Ah, the usefulness of the Net. Back in the 1990s, if I wanted to look a federal court ruling up, it required a trek to one of the central libraries in the various boroughs. Only one had the complete set, and in later years it did not have most of the lower court rulings. I didn't even try to find state rulings. Now, Supreme Court rulings are available to everyone online, and it is fairly easy to get a lot of lower court rulings ... and via someone who works in a library, I have a connection to a lot more rulings and law review articles. Not quite as much as someone with Westlaw, sure, but heckuva lot of stuff.
Thus, I peruse rulings a lot more often these days. The articles provide even more insight, but that is a near limitless resource, so rulings provide a more manageable way of doing things. See, e.g., yesterday's references. And, since the Findlaw and Cornell sites provide links to most rulings cites, it not only provides easy reference, but you can follow where each lead ... which can be quite interesting as well. An example of this is Speiser v. Randall, an important ruling that helped to establish the "unconstitutional conditions" rule,* which provided material relevant to an issue of the day ... the increase of second class postage in which the Post Office proposal (more friendly to small periodicals) was rejected in favor of a Time Warner option.
The value of the rate, which hearkens back to 1792 (newspapers) and 1794 (magazines/pamphlets) is suggested in a footnote to a ruling cited by Speiser. The ruling earlier noted that the purpose of the cheap rate was "to encourage the distribution of periodicals which disseminated 'information of a public character' or which were devoted to 'literature, the sciences, arts, or some special industry,' because it was thought that those publications as a class contributed to the public good." The case involved a denial based on the alleged indecent nature of the material, looked upon negatively by the Court, reflecting the dissenting opinion of an earlier ruling concerning seditious speech. The threat was real:
[Second-class privilege] was found to be worth $500,000 a year to Esquire Magazine. 'A newspaper editor fears being put out of business by the administrative denial of the second-class mailing privilege much more than the prospect of prison subject to a jury trial.' Chafee, Freedom of Speech (1920), p. 199.
This is a clear case of the government "securing" our liberties ala the Declaration of Independence, there being any number of ways that this can be done. Here speech and knowledge was promoted by providing a type of subsidiary, which occurs in any number of cases these days, with mixed success. The mails might not be the primary way of communicating ideas to a broad audience, though it once was, but it remains of major importance. For instance, paid subscriptions is often a primary source of income, online versions of publications a sort of extra subsidized ... natch ... by that route.
And, as noted in the I.F. Stone collection, second class rates can be quite important for small time publishers with small profit margins.** Denial is not the only way they can feel a tug ... a tug with harm to the general public as well. Likewise, this underlines the importance of who fills the government, including executive and independent agencies. After all the Postal Regulatory Commission (yeah, who?) made the decision here. It is notable here that the Post Office's own proposal was rejected here, while an important issue got little notice ... partially the fault of the people given the responsibility to regulate the issue.
A matter that hits to the "public character" and has roots over two hundred years ago deserves such clarity. But, competent government is not really the goal from the second branch. Mixed bag in the First. For instance, this left something to be desired.
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* Just because a privilege, such as a tax exemption, is at issue does not mean that the government can require surrendering of a constitutional right ... such as in that case a loyalty oath requirement.
** The problem with the new plan is suggested here, suggesting Bushie free market mentality over acting in the public interest:
Under the proposed rate structure for mailing periodicals, the biggest publications--your Times, your Rolling Stones, your Vanity Fairs--are granted the best prices thanks to their ability to produce better mailing efficiencies (bundling, sorting, transport); smaller publications that don't have the budget for such efficiencies pay for the Postal Service's work on their behalf.
From a free-market standpoint, this isn't, on its face, unfair: since big mag publishers use fewer Postal Service resources, they get to pay less. But the USPS isn't supposed to be a competitive enterprise. It's a government body whose rate structure has until now been meant to facilitate and encourage the dissemination of information and ensure a thriving marketplace of ideas.