Source: https://www.floridabar.org/news/tfb-journal/?durl=/DIVCOM%2FJN%2FJNJournal01.nsf%2F8c9f13012b96736985256aa900624829%2F7475e86cae2deb3b85257a61005129df%21OpenDocument
Timestamp: 2018-01-19 04:02:45
Document Index: 85929326

Matched Legal Cases: ['§24', '§286', '§119', '§119', '§119', '§119', '§286', '§286', '§24', '§24', '§24', '§24', '§3', '§3']

Florida Bar Journal – Walking on Sunshine Laws: How Florida’s Free Press History in the U.S. Supreme Court Undermines Open Government – The Florida Bar
by Joseph T. Eagleton
“Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost.” — Thomas Jefferson1
Only 15 percent of people around the globe live in a nation that embraces freedom of the press, meaning that the vast majority of the world has its news filtered, stifled, tainted, propagandized, or controlled entirely.7 The Arab Spring 8 (as the pro-democracy protests in the Middle East and Northern Africa that erupted during 2011 and toppled governments in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya, have come to be known)is a stark and powerful reminder of what can happen when a country’s citizens are silenced and repressed by secretive and authoritarian government regimes. While these protests have yet to translate officially into greater press freedom in a region dominated by state-sponsored media,9 there is little doubt that freedom of the press is one of the key reforms at the heart of these protests — and for good reason.
In 1967, the Florida Legislature passed the “Government-in-the-Sunshine” law, which reaffirmed the principles of the 1909 Public Records Law and became the nation’s first open meetings law.26 The Sunshine Law is well known to most Floridians, perhaps as a result of its uniquely apropos name, and it remains a benchmark for other states’ open government laws. The law, now codified in F.S. Ch. 286,27 provides that all board and commission meetings at which official acts are undertaken must be publicly open, that reasonable notice of all such meetings must be given, and that minutes of the meetings must be promptly recorded and made available for public inspection.28 The Florida Supreme Court has broadly interpreted the Sunshine Law’s open meetings provision to apply to any gathering of a covered entity — which the court has said includes every board or commission over which the legislature has “dominion or control”29 — “where the members deal with some matter on which foreseeable action will be taken by the board.”30 The Sunshine Law ensures that formal government business is conducted in the open and — coupled with the Public Records Law’s mandate that all official government communications be subject to inspection — ensures that Florida’s state government is accountable to its citizens.31
• Miami Herald Publishing Company v. Tornillo — Florida and freedom of the press came into conflict again in the 1974 U.S. Supreme Court case of Miami Herald Publishing Company v. Tornillo, 418 U.S. 241 (1974). Pat Tornillo, a well-known and controversial south Florida teachers’ union leader, was a candidate for state house in an October 1972 run-off election.69 The Miami Herald, not a fan of Tornillo’s, published two editorials critical of Tornillo and his bid for public office.70 Pursuant to a Florida “right of reply” statute then in existence,71 Tornillo requested, as the law provided, equivalent space in the paper to respond to the Herald’s disparaging commentary.72 The paper refused, and Tornillo brought suit for declaratory and injunctive relief, as well as damages of more than $5,000.73 The circuit court, agreeing with the argument brought forth by the paper, found the statute an unconstitutional violation of freedom of the press.74 The Florida Supreme Court, exercising its mandatory jurisdiction over cases when a lower court declares a statute invalid,75 reversed, stating that the “right of reply” statute furthered, rather than restricted, free speech and public access to information.76
B.J.F. was the victim of a violent robbery and sexual assault in Duval County.85 The county sheriff’s department formulated a report of the crime based on the information B.J.F. provided and placed the report in the pressroom at the department’s office, which meant that the report’s contents, including B.J.F.’s full name, were available for public viewing.86 An employee of The Florida Star, a weekly Jacksonville paper with a circulation of about 18,000 at the time, copied the information contained in B.J.F.’s police report, and the newspaper printed a one-paragraph article about the crime in its regular “Police Reports” section.87 Publishing B.J.F.’s full name broke both the Star’s internal policy and the Florida law banning the disclosure of a sexual assault victim’s identifying information.88 As a result of her name’s publication, B.J.F. and her family suffered emotional trauma, intimidation, and significant changes in their daily lives.89
Speaking for a five-person majority, Justice Marshall explained that, while the First Amendment perhaps does not bar punishment for all truthful publications when privacy rights or national security concerns are implicated,95 it does prohibit a state from holding the press liable for publishing information lawfully obtained96 and publicly available.97 Justice Marshall further pointed out that The Florida Star’s article was related to a matter of great public importance — a violent crime — and that the Florida Legislature’s interests in protecting sexual abuse victims, although meaningful, could not justify the imposition of a fine on a newspaper’s accurate reporting of publicly available and socially material information.98 Therefore, the Court held that Florida’s statute could not be used, consistent with the First Amendment, to impose liability on the press in this instance.99
1	Letter from Thomas Jefferson to James Currie (Jan. 28, 1786), available at http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/jefferson/images/vc115.jpg.
2	U.S. Const. amend. I (“Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press . . . .”).
3	See, e.g., Frank Ahrens, The Accelerating Decline of Newspapers, Wash. Post, Oct. 27, 2009, available at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2009/10/26/AR2009102603272.html.
4	See generally Robert D. Richards & Clay Calvert, Suing the News Media in the Age of Tabloid Journalism: L. Lin Wood and the Battle for Accountability, 16 Fordham Intell. Prop. Media & Ent. L.J. 467 (2006).
5	See generally Ted Koppel, Editorial, Olbermann, O’Reilly, and the Death of Real News, Wash. Post, Nov. 14, 2010, available at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/ 11/12/AR2010111202857.html.
6	This is not meant to suggest that journalism was necessarily better when network news and paper newspapers dominated information flow. Indeed, easier access to news, more varied sources, and immediate commentary — all of which are a product of current technology and the social media revolution — are powerful weapons for journalists, bloggers, and citizens alike. But it is the very ease and fluidity with which news is now disseminated and consumed that produces a culture in which the availability of that news itself is often taken for granted.
7	Karin Deutsch Karlekar, Press Freedom in 2010: Signs of Change Amid Repression, Freedom House, available at http://www.freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-press/freedom-press-2011.
8	See Anthony Shadid, Post-Uprising, a New Battle, N.Y. Times, Nov. 26, 2011, available at http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/27/world/middleeast/arab-world-struggles-to-shape-new-order.html.
9	See Daoud Kuttab, The Arab Spring Has Yet to Focus on Media Freedoms, Huffington Post, Dec. 8, 2011, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/daoud-kuttab/the-arab-spring-has-yett_b_1135842.html.
10	See American Newspaper Association Foundation, Speaking of a Free Press 13 (2005), available at http://nie.miamiherald.com/_pdf/Speaking_of_a_Free_Press.pdf.
11	See Robert Aziz, Why Power Corrupts and Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely, Huffington Post, Aug. 7, 2011, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-robert-aziz/why-power-corrupts-and-ab_b_920638.html.
12	Fla. Const. art. I, §24.
13	See Florida Supreme Court, Press Information, http://www.floridasupremecourt.org/pub_info/press.shtml.
14	Fla. Stat. §§286.001–286.0115 (2011).
15	Of course, the state’s actual degree of governmental openness in practice is subject to some interpretation. See, e.g., Editorial, Scott’s Transparency Problem, Miami Herald, Oct. 9, 2011, available at http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/10/09/2443947/scotts-transparency-problem.html.
16	See Florida Star v. B.J.F., 491 U.S. 524 (1989).
17	See Pennekamp v. Florida, 328 U.S. 331 (1946).
18	See Miami Herald Publ’g Co. v. Tornillo, 418 U.S. 241 (1974).
19	See First Amendment Foundation, Sunshine Manual 13 (2011), available at http://myfloridalegal.com/webfiles.nsf/WF/KGRG-8D2MLA/$file/2011-SunshineManual.pdf (“The comprehensive breadth and scope of our open government laws have served for many years as a model for the rest of the nation.”).
20	Florida Attorney General, Open Government, http://www.myflsunshine.com/.
21	See Florida Attorney General, The “Sunshine” Law, http://myfloridalegal.com/pages.nsf/Main/DC0B20B7DC22B7418525791B006A54E4.
22	See Fla. Stat. §119.01(1) (2011).
23	See Fla. Stat. §§119.071–119.0713 (2011).
24	See Fla. Stat. §119.07(1)(a) (2011).
25	Fla. Stat. §119.011(12) (2011).
26	See USLegal, State Freedom of Information Acts, http://freedomofinformationacts.uslegal.com/state-freedom-of-information-acts/.
27	See Fla. Stat. §§286.001–286.0115 (2011).
28	Fla. Stat. §286.011(1)–(2) (2011).
29	City of Miami Beach v. Berns, 245 So. 2d 38, 40 (Fla. 1971).
30	Board of Pub. Instruction of Broward County v. Doran, 224 So. 2d 693, 698 (Fla. 1969).
31	See First Amendment Foundation, Sunshine Manual 13 (2011), available at http://myfloridalegal.com/webfiles.nsf/WF/KGRG-8D2MLA/$file/2011-SunshineManual.pdf (“For several decades now, Florida has shown that openness is the key to building and maintaining public trust in the institutions of government.”).
32	The public records and meetings amendment received almost 3.9 million votes, soaring into the constitution with 83 percent voter support. See Florida Department of State Division of Elections, Election Results, http://election.dos.state.fl.us/elections/resultsarchive/Index.asp?ElectionDate=11/3/1992&DATAMODE=.
33	Fla. Const. art. I, §24.
34	See Florida Attorney General, The “Sunshine” Law, http://myfloridalegal.com/pages.nsf/Main/DC0B20B7DC22B7418525791B006A54E4.
35	Fla. Const. art. I, §24(a).
37	Id. at §24(b).
38	Id. at §24(c).
39	Chandler v. Florida, 449 U.S. 560, 567 (1981).
41	See id.
42	Id. at 566.
43	Id. at 567.
44	Id. at 568.
46	Id. at 568-69.
47	Justices Stewart and White each filed separate opinions, but both concurred in the result. Justice Stevens did not participate in the case. See id. at 583-86.
48	See id. at 579.
49	Id. at 582.
50	Id. at 574-75.
51	Id. at 575.
52	See Asgeirsson v. Abbott, 773 F. Supp. 2d 684, 704 (W.D. Tex. 2011). The case was brought by several local city council members who were allegedly involved in an email exchange that led to criminal indictments of two other council members for violating the Texas Open Meetings Act. Id. at 688. The complaint alleged, inter alia, that the law infringed on the elected officials’ free speech rights by prohibiting certain kinds of communication and was, therefore, an improper content-based restriction on speech. See id. at 688-89, 707.
53	Christine Beckett, Court: Meetings Act Does Not Violate First Amendment, Reporters Comm. for Freedom Press, Mar. 28, 2011, available at http://www.rcfp.org/node/98228.
54	As with any generalization of this sort, there are bound to be exceptions. For two that tend to temper the idea that the Supreme Court is always favorable to freedom of the press, see Branzburg v. Hayes, 408 U.S. 665 (1972) (holding that reporters cannot refuse to testify before a grand jury in criminal proceedings), and Houchins v. KQED, Inc., 438 U.S. 1 (1978) (holding that the press does not enjoy a right of access to report on prison conditions).
55	See Near v. State of Minn. ex rel. Olson, 283 U.S. 697, 721 (1931) (holding that a Minnesota statute allowing for the abatement of any “‘malicious, scandalous and defamatory newspaper, magazine or other periodical,’” id. at 701-02, was violative of the First Amendment and not “consistent with the conception of the liberty of the press as historically conceived and guaranteed.”). Id. at 713.
56	See N.Y. Times Co. v. United States, 403 U.S. 713, 714 (1971) (holding that the federal government could not prevent publication of the “Pentagon Papers” based on national security concerns).
57	See Grosjean v. Am. Press Co., 297 U.S. 233, 250 (1936) (“The tax…is bad because…it is seen to be a deliberate and calculated device in the guise of a tax to limit the circulation of information to which the public is entitled in virtue of the constitutional guaranties.”); Minn. Star & Trib. Co. v. Minn. Comm’r of Revenue, 460 U.S. 575, 583 (1983) (“There is substantial evidence that differential taxation of the press would have troubled the Framers of the First Amendment.”).
58	See N.Y. Times v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254, 279-80 (1964) (“The constitutional guarantees require, we think, a federal rule that prohibits a public official from recovering damages for a defamatory falsehood relating to his official conduct unless he proves that the statement was made with ‘actual malice’ — that is, with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not.”).
59	Id. at 270.
60	Pennekamp v. Florida, 328 U.S. 331, 333 (1946).
61	Id. at 342.
62	Id. at 339.
63	Id. at 340.
64	Id. at 343, n.6.
65	Id. at 350.
67	See id. at 347.
68	See id.
69	See Miami Herald Publ’g Co. v. Tornillo, 418 U.S. 241, 243, and 243, n.1 (1974).
70	Id. at 243.
71	Id. at 244.
73	Id.
74	Id. at 245.
75	See Fla. Const. art. V, §3(b)(1); Tornillo v. Miami Herald Publ’g Co., 287 So. 2d 78 (Fla. 1973), rev’d, 418 U.S. 241 (1974).
76	Tornillo, 418 U.S. at 245.
77	Id. at 258.
79	See id. at 257.
81	Id. (quoting Mills v. Alabama, 384 U.S. 214, 218 (1966)).
82	See id. at 258.
83	Florida Star v. B.J.F., 491 U.S. 524, 527 (1989).
84	Id. at 527.
86	Id. (“The Department does not restrict access either to the pressroom or to the reports made available therein.”).
87	Id. The Florida Star turned 60 in April 2011 and describes itself as “Northeast Florida’s oldest African American-owned newspaper with the most news and the largest circulation.” The Florida Star, About, http://www.thefloridastar.com/?page_id=444.
88	Florida Star, 491 U.S. at 528.
89	Id. (indicating that B.J.F.’s co-workers and acquaintances told her about the article, that her mother received threatening phone calls, and that B.J.F. was forced to move, change her phone number, and seek mental health counseling).
91	Id.
92	Id. at 528-29.
93	Id. at 529; see also Fla. Const. art. V, §3(b)(3).
94	Florida Star, 491 U.S. at 529.
95	Id. at 532.
96	Id. at 534.
97	Id. at 535 (“[W]here the government has made certain information publicly available, it is highly anomalous to sanction persons other than the source of its release.”).
98	Id. at 537.
99	Id. at 532.
100	See First Amendment Foundation, Sunshine Manual 13 (2011), available at http://myfloridalegal.com/webfiles.nsf/WF/KGRG-8D2MLA/$file/2011-SunshineManual.pdf.
101	While both cases were unanimous in result, each had a number of separate opinions. Justices Frankfurter, Murphy, and Rutledge wrote special concurrences in Pennekamp, while Justice Jackson did not participate in the case. In Tornillo, Justice Brennan and Justice White each wrote individual concurring opinions.
102	See Florida Star, 491 U.S. at 547 (White, J., dissenting).
103	Id. at 537.
104	See generally, e.g., Steve Bousquet, Florida Election Law Changes Draw Scrutiny by U.S. Attorney General Holder, St. Petersburg Times, Dec. 15, 2011, available at http://www.tampabay.com/news/politics/legislature/article1206279.ece; Rights Commission’s Report on Florida Election, Wash. Post, June 5, 2001, available at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/onpolitics/transcripts/ccrdraft060401.htm.