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States To Kids: Cover Your Eyes And Don't Peek
Legislators nationwide, frustrated at the lack of federal success in enacting a barrier between kids and online sex, have introduced a slew of bills aimed at filtering allegedly lewd material from computers in public schools and libraries. Ranging from a mandate that schools and libraries install Internet filtering software to suggestions that localities maintain their own standards, states are sending a clear message that they are not going to wait for the federal government to finish the job.
So far, four attempts to pass such laws have failed in the courts or bogged down in the Congress. The Communications Decency Act was declared unconstitutional, and its progeny, the Child Online Protection Act, was enjoined earlier this month by a federal judge. The U.S. House of Representatives Safe Schools Internet Act, introduced by Rep. Bob Franks R-NJ to require public schools to install filtering technology, is mired in a subcommittee. And the U.S. Senate bill, the Children's Internet Protection Act, introduced by presidential contender Sen. John McCain R-AZ is virtually identical, though it contains less stringent requirements than the House legislation.
Free speech advocates could have their work cut out for them, because some of the new bills are crafted with an eye to withstanding First Amendment challenges.
One of the most liberal bills was introduced in Connecticut by Senate President Pro Tempore Kevin B. Sullivan D-West Hartford. The bill does not mandate that schools use filtering, but rather sets aside funds for schools looking to develop blocking services. Prompted by a few local cases in which people stalked children who were on the Internet during school time, Sullivan said the legislation might even protect schools systems from litigation.
"Any school system should understand that freewheeling access is going to lead them in a direction of liability they don't want to get into," he said.
However, Sullivan said requiring filtering in public libraries is a different issue, one that's a step closer to encroaching on the First Amendment.
"In the school system you're dealing with the juvenile population, a captive audience," Sullivan said. "In a public library we're also dealing with adults who might have a higher level of appropriateness."
For that reason, Arizona state Rep. Mark Anderson R-Mesa says his proposed legislation purposely sidesteps regulating library access. Anderson's bill asks libraries to craft their own policies restricting minors from accessing harmful materials on the Internet. Acceptable methods include anything from installing filters to monitoring visited Web sites each year. But it does demand that all public schools, K-12, filter Internet access either with an installed program, or by selecting an ISP that blocks certain sites.
Anderson said that nobody from the schools has opposed his bill, and that his previous attempt to pass the act last session sailed through the House and died in a 15-15 vote in the Arizona Senate.
Anderson acknowledged the inherent problems in blocking, namely, that important sites such as those on "sex education" or "breast cancer" are blocked simply because they contain the "offensive" words. But he maintained that protection is more important. "Nothing in this world is perfect but the positives outweigh the negatives" in this case, he said.
The negatives may include cyberstalking, or lawsuits against schools that allow children to download pornography. California legislators are all too familiar with that, thanks to a rash of recent, high-profile cases. State Sen. Joe Baca D-San Bernardino has written a bill demanding public libraries filter all Internet access, saying that he is protecting "our children from obscene porn material and online predators on the Internet." The filtering system he proposes requires children's use to be limited, while adults have free run of the Internet. Baca said his bill targets libraries because it is easier to control and fund them, rather than the huge number of public schools in the state. He insists the act in no way violates the First Amendment.
But Virginia legislators are not as confident. As part of Republican Gov. Jim Gilmore's Virginia Internet Policy Act, which includes legislation on everything from spamming to filtering, the state would turn over decisions about public school and library Internet access to individual counties, demanding they develop their own policies.
"The Governor feels there is no one answer for this problem," says Todd Reid, assistant to Technology Secretary Don Upson. Reid said he predicts one county will come up with a solution that other localities will emulate, and because the degree of connectivity differs across the state, a broad policy won't work. But Reid also warned against some of the policies that other states are trying to adopt. "Is there a chance for this to get out of hand?" he asked rhetorically. "Yeah. If each locality wanted to put on filters the ACLU would have a field day."
The American Civil Liberties Union already has. Its Web-published white papers "Censorship in a Box" detail the many reasons free-speech advocates reject public library filters. Among those reasons is the notion that blocking software is clumsy and ineffective, with many sites that could be appropriate filtered out because of imprecise techniques. The ACLU has outlined what it sees are appropriate alternatives, such as time limits, "driver's ed" for Internet users to teach students critical thinking skills for the Internet, library-recommended reading with links to appropriate Web sites and even privacy screens to physically block passers-by from viewing what's on the computer terminal.
ACLU attorney Ann Beeson, who argued the Child Online Protection Act case in Judge Lowell Reed's Philadelphia courtroom, says the civil liberties group has been monitoring the Web for four years already, and will continue to do so, suggesting legislation if deemed necessary.
- by Stephanie Lash
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