Who Watches the Watchers?

by Jay Marshall Wolman

On May 25, 2020, George Floyd was killed by then-Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin during an arrest of Floyd for allegedly using a counterfeit $20 bill to purchase a pack of cigarettes.

A 17-year old filmed the arrest and murder, which was then shared and resulted in protests against system racism and police brutality in all 50 states. But, according to the criminal complaint charging Chauvin, it was not the teenager’s video that provided the evidence to support the charge. Instead, it was police body cameras.

That video has not been released. For all we know, if Chauvin does not have a trial (by plea deal or some legal defect in the charge), the video may never become public.

I am currently litigating a matter in Connecticut where my client is seeking police footage of her own interaction with officers. The police have resisted, under the state Freedom of Information law, under a provision that says they do not have to produce it if it contains “uncorroborated allegations” of criminal activity. Essentially, their argument is that if no one is convicted, state law allows the video to remain hidden.

Minnesota’s FOI law seems a bit more open, permitting disclosure in “inactive” case. Assuming there were no other videos or witnesses to his murder, and no uproar and investigation into the death as a crime itself, the body cam footage of George Floyd’s arrest and death could probably be disclosed, since the counterfeiting case would be “inactive”. If this had happened in Connecticut, since Mr. Floyd’s death precludes his conviction, the body cam footage might not be made public, as it may contain uncorroborated allegations of his unproven criminal activity.

The point of body cam footage is so that we do not simply take the responding officer at his/her word. All a Connecticut officer (or officer of another state with a similar provision) need do to escape liability for abuse is kill their victim or otherwise lose the case. Any innocent person who is unlawfully abused during the arrest, even the victim him/herself, would be denied access to the footage.

Police cameras do represent an intrusion into privacy, and there is a legitimate debate as to whether they should be wearing them. And, there are debates as to whether they should individually have the power to turn them off. (I think they should, such as when they use the bathroom, but if they turn them off in the context of their duties, they should be significantly disciplined and there should be a presumption against the credibility of their testimony as to the unfilmed interaction.) But, if the video exists, it should be made public or, if publicity would be against public interest (unduly invading someone’s privacy, compromising investigations, etc.) then it should still be releasable to subjects of the videos (or their estates), possibly subject to a protective order.

We should not have to rely on a 17-year old with the fortitude to record a crime in progress in order that criminals who happen to wear a badge face justice.

Buzzfeed News profiles Marc Randazza and explores his high-profile, controversial cases

Marc Randazza, the lawyer working to protect First Amendment rights of people spewing socially undesirable speech, recently opened up to Buzzfeed News about his devotion to the First Amendment and how representing neo-Nazis, trolls, and Satanists helps him uphold what he believes is one of the most important ideals this country was founded upon.

The First Amendment guarantees United States citizens a constitutional right to freedom of speech. Government cannot infringe upon this right, although certain types of speech such as incitement, obscenity, and defamation do receive less protection. Protection can be based on the place in which speech occurs. For instance, speech that takes place on the campus of a public school has high First Amendment protection but speech in a private workplace receives little protection. Between court rulings and interpretation of the Constitution, protections of free speech have become pretty well defined over the last several decades. However, there’s one grey area that is polarizing First Amendment advocates today – speech on the Internet.

That’s where Randazza focuses much of his effort.

Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (CDA) protects technology platforms from liability based on their users’ content, but despite this protection, tech giants are restricting their users’ speech. Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube claim they can take down any content they consider inappropriate or objectionable. Moreover, these platforms claim they have the right to ban undesirable members. Randazza believes that the Internet is a de facto public space, meaning it is privately owned yet publicly accessible, and therefore, online platforms must be more tolerant of such speech, especially given that they are afforded immunity through the CDA.

One group that claims they are a target of such discrimination are white nationalists. While their rhetoric is seemingly experiencing a wave of popularity, it’s also publicly despised and tech giants are being accused of suppressing it. Scratch the surface of Jared Taylor’s lawsuit against Twitter or Alex Jones’ lawsuit against PayPal and you’ll understand why Randazza thinks white nationalists are one of today’s most vulnerable groups in regard to the suppression of free speech.

Randazza has received heavy criticism from his peers not so much for his position, but more so for representing extremists like Taylor and Jones. But, he believes that protecting First Amendment rights is a matter of principle, not message.

“Sometimes we have to take people on who we find unsavory, but that’s what a commitment to the First Amendment means,” said Randazza.

Read the full article about Marc Randazza on Buzzfeed News.

Note for the Legal Satyricon Blog: Marc Randazza on Alex Jones’s defamation case

Marc Randazza is protecting the rights of Alex Jones, a host on InfoWars and a journalist.

Alex Jones faces several defamation lawsuits in different states filed by the families of victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre. Alex Jones at one point questioned the official narrative of the story, but now believes the shooting happened.

“Even though overwhelming – and indisputable – evidence exists showing exactly what happened at Sandy Hook Elementary School on December 14, 2012, certain individuals have persistently perpetuated a monstrous, unspeakable lie: That the Sandy Hook shooting was staged, and that the families who lost loved ones that day are actors who faked their relatives’ deaths,” the suit filed by lawyers from the Koskoff Koskoff & Bieder law firm claims, reports Connecticut Law Tribune.

Marc Randazza is defending Alex Jones in Connecticut.

“If you are a First Amendment lawyer and you hesitate in defending someone because of allegations of what they said, then you are not a First Amendment lawyer,” Randazza said.

Recently, Marc Randazza appeared as a guest on Alex Jones’s show InfoWars to discuss First Amendment issues. Randazza and Jones discussed a plethora of topics, including defamation lawsuits, free speech rights violations, and the growing impact of censorship by social media companies.

“You see this with people on the right being systematically ‘no platformed’, not just from media sites, but from YouTube, from Facebook, from Twitter and now from PayPal and Stripe. If any company decides that it doesn’t like the kind of thing you have to say, then you are off.”

Now, Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, Apple, LinkedIn, Spotify, Stitcher, and Pinterest have banned Alex Jones and InfoWars. How does this ban affect freedom of speech and the First Amendment rights of US citizens? Marc Randazza shared his opinions on the ban here:
https://www.mediamatters.org/research/2018/08/06/empire-strikes-back-right-wing-media-defend-alex-jones-after-infowars-banned-several-major-platforms/220912

Marc Randazza at Alex Jones Show: The most intriguing moments of the latest interviews

Over the past few weeks, Marc Randazza has been appearing on Info Wars. You can take a look at the video interviews on the Randazza Legal Group YouTube channel.

Marc Randazza discussed various issues related to the First Amendment and freedom of speech and expression.

In the interview (titled) Marc Randazza at Infowars: freedom of speech, well-known First Amendment cases, and censorship, Marc discussed defamation and free speech in the United States. According to Marc Randazza, there will always be people trying to use censorship to influence the marketplace of ideas. But the First Amendment allows all kind of speech, so Americans should let the marketplace of ideas flourish.

5:48 – 6:05
“… what troubles me is anytime I see anybody coming after that, I have a problem with it. The First Amendment is there for Nazis, for Clansmen, for Westboro Baptist Church, for anybody. It’s there for the speech you hate.”

15:15 – 15:41
“I don’t really care whose free speech it is that is being trampled. I will stand up to protect them, whether it’s Randa Jarrar who I find to be one of the most reprehensible human beings in America, whether it’s the Nazi party or the KKK, or whether it’s the communist party. Every one of them has an equal right to be there and the intellectual texture of America, the strength of America, the idea of America erodes and begins to grow a cancer if we don’t protect that.”

In this interview [titled], Marc Randazza commenting on the First Amendment rights protection at the Alex Jones Show Marc Randazza shares his point of view on several well-known free speech lawsuits and helps Alex Jones to figure out his own charges.

2:32 – 2:44
“What you can do is continue to educated people on what the First Amendment is because I’ve just been delighted over the past few years at how much more awareness there is now about First Amendment rights…”

Also, Mr. Randazza commented on a case involving a Scottish comedian named Mark Meechan, who taught his girlfriend’s dog to raise his paw every time he said “Sieg Heil”. Now Meechan is facing up to a year in prison for hate speech. Randazza also discussed this case on his CNN column.

According to Marc, “[censorship] looks much more like the purview of the left, at least in the West.“

14:58 – 15:17
“You see this with people on the right being systematically ‘no platformed’, not just from media sites, but from YouTube, from Facebook, from Twitter, and now from PayPal and Stripe. If any company decides that it doesn’t like the kind of thing you have to say, then you are off.”

Watch the full interviews to understand the complete picture and catch up with the latest First Amendment insights from Marc Randazza.

Marc Randazza on the Nazi-salute dog video and hate speech in Europe and the US

In his recent CNN article, Marc Randazza shared his opinion regarding a Scottish comedian, who made a horrible joke that could now have criminal consequences.

A Scottish comedian named Mark Meechan, of Coatbridge, Lanarkshire taught a pug named Buddha to raise his paw any time he said “Sieg Heil.” Meechan posted a video of the pug on YouTube. Meechan said that he made the video and taught the dog to give Nazi salutes as a joke on his girlfriend.

In the video Meechan said that his girlfriend annoyed him by always saying how cute her pug is and he decided to get her back by teaching the dog something that’s not cute.

But authorities arrested Mark Meechan and he is now facing up to 6 months in prison for a hate crime.

The court found him guilty under the Section 127 of the UK Communications Act which prohibits “grossly offensive, indecent, obscene, or menacing” electronic communications. Mark shared his video on social media and YouTube which was offensive because of it being “anti-Semitic and racist in nature”.

Marc Randazza imagines how this case would proceed if it had happened on the other side of Atlantic, and notes that even though the United States has the First Amendment, Canada has adopted hate crime laws. For example, when Ezra Levant republished “Mohammed cartoons” in Canada, he faced a complaint before the Alberta Human Rights Commission.

In the US, Marc Randazza believes that the First Amendment protects such freedom of expression, but he fears that more hate speech prosecutions, like the ones in Europe, could be in our nation’s future. “With our growing tolerance for intolerance, I fear, UK-style prosecutions may be on the horizon for us. Even without them, the forces of censorship may simply make them unnecessary by suppressing all speech that someone might whine about.”

Marc Randazza says that if Mark Meechan were a US college student, he probably would be disciplined for such a speech. Marc Randazza recalls an instance when he was accused of hate speech at the University of Massachusetts for putting up a poster of the punk band the Dead Kennedys. The poster featured a swastika covered by a red circle and a line through it, but even though the swastika was crossed out some people were offended.

Today social networks are beginning to take down  “offensive speech” if someone thinks that it is inappropriate. However, different people may determine that the speech is humorous but not offensive.

Even though Marc Randazza agrees that the Nazi salute dog is offensive, Marc Randazza thinks that free speech should be protected, including speech that may be deemed “offensive”.

Randazza’s Client Andrew Anglin and the First Amendment

Marc Randazza represents Andrew Anglin, a neo-Nazi who runs the Daily Stormer, in a First Amendment case. It started as a small-town dispute between the plaintiff Tanya Gersh and a few other residents of Whitefish, Montana.

Gersh accuses Anglin of using his online platform to encourage his readers to launch an avalanche of hate and harassment threats toward them. Gersh says she received hateful messages and records of phone calls made by the followers of Randazza’s client. Gersh alleges that she received threats and verbal abuse because she is Jewish.

Gersh wants Marc Randazza’s client Andrew Anglin to be held responsible for the actions of the third-parties who contacted her. However, Marc Randazza, says that according to the First Amendment, “liberty demands that Anglin’s readers remain free to speak”. The prominent First Amendment attorney thinks that if people believe in freedom of expression and protect it as a constitutional right, they should believe in it even for “Nazis, Klansmen, pornographers, and anybody else you might find to be objectionable.”

Marc Randazza says that his client should not be held liable for the speech of his readers. Moreover, his client said multiple times that the statements made by his readers toward the plaintiff do not imply violence: the statements should be perceived as “hyperbolic insults”.

Marc Randazza stated that he is not defending Anglin’s beliefs, as Randazza does not support Anglin’s views. However, Mr. Randazza believes that defending people whose speech you abhor is probably the best way to preach your love for the First Amendment.

Read the latest about Marc Randazza’s case on CNN here.

Marc Randazza about Section 2(a) changes

Marc Randazza shared his opinion regarding some recent First Amendment and Trademark cases.

15 U.S.C. § 1052(a) (known best as “Section 2(a)”) is a federal trademark law, which prevents certification of certain classes of marks that “may disparage” or can be “immoral or scandalous”. But at the beginning of the year, the Supreme Court found that prohibiting disparaging marks from being registered violates the First Amendment. So, Section 2(a)’s unconstitutional arrangements have finally fallen.

In his latest article on Popehat, Marc Randazza comments on two recent important cases: the Brunetti decision and the Tam precedent. Both cases include trademark registrations and the restrictions of Section 2(a). Since the Supreme Court struck down the disparagement clause, many people speculated whether the immoral or scandalous clause would survive.

Mr. Randazza notes that now, with Brunetti, we no longer need to speculate (if there is no appeal). Brunetti tried to register his trademark FUCT. But the United States Patent and Trademark Office declared that this mark is a synonym with “fuck,” making it sound vulgar, and thus conflicting with Section 2(a).

Now, the Federal Circuit has found that the “immoral or scandalous” restriction on registration is unconstitutional, a decision influenced by the Supreme Court’s Tam decision. The Brunetti court pronounced that the “immoral or scandalous” restriction was likely viewpoint-based.

The Tam decision tossed aside the government’s theories on censorship, that:

1. Federal trademark registration scheme is a public forum that allows content-based restrictions on speech;
2. The “immoral or scandalous” portion of Section 2(a) survived the lesser level of examination for restrictions on commercial speech.

In this case, the test was conducted. It was supposed to determine whether a mark is “immoral or scandalous” or if the general public would find the mark “shocking to the sense of truth, decency, or propriety; disgraceful; offensive; disreputable . . . giving offense to the conscience or moral feelings . . . or calling out for condemnation.”

But finally, after years of unconstitutional actions by the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the trademarks registration process has changed and today there is no “immoral or scandalous” block.

Randazza: The Legal Battle Over Andrew Anglin Continues

An article about one of Marc Randazza’s most controversial and groundbreaking cases  – a case involving the founder of a Neo-Nazi website Andrew Anglin – was published in the December issue of the Atlantic magazine.

The article, “The Making of an American Nazi”, tells the story of the founder of The Daily Stormer: the site that is arguably the leading hate site and neo-Nazi platform on the internet. Anglin is now being sued for allegedly harassing Tanya Gersh, a Whitefish, Montana, real estate agent, and orchestrating an anti-Semitic online trolling campaign against her family.

In April, she filed a lawsuit claiming that anonymous internet trolls started bombarding her family with hateful and threatening messages after Anglin wrote a post blaming Gersh for engaging in “extortion” regarding a property sale from Sherry Spencer, whose son is another white nationalist and arguably the face of the alt-right movement. In that post, Anglin shared personal details, including photographs of Gersh’s family and other Jewish citizens of Whitefish, and called on his supporters, the “Stormer Troll Army” – to “hit ’em up.”

Currently, Gersh is suing Anglin for invasion of privacy, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and violation of a Montana anti-intimidation statute. Marc Randazza is representing Anglin in this case. Anglin is also accused of unleashing a campaign against other Jewish residents of Whitefish, as well as “cyberstalking” and aggressive online trolling of other people, whose identity or views are not in line with his beliefs as a white nationalist.

It’s also reported that apart from committing the aforementioned activities, encouraging his followers and fellow nationalists to share his views online and participate in cyber trolling campaigns; Anglin allegedly continued to grow his audience and supposedly urged them to take their hate from the online to the real world.

Marc Randazza, the managing partner of the Randazza Legal Group, is representing Andrew Anglin. This lawsuit has attracted the attention of legal experts and the public not only due to Anglin’s notorious personality, but because it’s the first time that an internet troll is being sued for his actions.

However, according to Marc Randazza, a well-known First Amendment attorney and a fighter for free speech, restricting Anglin’s online trolling may set a dangerous precedent for the American legal system. As Mr. Randazza commented, Anglin “has every right to ask people to share their views, no matter how abhorrent those views are…this is the shitty price we have to pay for freedom.”

Marc Randazza protects the rights to free expression

Marс Randazza is defending the right to reproduce and distribute works that are in the public domain, pursuant to the principals of free expression and the First Amendment.

While Randazza’s client has not admitted to copying or reproducing the artwork in question, even if he did so, Marc Randazza is confident that his client’s presumable actions didn’t violate the law. “We guard freedom of expression very jealously here,” he said.

Stay tuned to find out how the case will end up.

Marc Randazza Commented on a Recent Case Against Pissedconsumer.Com Regarding Reviews About ‘Sexual Dalliances’

Marc Randazza represented PissedConsumer.com in a lawsuit involving the Law Offices of N.M. Gehi.

PissedConsumer.com is a website for online consumer reviews. The Law Offices of N.M. Gehi is an immigration law firm located in New York.

In September, the Law Offices of N.M. Gehi filed a lawsuit against PissedConsumer.com, where negative online comments about the company were posted. Naresh Gehi – the founding partner – stated that those reviews were defamatory and caused emotional distress. He requested a preliminary injunction and a temporary restraining order against the consumer website.

The comments contained allegations of “sexual dalliances”.

PissedComsumer.com had already successfully defended itself against similar cases.

Marc Randazza, the Managing Partner of the Randazza Legal Group, commented: “Moreover, even if defendant created an ‘atmosphere’ for complaints, there is no basis to suggest defendant requires them to be libelous.”

Read the full story here.

On Oct. 3, the Law Offices of N.M. Gehi dismissed its case without prejudice.

Marc Randazza reacts to the Las Vegas shooting in his most recent CNN column

 

In his latest CNN opinion column, Vegas based attorney Marc Randazza reacted to the brutal mass shooting that happened in Las Vegas on October 2, 2017. Fortunately, neither Marc Randazza, nor his family members or friends, were harmed during that tragic incident.

However, as a First Amendment attorney and the managing partner of the Randazza Legal Group — a law firm that handles cases related to Constitutional law — Randazza could not remain indifferent.

While expressing his deep sympathy and condolences to the victims and the survivors, Marc Randazza emphasized that it’s fairly important not to let terrorists plunge the nation into chaos and fear. As Mr. Randazza noted, “Let us remember that those who kill innocent victims do not do so simply because they wish them dead — terrorism is about killing a few to strike fear into many.”

Oppressing people’s freedoms and restricting the rights of regular people isn’t the best way to react to mass shootings. Marc Randazza believes that we should “Do nothing but mourn, care and investigate. Yes, at some point this event will inform decisions on how we govern ourselves. But not today.”

Find out more about Marc Randazza’s response to the Las Vegas shooting in his most recent CNN column: “The best way to respond to Las Vegas massacre.”

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Jail For Laughing Protester Is An Outrage

Marc Randazza’s most recent CNN column analyzes the recent conviction of Code Pink Protestor Desiree Fairooz after the media suggested she had been arrested merely for, “laughing at Jeff Sessions” during a Congressional hearing.

There is, of course, more to the story.

See: Jail for laughing protester is an outrage

When Fairooz laughed loudly during Session’s confirmation hearing, Officer Coronado removed her, which caused Fairooz to protest loud enough to disrupt the session. Fairooz was charged with, “disorderly and disruptive conduct and parading or demonstrating on Capitol grounds.”

However, it didn’t end there: Marc Randazza notes that a jury of her peers actually convicted her of these crimes.

Marc Randazza says, “Several jurors said they sympathized with Fairooz, but because the law is so broad that they felt they had no option but to convict.”

“[F]or Fairooz to be facing prison for her conduct is outrageous,” asserts Marc Randazza.

Marc Randazza reminds us that, “the notion of an American citizen going to jail for a nonviolent political protest is utterly antithetical to what this country is all about.”

But why?

As Marc Randazza points out, this has nothing to do with Ms. Fairooz’s message—as he admits he often does not agree with the message of Code Pink—this is about Free Speech and the First Amendment.

For Marc Randazza, it is not the message that deserves protection, it is the speech itself.

“The wall that protects the First Amendment is not manned with pretty happy smiling thoughts and easy-to-love characters. That rampart is manned by the ugly, the impolite, the impolitic, the disturbing image, and the thoughts that you may swallow no easier than if they were made from crushed glass.”

Read the rest here.

Marc Randazza’s most recent CNN column analyzes U.C. Berkeley’s decision to silence Ann Coulter

See Dear Berkeley: Even Ann Coulter deserves free speech.

There has been a wave of violent outbursts against conservative speakers during the 2016 election season, including violent protestors at Berkeley driving Milo Yiannopolous off campus a few months ago.

Berkley’s reaction? When the Berkeley College Republicans invited Coulter to speak, Berkeley canceled it, citing the recent violent outbursts as the reason. Marc Randazza explains that Ann Coulter suggested disciplining the students that engaged in violence, but Berkeley decided instead to reschedule the speech on a day when no students were on campus.

This is censorship.

Marc Randazza says that some people on the left feel, “emboldened by a view that ‘we’ are right and the Right (is) wrong,” and goes on to scold the left: “Shame on the Left for tacitly condoning this culture of violent suppression of views it disagrees with.”

Marc Randazza reminds us that we don’t need a First Amendment for speech that neither challenges, nor offends, because sometimes that very challenging and offensive speech fosters growth.

Marc Randazza points out that the left used to be beacons for free speech, and credits a few well-known liberals for defending Coulter’s right to speak in the column:

“Are we living in an alternate reality, one in which Bill Maher and Bernie Sanders are sticking up for Ann Coulter?

What could have caused this rip in the space-time continuum?

The so-called birthplace of the free speech movement, the University of California at Berkeley, has once again engaged in liberal censorship, this time of Ann Coulter, using the fear of violence as cover to suppress a voice it did not like.”

Read the rest here.

Building a Slippery Slope to Code

by Jay Marshall Wolman

I’ve been following the efforts of Carl Malamud and Public.Resource.Org to free the law.  In short, and inadequately summarized, sometimes lawmakers incorporate by reference or otherwise make part of the law works that are subject to copyright.  Thus, for example, a state may require electricians to comply with the NFPA National Electrical Code.  And, for the low low price of $98, the NFPA will sell it to you.

“But, wait!” you may say, “why should I have to pay for a copy of the code when the code is the law?”  And that’s the kind of thing Public.Resource.Org has been questioning.  It originally bought copies of these codes and published them.  And, earlier this year, they lost a law suit brought by the publishers of these codes, and they have been enjoined from publishing them.  They also suffered a second defeat, in another case, last month, involving the State of George’s official, but privately published, annotated code (the code is in the public domain, but the annotations are not, despite legal reliance on the annotations).

From a due process standpoint, it is unreasonable to be held accountable for a violation of a law or code, locked up behind a copyright, especially where there is no defense for ignorance.  On the flip side, the fact that code authors should have to give their works away for free just because (even though at their encouragement) some government entity adopts it as law, gives me pause.

Codes sound very law-ish by their nature that it’s easy to mentally treat them as something that shouldn’t even be copyrightable, like a phone book.  But, since there is some creativity involved, with choices made as to what is safe and what is not, it probably is copyrightable.  Thus, there’s no legal reason why one class of copyrightable works should be treated differently than any other.  And republication would, generally speaking, be infringement.

Let’s use a different type of copyrightable work to illustrate.  Assume the State of New Columbia requires all teenagers to graduate from high school.  And let’s say the curriculum, as implemented by the schools and teachers, required every student to read and do a book report.  One teacher chooses “Twilight” for some horrible reason, presumably related to the sorry state of our educational system.  Thus, essentially by law, every student in that teacher’s class must obtain a full copy of Stoker’s ugly stepchild.  Should I, then, be allowed to post a PDF of that book for any of the students to download for free, without permission of the author?  Of course not.  Even if she lobbied the schools.  So long as the schools fairly make the book available to borrow, so students can actually do their assignment, due process should be satisfied.  So, too, with the codes.  So long as an electrician can fairly access and learn what he/she needs to do, that should be sufficient.

The Google Books saga is informative, and there was a fascinating article in The Atlantic yesterday that got me thinking about this again.  About two and a half years ago, Google prevailed in an appeal before the Second Circuit in its case against the Author’s Guild.  Google had embarked on an ambitious project to scan millions of books in order to make snippets of text available in search results.  The Second Circuit found that Google’s reproduction of the works, but limited to the snippets, was fair use.  This is where Google’s outcome differs from the losses of Public.Resource.Org.  The latter published and made available the full texts of the codes online, unlike Google, which restricted the amount of the works displayed.  This was a key distinction made by the courts.

Of course, sometimes you can republish a work wholesale for comment as fair use.  And Public.Resource.Org could well prevail in these arguments on appeal.  It will be interesting to watch, both for freeing the law and, if successful, for whatever else might be freed just because the government made it required reading.