Sorry, the Constitution doesn’t work that way
The University of Wisconsin Oshkosh is attempting to squelch the First Amendment. The school is suing a reporter to stop him from publishing documents which the reporter legally obtained while working as a student journalist at the university; the student had made a disciplinary records request, and the school had inadvertently sent him unredacted copies of the records. It is those records that the university wishes to bury, by legal force if necessary.
What is in the records isn’t really important; indeed, the records themselves may be wholly unimportant. The important aspect of this whole affair is that the University of Wisconsin is attempting to trample the First Amendment, calling on the government to use prior restraint to muzzle freedom of the press. That is of great concern. The Supreme Court has ruled repeatedly that the government cannot censor the press except in extremely narrow circumstances, none of which has to do with a university’s disciplinary records.
What is happening here is clear: The University of Wisconsin screwed up, gave a journalist some documents it didn’t intend to, and now wants desperately to cover up that error. One can sympathize with the impulse: It’s embarrassing to make such a mistake, and nobody can fault university officials for wanting to sweep this whole embarrassing spectacle under the rug.
But the First Amendment is much more important than the vanities of campus officials. The freedom of the press—the freedom to publish without fear of prior or subsequent censorship—is a critical component of a free society. This applies even in the case of the University of Wisconsin’s mistakenly emailed unredacted administrative records; the wonderful thing about the United States constitution is that there is no area of the law it does not cover, and no citizen whose fundamental rights and liberties it does not protect.
MORE: Progressive hysterics highlight the beauty of the First Amendment
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