth Circuit prominently among them. (See, e.g., Grubbs, supra, 974 F.2d 119; Wood, supra, 879 F.2d 583.) Other courts have declined to follow the doctrine, taking the position that it is inconsistent with DeShaney. (See, e.g., Foy v. City of Berea (6th Cir. 1995) 58 F.3d 227, 230-232 [following DeShaney in finding there to be no affirmative duty of care and protection in the absence of custodial restraint]; Was v. Young (E.D. Mich. 1992) 796 F.Supp. 1041, 1050 fn. 5 [declining to follow Wood in light of DeShaney]; see also Wood, supra, 879 F.2d at pp. 599-600 [Carroll, J., dissenting] [arguing that the majority’s danger creation holding extends substantive due process rights beyond the limits set by DeShaney ].) Because plaintiff appears to argue for a danger-created duty in her opening brief (see OB at p. 19), amici will demonstrate why the facts of this case do not fit within the exception as it has been defined by the case law. In so doing, amici do not mean to suggest that such an exception is sound law or policy after DeShaney.
 The requirement of direct affirmative conduct overlaps conceptually with the requirement in all section 1983 cases of proximate causation. Plaintiff’s inability to make a showing of proximate cause is fatal to her claim. Amici address causation here in the danger-creation context, but also address the issue more generally in section II.C, infra. The causation requirements set forth in section II.C apply equally to all civil rights claims, whether based on a danger-creation theory or any other theory.
 Amici assume, arguendo, that plaintiff has alleged facts sufficient to establish a policy or custom.
 See also the discussion of causation in the danger-created-duty context, supra, section II.A.2.

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