Posted by mist on April 28, 2002, at 12:37:27
In reply to Rules v. Laws » Ron Hill, posted by beardedlady on April 28, 2002, at 7:20:16
> AOL, an enormous on-line company (an understatement, of course) has its own civility rules--strict ones, and they cannot be challenged in the supreme court.
I'm not taking sides on this issue, haven't read the posts in question, but just wanted to point out that AOL is a private company so the first amendment wouldn't apply anyway. It only applies to speech restricted by government or government-funded entities.
> In my school--a university, I have a contract with my students.
> This is not a constitutional law issue.My understanding is that if an institution receives federal funding participants in its activities are entitled to first amendment protections. Even if you have a contract, someone could challenge it and it may not hold up in court based on constitutionality issues. There may be exceptions. I'm not an attorney but I have spoken with one about a related situation in real life that I observed, concerning a private nonprofit organization that received federal funding. The attorney confirmed my understanding that there were first amendment issues involved. Since this is a university research project I imagine the same laws would apply even though it's online (if the university receives government funding).
Again, I don't have an opinion about the specific situation that gave rise to this issue or who's right and who's wrong. I just wanted to provide some information based on what I've learned looking into something similar in the past. I think it's good to be aware of potential issues like this no matter what.
poster:mist
thread:4740
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/admin/20020420/msgs/4778.html