September 12, 2011
1. Facts of Case
In the case Hosty vs Carter (2005), http://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-7th-circuit/1316383.html, the administration at Governors State University in Illinois shut down Innovator, a college student run
newspaper, after the students refused to let administration approve publications before they were published. Three students then sued the University because their First Amendment rights were being violated.
2. Legal Issue
The issue brought before us is whether or not the administration has the authority to censor college run media. While arguing the Hosty vs Carter case, the court looked back on a similar case known as Hazelwood.
In the Hazelwood case the court decided that it was okay for a principle to censor a high school newspaper if it was considered, “poorly written,” “ungrammatical,” “biased” or “inconsistent with the shared values of a civilized social order”.
3. Decision
The students won the battle in district court and U.S. Seventh Circuit Court Appeals. They acknowledged that a high school principle and the president of a public University should not have the
same the censorship authority.
However after asking the Seventh Circuit to reconsider the decisions was reversed the ruling in the lower courts and said the ruling for Hazelwood was justifiable for college universities under the Seventh Circuit which included Illinois, Wisconsin and Indiana. For those three states censorship by the administration can be considered okay.
4. Analysis
The courts decided that the newspaper wasn’t considered a public forum but instead an extracurricular activity. Since it is not a public forum it was not protected by the First Amendment. Therefore in this case the courts decided in favor of Carter. However, this legal decision only impacts those who live in the Seventh district.
5. Questions
- If the administration is unhappy with the articles published by a college student media do they have the right to cut
funding? - What do you think would happen to the BGNews if they applied the Hosty ruling to the newspaper?
- Should editors outside of the Seventh District warn/communicate to administration before reporting controversial articles?
5 thoughts on “Hosty vs Carter (2005)”
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September 12th, 2011 at 11:09 am
Solid job on your brief. Quoting from the actual case would add some nice detail. Watch out for typos. : )
September 13th, 2011 at 12:03 am
As a member of The BG News’ editorial staff, I found this case brief very interesting. I read the entire description on the link you provided to get more background information on it.
I don’t believe administrators have the right to cut funding from a college newspaper simply because they are not happy with what is being published. If the articles published are false or defamatory, the issue should be addressed, but to simply withdraw funding because of critical, but factual articles should not be tolerated.
The BG News’ policy has and always will be to refuse prior review when printing an article. Many sources I have interviewed at BGSU request a copy sent to them before it prints — people seemed to be trained to distrust the media — and sometimes it is tough to refuse, but the policy must be upheld. The college newspaper discussed in this brief differs from The BG News, however, because it sounds like that paper completely relies on university funding to operate, while The BG News is an independent press and not directly affiliated with BGSU.
When newspapers give in to outside pressures they risk losing their objectivity and the ability to produce hard-hitting, factual stories. No editor should “warn someone” before a controversial article is printed about them. It is the media’s job to serve as a watchdog for the general public, and that role can’t be compromised. I completely agree with the ruling in this case.
September 15th, 2011 at 4:14 pm
I really don’t think it is right to let the administration cut funding to a student paper just because they don’t like the content of the paper. Just because in their opinion they don’t like it, doesn’t mean it can’t be published. I feel like the administration wants to control everything that goes on in the school like monitoring the paper and that is just the them going on a unnecessary power trip.
I wrote for the BGNews this summer as an intern and I feel like I would be so concerned about what the administration is going to think about my articles that I would not have wrote them the same way. My main focus would be oh will the administration approve this and not getting the story out the way it should be written. I think it would take a lot away from the BGNews because not that the BGNews writes anything bad but I feel it would take away the “freedom” from the paper itself.
I dont think they should have to warn administration at all because then that opens the door to let the administration be like well if it is that controversial then just don’t run the story at all. Warning them is just as bad as them monitoring it because it is still letting them have control over the paper. There is no reason that any administration should be censoring student media.
September 15th, 2011 at 11:16 pm
I do not think that the administration of a college or university would have the right to cut funding for a publication just because they are unhappy with the articles being published. I feel as though if this would happen the marketplace of ideas that is supposed to be on college campuses would not exist due to the administration censoring certain articles.
If this ruling was applied to the BG News then the content of the paper may be quite different because the articles would be able to be censored. Since the BG News is not associated or depend on the university for funding, they are able to publish anything they want which, in my opinion, results in a better paper.
No I do not think editors should warn the administration before anything is printed. If you do this then you may give up some control of what the paper will print because you will know ahead of time of the administration is unhappy with the article. It is the media’s job to report what is going on around us and they do not need to warn anyone before they do that.
September 17th, 2011 at 5:30 pm
I believe that unless the Universities administration is directly associated with the paper they should not be able to determine what should be published.
I don’t know much about the BG News but if the administration had to review every article that was published I believe the University would not be able to be written about in a negative tone.
I feel that it depends on the situation at the university on weather or not the editors should confirm articles with administration.