Government Abuse : State Government Seizes thousands of Missouri Newspapers, Machines and Company money without notice. (limit, computers)

[RichMonk]

Originally Posted by Curmudgeon

While I cannot argue with the Constitutional and legal issues and am forced to agree with them, it becomes a matter of good taste vs. bad, civility and decency. Obviously, those are beyond some, being over-ridden by pursuit of the almighty dollar. Pity!

Agreed, bad taste, but is it the government's job to get involved in what people read? Is it up to the government to decide what is civil and decent? I believe that is our responsibility and if Missourians want remove a publication from their public rest stops then they should be able to petition for it and, if successful, remove it using activist volunteers.

Instead of expending state resources lining up lawyers and workers to go after unsightly smut we should be investing in new Missouri jobs or trying to cover our state's deficit (which is estimated at $500 million). This is an effort that can wait for better times, IMO.

[ikab6209]

This is the Correct URL for the 8 page non commercial
website of legal positions and court rulings etc including one upheld by the St Louis U.S. Court of Appeals (8th Cir.) which upheld a federal District Court ruling that state regulations limiting vending machines at rest stops violate a newspaper publisher's First Amendment rights.

http://missouri.violatesrights.com/
Rest-stop newsrack ban struck down

[ikab6209]

This is the Correct URL for the 8 page non commercial
website of legal positions and court rulings etc including one upheld by the St Louis U.S. Court of Appeals (8th Cir.) which upheld a federal District Court ruling that state regulations limiting vending machines at rest stops violate a newspaper publisher's First Amendment rights.
http://missouri.violatesrights.com/

[Curmudgeon]

Originally Posted by RichMonk

Agreed, bad taste, but is it the government's job to get involved in what people read? Is it up to the government to decide what is civil and decent? I believe that is our responsibility and if Missourians want remove a publication from their public rest stops then they should be able to petition for it and, if successful, remove it using activist volunteers.

To a degree I think it is, but it's also a fine line to tread. It's like the three bears - too much, too little and trying to find and maintain just right.

With no controls, whatsoever, human nature will devolve into anarchy. With too many controls and government dictates you have California!

[cyrano]

Originally Posted by ikab6209

This is the Correct URL for the 8 page non commercial
website of legal positions and court rulings etc including one upheld by the St Louis U.S. Court of Appeals (8th Cir.) which upheld a federal District Court ruling that state regulations limiting vending machines at rest stops violate a newspaper publisher's First Amendment rights.
Rest-stop newsrack ban struck down

Don't want to answer my question, I see.

[ikab6209]

Originally Posted by cyrano

I guess you didn't want to do business with the Missouri Association of Sheltered Workshop Managers, who have the exclusive license to authorize publishers to place publication vending racks at Missouri rest stops.

No, I have no special knowledge. It took me all of 30 seconds to find this. If you tried to place your racks without knowing of this arrangement, then you now have someone to contact. If you tried to do an end run around them, though, you should be honest and say so.

No one's interfering with your free speech or freedom of the press rights.

We are one of many newspaper distributors of 22 newspapers such as USA today at Missouri rest areas. There are no pornographic newspapers distributed at rest areas.

We distributed 5 and did the litigation that opened up rest areas to first amendment protected newspaper distribution.

We assembled an 8 page non commercial
website of legal positions and court rulings etc including one upheld by the St Louis U.S. Court of Appeals (8th Cir.) which upheld a federal District Court ruling that state regulations limiting vending machines at rest stops violate a newspaper publisher's First Amendment rights.
http://missouri.violatesrights.com/

We had filed twice before seizure, that we had a constitutionally protected right to distribute there, that in addition to several court rulings, they had opened it up to many first amendment activities including registering voters, handing out political literature.. for 18 years thereby making it a dedicated public forum.

They never acknowledged that and despite four inquiries and two responses do not directly admit to four direct inquiries that they have seized our newspapers.

Also that we were entitled to be notified and granted a hearing under the due process provisions of the constitution

Rest areas are paid for by the Federal government and managed and maintained by the state government. Thus they are paid for and owned by the public and all constitutional rights apply there as any where else in Missouri.

Read up on the subject of the importance of newspaper to free society's. The people of Missouri have a right to receive literature, and have obtained 22 newspapers for 18 years and have a right to continue to do so.

U.S. Supreme Court in Martin Vs Struthers......

The Court held that the First Amendment protects both "the right to distribute literature" and "the right to receive it" and stated that the distribution of literature is protected "even if it creates the minor nuisance for a community of cleaning liter from its streets." Justice Hugo Black, writing the opinion of the court,.....-Wikipedia

[ikab6209]

Originally Posted by lifelongMOgal

What the heck is this thread about? Anyone have a link?

This is the Correct URL for the 8 page non commercial
website of legal positions and court rulings etc including one upheld by the St Louis U.S. Court of Appeals (8th Cir.) which upheld a federal District Court ruling that state regulations limiting vending machines at rest stops violate a newspaper publisher's First Amendment rights.
http://missouri.violatesrights.com/

[cyrano]

Originally Posted by lifelongMOgal

What the heck is this thread about? Anyone have a link?

I found out some more after following the thread starter's link, and then following some clues from there. I'm pretty sure I know who ikab is, or at least the person for whom ikab is writing. Just as I write here under a pseudonym and wouldn't appreciate someone revealing my real-life identity, so I won't reveal his. He's the publisher of a couple of newspaper-like publications that are distributed mostly in the midwest. The problem starts when he puts his newspaper racks (those old-fashioned machines where you put money in, lift the metal/glass cover, and get your paper) in places where laws say you either can't put them at all, or you need to get a license to do it. I found 22 judicial opinions with this man's name on them from a quick Westlaw search earlier this evening-- all in federal courts, and all with this common theme. I think it's fair to say he's quite litigious, although the last published opinion was from 2006-- they date back to 1986.

The reason I keep pressing him on why he didn't do business with the nonprofit corporation in Missouri that holds the license for vending machines is that no one's keeping him from putting his machines up in rest areas-- he just has to pay a royalty (something like a nickel a paper) to the people who are responsible for keeping the vending areas tidy. I should mention that this non-profit is run and staffed by blind people-- it's a good way of helping them be self-supporting.

But ikab apparently thinks that these regulations and such are interfering with his free speech and free press rights, so he breaks these rules, puts up the racks without getting a license from the non-profit company, and the state of Missouri, like every other state that I read about while scanning the opinions, takes them down. Then he sues.

And yes, he won one such suit. While he refers to the court as the "St. Louis Court of Appeals" or something like that, it's really the 8th Circuit, and they're headquartered in St. Louis. But the suit was about his actions in South Dakota, and he won, not on some grand freedom of the press grounds, but because the South Dakota laws that the state applied against him were unconstitutional as applied against him. If you want to read the opinion, drop me a PM and I'll send you a URL to the Google Scholar-- but if I posted it here, you'd know who ikab (probably) is.

I'm pretty sure Missouri doesn't have laws like those. What it does have is a law that gives blind people priority for operating vending machines at rest stops (which includes licensing others, like ikab, to do it), and some regulations that describe how the program is to be run.

Oh, I nearly forgot to mention that he's lost every other suit whose record I could find on Westlaw (a database of cases and statutes that lawyers use for legal research), so it's not as if Missouri government is exactly swimming against the tide-- the overwhelming case law has held that ikab is wrong.

There's no such thing as absolute freedom of speech or freedom of the press. The classic statement is that freedom of speech doesn't let you shout "fire!" in a crowded theater (remember theaters?). More generally, the government can regulate both speech and the press to a certain extent, such as determining the rules by which ikab's newspaper racks can be placed in rest areas. I could go into those, but this is too long already.

I'm not involved in this case at all-- I just got curious.

[lifelongMOgal]

Thanks for the explaination cyrano. No, after reading his rants in this thread I am not interested. Though, I do have to wonder why he is using CD for his rant. I'd think that might hurt any pending court case.

[cyrano]

There is no pending court case in Missouri, either in state or federal court. He might be planning to file such a suit-- I can't research that from my home office. When I can start reading minds, I'll quit my job and walk away from my pension-- I won't need it.

While checking the possibility of his filing a state court suit, I found that he did have a speeding ticket in Buchanan County in 1994 (haven't we all?), but just paid it. (in case you don't know about case.net, it's an entertaining way to kill an hour or two, looking up your ex-spouse's records in Missouri courts, and unlike Westlaw or PACER, the federal court records database, it's free. But yes, I use it for work as well.) Computers are wonderful things.