Free Speech Alliance Delivers 400,000 Petitions Calling on Congress to Ban Regulation of Political Speech on Radio

Thursday, June 04, 2009
By Nicholas Ballasy, Video Reporter


(CNSNews.com) – More than 400,000 Americans have signed petitions urging Congress to hold a vote on the Broadcaster Freedom Act of 2009, which would permanently ban reimplementation of the so-called "Fairness Doctrine," which was used by the Federal Communications Commission to regulate discussion of public policy and politics on the radio before it was thrown out in the 1980s by an FCC dominated by Reagan appointees.

It was only after the Fairness Doctrine was revoked that public-policy oriented talk radio, led by Rush Limbaugh, began to flourish. The doctrine had required that when any broadcast station discussed an issue of public controversy opposing sides of the controversy had to be given an opportunity to express their views on the air on that station. As a result, radio station largely avoided discussing controversial issues.

The 400,000 petitions to permanently ban the Fairness Doctrine, gathered by the grassroots activist group the Free Speech Alliance, were sent to Capitol Hill this week for delivery to the offices of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.).

The Free Speech Alliance is led by the Media Research Center, a conservative media watchdog group, that is the parent organization of CNSNews.com. Some members of the Alliance include Concerned Women for America, Americans for Tax Reform, the Discovery Institute, and talk-radio hosts Lars Larson and Rusty Humphries, as well as Clear Channel Communications, which owns more than 300 talk-radio stations.

The Broadcaster Freedom Act of 2009 was sponsored by Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.)
If passed, the bill would amend the Communications Act of 1934 to stipulate that the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) cannot, by law, require talk radio stations to broadcast varying views on controversial issues as was the case under the Fairness Doctrine

Conservative critics have charged that reimplementation of a Fairness-Doctrine-type regulatory regime, often referred to as the “Hush Rush Doctrineâ€