1st Amendment, First Amendment Quotes
Two decades later Jefferson, after his Presidency, had developed a different attitude towards the press. See {585116}.
The phrase ‘This would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion at all!!!’ is often quoted to imply that Adams was opposed to religion. This is a classic use of using quotations out of context for if one reads the entire quotation, Adams is stating that without religion the world would not be a particularly fit place. Some religionists then use the entire quotation to argue that Adams was a religious, Christian man who saw America as a Christian nation. That too is out of the context of the totality of his views—see {592753}.
Opponents of the strict separation of church and state use this quotation to support their view. However, Story herein describes public sentiment, not what was passed and ratified in the Constitution and Bill of Rights. See {614309} and {614310} for his statements from the same work that show that there was no question in his mind but that church and state are separated by the Constitution and the First Amendment.
Note the language used to describe the American government at the time. To the founders, it was an EXPERIMENT. Nothing like that had ever been tried before. And none of them were sure it would work. After defeating the British, they could have chosen for their new independent nation any one of dozens of well-established forms of government. But these were all flawed. So they risked the new nation on a form that had little or no precedent and might or might not survive. Centuries later many national leaders and legislators were fearful to try anything that they were not highly certain would be effective. Experiments were rare until there were crises so great that none of the orthodox solutions would be sufficient, and even then the innovators were criticized such as with Lincoln and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. They were candid enough to admit that they were experimenting. FDR in particular announced experimentation as a policy with rapid change for the experiments that did not work out of which there were several.
Falwell was a religious fundamentalist who advocated religion vigerously participating in politics.
Tinker referred to the Supreme Court Case of Tinker v. Des Moines where the court ruled that school children had Constitutional rights as well as adults. It was not possible to have a blocking system that would keep “improper” or “indecent” internet sites from library or school computers. Even if it could, the appropriate material for a 17 year old to see and a 5 year old were very different. The blocking software never worked well. Computer sophisticated students would pride themselves by showing how they could evade the blocking software, and at the same time teen age girls would have health sites blocked because they showed how to do breast self-examinations.
There has been a constant conflict between the government and the press regarding the right of a journalist to refuse to disclose his/her sources for a story or to reveal his/her notes or outtakes. Reporters would sometimes be subpoenaed and if they refused to testify or disclose the subpoenaed information, they could be held in contempt of court and fined, jailed or both. However, one of the major reasons reporters have been able to get information on the malfeasance and incompetence of government is that leakers and whistleblowers have been willing to provide information to the press is that they are confident that the press will not disclose the source. The courts have ruled that journalists have no special rights regarding subpoenas, so the outcome of the conflict depends on the political decision of the administration. Risen had been subpoenaed during the George W. Bush Administration and he and the New York Times had fought the case all the way up to the Supreme Court which ruled, that Risen had no special right wo withhold information about a possible crime. That seemed to leave Risen with his “two choices”.
