Judge Says Web Filters Might Violate First Amendment

Staff -- School Library Journal, 5/1/1998

If public libraries use software to block access to certain Internet material, their filtering policies must meet the strictest First Amendment standards, a federal judge has ruled.

In a preliminary ruling on the closely watched lawsuit against Loudoun County (VA) Public Library, U.S. District Court Judge Leonie M. Brinkema on April 7 denied the library's motion to dismiss the case, rejecting its argument that the First Amendment doesn't apply to library decisions on whether to give access to Internet information.

Opponents of Internet filters in libraries hailed the decision, particularly because Brinkema quoted liberally from last year's Supreme Court ruling striking down the Communications Decency Act. The judge "followed the Supreme Court in finding that the Internet is a single integrated body of knowledge and [that] when you purchase access to the Internet you get everything," said Larry Ottinger, Senior Staff Attorney at the People for the American Way Foundation, co-counsel in the lawsuit brought by the group Mainstream Loudoun.

Now Brinkema must rule specifically on whether Loudoun County's policy of having filters on all Web terminals violates the First Amendment.