Federal Times newspaper clipping

Title

Federal Times newspaper clipping

extracted text

FEDERAL TIMES JULY 31, 1978
by John Kidner

The B.E.S.T.* on…
Supreme Court Decisions

-*Bureaucratic Evaluation of Solutions and Tactics.

The Supreme Court (SupCt) has just ended another term. It has been a remarkable one because (1) each decision was better than the next, and (2) it slid us gently across the High Noon of our System of Laws.

Let me explain. I began a broad study on the Judiciary sometime back. Among other things I wanted to investigate parking tickets because I felt, for example, that my collection was due entirely to discrimination. That is, why should there be empty reserved places where I worked and when I needed a place to park, couldn't get one because I was not among those to whom the places had been allocated. At the time, the Bakke thing was blooming and I believed I might get one of the flowers if I screamed, "QUOTA!”

I called in a couple of lay people who had some legal experience. One was on probation for, as he put it, making a typographical error on his Federal Income Tax return. The other was on parole for too violently defending the right of elements of the Civil Liberties Union to say that the U.S. Nazi Party isn't included in civil liberties.

By the end of the third visit, we agreed that within a matter of days, the U.S. would have so many laws on the books that the passage of just one more would contradict one that already existed! I was then infinitely pleased to see that during this term of the SupCt. our conclusion was borne out.

The court handled this turning point quietly by rendering two decisions. The first was the right of authorities to search newspaper offices when they think there is evidence on file that might be needed. The second was the decision to prohibit the press from using seven very dynamic, dirty words.

The contradiction comes through asking, “How is an editor going to express his feelings after some under-fire politician repeatedly has the newsroom searched for evidence?”

[handwritten at the top of the clipping in red ink]
Is this a shit-on?*

[political comic of ERA protestors]
"WHO ORGANIZED THIS MARCH FOR A SUNDAY, LILLY? HE SAYS ON SUNDAYS THERE ISN'T A POLITICIAN IN THE WHOLE JOINT!'

Fred Reed
To Make It, We’ve Got to Spend It

A matter of pocketbook importance to all of us, yet one which seems to be overlooked, is the strength of American technology. It appears to be slipping. The reasons for the decline vary according to [illegible] ... of electronics are now aflutter because the Japanese are gearing up to enter the microelectronics industry. Microelectronics is a little known but extraordinarily important field which allows fairly sophisticated computers about the size of a fingernail, to be built cheaply.

These clever chips of silicon are on the way to controlling the operation of everything from machine tools to artificial limbs [illegible]

[handwritten at the bottom of the clipping in red ink]
(*on us, that is)