Date   : Thu, 24 May 1984 06:00:41 EDT
From   : Stephen Wolff <steve@Brl-Bmd.ARPA>
Subject: Re: BBS Confiscation

>>                                    However, I do not agree that the phone
>>       company (or congress, acting on its behalf) should be permitted to
>>       abridge first amendment rights any more than The Progressive should
>>       have been prevented from publishing its article (as it was not).
                                                       ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Oh, yes it was!  Morland's article was originally scheduled for the April, '79
issue, but on March 26 Federal judge Robert W. Warren "..did what no Federal
judge had ever done before in the 203-year history of the American republic"
when he issued a preliminary injunction barring publication, and had all
copies of the article, its proofs, sketches &c. locked up.

Sanity did not prevail until September 28, when the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court
of Appeals vacated Judge Warren's incredible injunction.  The article was
printed in November.  The Progressive was, in fact "prevented" from printing
it (by Warren's injunction) for more than six months.

A last note:  While this was only a minor random aberration on the Government's
part, nearly five years later The Progressive is still struggling to get out
of debt from the costs it incurred in defending the first amendment to the
Constitution.