Fairness
There is currently under way an effort to return the Fairness Doctrine that will in effect limit free speech on the public airways. The Federal Communications Commission can reinstate the rule with no action by the US Congress or the President. The thought is that utterances on the radio must be fair and that a second view must be given equal time.
The public airways are actually a spectrum that has been divided into numerous specific frequency ranges that are corridors along which a radio wave carrying information is transmitted. These discrete licensed spectra are in actuality corridors along which information is carried. This proposed action regulating the information carried is a Federal matter since the airways are considered to be part of interstate commerce and require a Federal license. The states have no say in the matter.
The purpose of this essay is to develop a logical thought pattern that will permit the various States to gain some control of intra state transmission of information. That would be particularly true of my State, Tennessee.
Within the State of Tennessee information is transmitted and transferred by several methods but in this piece consideration will be restricted to two, printed publications and cable TV.
All printed material be it newspapers manufactured within the state borders or magazines, CD’s, DVD’s, recorded tapes or other similar publications from numerous sources are transported on the Tennessee public streets, roads and highways. These transportation corridors are in every respect similar to the spectral corridors regulated by the FCC except the roadways are regulated by the state of Tennessee. It is there fore a very logical step to conclude that based on the logic of information flow regulation by the FCC over federally regulated corridors, a similar regulatory body can be established by the State to assure that fairness is achieved in information carried or transported on the state regulated corridors and roadways. Printed publications must be fair to be transported over public ways.
In a similar vein, the state of Tennessee should be able to regulate the use of rights of way that are actually part of the same streets, roads and highways noted above. These rights of way are heavily used for various purposes including the physical presence of fiber optic and coaxial cable that are in fact information corridors similar to the FCC regulated corridors that are the public airways. The cable companies transporting on the public rights of way should be subject to the same fairness regulations governing the printed media transported on the adjacent roadways. Cable information must be fair to be transported over public rights of way.
There is no difference. Printed media and cable TV information are both transported along public ways .There is no difference between printed medis transported over public roads and voice utterances transmitted over radio waves. Thoughts are transmitted over public ways.
Then there is the question of the first amendment and free speech. It can be argued that such regulation is a violation of the First Ammendment to the Constitution. That is obviously not the case or the FCC would not be able to impose the Fairness Doctrine. There is no action in the regulation preventing the free exercise of the right to say what ever the writer or publisher or news commentator desires. They can say what ever they want with no fear of any retribution by the State of Tennessee. If they desire to propagate the speech using the public ways, then they are subject to fairness regulation. The precedent for the State regulatory authority is the FCC regulated Federal authority.
If the public ways are restricted, then how can the speech material be propagated? The answer is quite simple. If the speaker wants to sell his material, he can set up a place of business where the public can come and buy what ever is for sale. The speaker can also go into an out of door site and speak whatever comes to mind to all within earshot. His rights of free speech are not restricted by regulations of the transport of the medium packets. It is the transport of those information packets on public ways that is regulated.
And yes there is an argument against speaking from your door step when it comes to the totalitarians. You can use nuisance type laws, disturbing the peace type of fascist logic, or even zoning boards clearly defining what can and cannot be permitted on private property all with the help of stacked courts of course. And if that doesn’t work, turn neighbor against neighbor and then step in with government force to quell the problem. I think that about raps up what is left of our freedoms at that point since most local government are small centers of do-gooders and tyranny. The logic of the left if anything else besides being insane, is quite thorough in its application.