FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
A judge yesterday granted the City of Clarksdale, Mississippi’s request to order a newspaper, The Clarksdale Press Register, to delete an editorial criticizing city officials. The order blatantly disregards the constitutional prohibition on “prior restraints” censoring the press.
The following statement can be attributed to Seth Stern, director of advocacy at Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF):
It's hard to imagine a more unconstitutional order than one compelling a newspaper to take down an editorial critical of the government. And it's particularly ironic when the editorial in question is about government secrecy undermining the public trust. If anyone previously trusted the secretive officials involved in this censorship campaign, they shouldn't now.
“The underlying lawsuit here appears frivolous for any number of reasons. But even in constitutionally permissible defamation lawsuits, it's been well-established law for decades that the remedy for plaintiffs is monetary damages, not censorship orders.
“This case should not be viewed in isolation — it's part of a nationwide increase in baseless censorship orders, known as ‘prior restraints.’ But this one is uniquely egregious. City Attorney Melvin D. Miller II and all other lawyers involved in asking a court to silence the press should face real consequences, as should Judge Crystal Wise Martin, who rubber-stamped their request. Judge Martin shouldn’t be adjudicating parking tickets, let alone First Amendment cases.
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