Reactions to the Separation
"The Court regarded the law's goal of protecting children from indecent material as legitimate and important, but concluded that the 'wholly unprecedented' breadth of the law threatened to suppress far too much speech among adults and even between parents and children. 'the interest in encouraging freedom of expression in a democratic society outweighs any theoretical but unproven benefit of censorship.'" - Justice Stevens
"There is no way in cyberspace to make sure that minors can be screened out while still allowing adults to have access to the regulated speech." - Justice O'Connor
"As a matter of constitutional tradition, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, we presume that governmental regulation of the content of speech is more likely to interfere with the free exchange of ideas than to encourage it." - Justice Stevens
(Excerpts from the Supreme Court Opinion in Reno v. ACLU, pulled from a New York Times article)
"Justice John Paul Stevens, writing for the majority, said that Congress had a right to protect minors, but the government failed to show that the broad - reaching decency act would work. The court also said that the act might curb unintended speech widely viewed as acceptable. He likened it to 'burning down a house to roast a pig.' 'It is true that we have repeatedly recognized the governmental interest in protecting children from harmful materials,' Stevens wrote. 'But that interest does not justify an unnecessarily broad suppression of speech addressed to adults.'"
(Excerpt from an Omaha World Herald article about the decision in Reno v. ACLU)
"'The court is telling parents to abandon any hope of a decent public culture, and simply to barricade their children behind the walls of SurfWatch,'' Coats said in a statement.' 'It is telling families to fend for themselves in an Internet universe of raw indecency.''"
"The decision was hailed by the group of organizations who fought the law as 'an historic day not only for free speech in cyberspace, but for the growth of the infant medium and the development on electronic commerce.'"
"'The Supreme Court has written the Bill of Rights for the 21st Century,' said Jerry Berman, executive director of the Center for Democracy and Technology, one of the groups that sued to overturn the CDA. 'We are elated.'"
(Excerpts from Arizona Daily Star article on the Supreme Court decision)
"'Now more than ever, parents need to monitor their children's use of the Internet,' said Carmen Pate, vice president of Concerned Women for America. 'This will mean that many parents will need to become computer savvy and establish firm guidelines for their children's use of the computer. We can no longer count on the court system to protect our families.'"
(Excerpt from a Washington Times article about the reactions to the Supreme Court ruling)