LEGISLATION
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Alaska Senate Bill 72 and House Bill 127: Amending the Internet Censorship Law at Issue in ABFFE v. Sullivan
Alaska House Bill 72 and Senate Bill 127 are companion bills that would have narrowed Alaska's existing harmful to minors law (currently enjoined as a result of a court challenge initiated by Media Coalition) as it applies to the Internet. The languague addressing the problems that prompted Media Coalition to challenge the law have now been removed from the legislation.
Most Recent News: H.B. 72 passed the House Judiciary Committee on March 11 with the section that applies the state's harmful to minors law to the Internet removed. On March 3, Media Coalition sent a memo to House Judiciary Chair Carl Gatto and Vice-Chair Steve Thompson addressing its members' concerns about H.B. 127, Section 9, which would have narrowed the harmful to minors law passed in 2010 to criminalize only the distribution of harmful to minors material by an adult if the recipient is under 16 years of age and the adult is reckless regarding the recipients' age or if the adult believes the recipient is younger than 16. The legislation would also have added a knowledge requirement as to the content being sent to a the minor. Because this language was later removed by the Judiciary Committee, the court challenge to the existing law will continue.
History: Alaska lawmakers on January 26 introduced S.B. 72 and H.B. 127 at the request of the governor. The legislation would amend the law at issue in ABFFE v. Burns, a legal challenge to Alaska's harmful to minors law initiated last year by Media Coalition members. In that case, a preliminary injunction has been granted (follow the link above to read more about the case). The bills would change the knowledge requirement in the existing law regarding distribution of certain speech on the Internet. The bills have been referred to the judiciary committees in their respective legislative bodies.
On February 14, Media Coalition sent the Senate Judiciary Committee a memo expressing our reservations regarding S.B. 72. The Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing on the bill on February 16.
Media Coalition sent a similar memo to the House Judiciary in reference to H.B. 127 on February 4.
Prior Legislative History
2010 Senate Bill: Under the original SB 222, proposed in March 2010, booksellers and librarians could have faced felony charges for selling or loaning a book, magazine, or DVD with even mild or educational sexual content to a person under the age of 16. The passage of such a law would have had a chilling effect on content creators and distributors who produce and disseminate age-appropriate and culturally significant books, magazines, movies, and other media. The bill also applies these restrictions to Internet transmissions.
At a hearing on April 5, 2010, the Alaska Senate Judiciary Committee took up a substitute version of SB 222, which substantially improved the flawed bill. The substitute version amends SB 222 to add the three prong Miller/Ginsberg test to the present law governing sexually explicit material. The Senate bill also excludes the provision, included in the House bill, that bans as child pornography material that appears to depict minors engaged in sexual conduct or lascivious nudity.
On April 6, 2010, Media Coalition sent a letter to Senator French, chair of the Judiciary Committee, outlining the constitutional problems that remain in the substitute version of SB 222, concentrating primarily on Section 8. Media Coalition also sent letters to both the House and Senate Finance Committees on April 12 and 9, respectively, asking the Committees to amend the bill's problematic sections.
2010 House Bill: Before Alaska's House Bill 298 underwent a serious amendment process, the proposed legislation sought to criminalize all distribution - whether electronic or physical - by adults to minors of material featuring any sort of sexual content. The bill as originally written would have criminalized librarians, booksellers, and even parents for selling, renting, or loaning material with sexual imagery, including age-appropriate sex education books, art anthologies featuring nudes, the Oscar-winning film Titanic or screen adaptations of Romeo and Juliet.
During the amendment process, HB 298 was amended to encompass only those works that, taken as a whole, appeal to the prurient interests of minors and lack serious artistic, literary, political, or scientific value for minors. But two constitutionally questionable provisions remained in the amended bill. First, HB 298 bans the electronic dissemination of sexual material, including material posted on generally accessible web sites. Secondly, another provision bans the sale of material that "appears" to show a minor engaged in sexual conduct. The Supreme Court has struck down restrictions on such depictions, since they do not cause harm to children.
Memo in Opposition to the amended HB 298
HB 298 went through a second round of changes in late March 2010, but the bill still contained two sections - Section 6 and Section 9 - that are of dubious constitutionality. Although the bill now seeks to criminalize only material that is "harmful to minors," its provisions also apply to generally accessible Internet content. Thus, because Internet retailers cannot verify their customers' ages, the bill could result in online businesses and content providers limiting themselves to selling or posting only material deemed appropriate for minors, violating the First Amendment rights of adult customers and consumers.
Memo in Opposition to the twice-amended HB 298
The House bill was eventually abandoned when the legislature took up an amended version of the Senate bill.
Post-Legislative History
After Governor Parnell signed S.B. 222 into law, Media Coalition members challenged it as unconstitutionally overbroad. Read more about that case here.
updated 12/31/11
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