U.S. Supreme Court
Photo credit: U.S. Govt.
Posted 11/28/11
Some time next spring, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments on the constitutionality of President Obama’s health care plan, the one dubbed Obamacare by its critics. The real title is the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
Last week, U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), and two colleagues Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL), and Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY) wrote to Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts asking him to consider allowing broadcast and cable outlets to offer live coverage of the oral arguments.
This is not a simple request. The high court has never invited such coverage. The closest the justices have come is to make available audio recordings of oral arguments at the end of each week during the court season, and that’s a recent development.
The overall history of “cameras in the courtroom” is relatively modern. Most states supreme courts do allow microphones and cameras in for oral arguments, and increasingly lower courts grant broadcast permission, but it has been a long fight to make this happen.
For instance, Connecticut began slowly, experimenting with cameras in the courtroom in limited cases for several years, before broadening permission only in recent times. Cameras and mikes now are allowed from Superior Court to the State Supreme Court.
Many judges have resisted broadcast coverage. Why? Because they could, and because many feared their power as “king in their own courtroom” would erode, and their rulings laid open to more public scrutiny. Those fears often were masked by claims that somehow broadcast coverage would be disruptive to the seriousness of court proceedings.
More enlightened judges and judicial officials have realized over time that showing the general public what goes on in the courtroom can be beneficial. Judges and courts in general would no longer be seen by many people as forces secret and dangerous that imperiled their human rights.
The U.S Supreme Court, being supreme in the judicial system, has been the last hold-out on broadcast coverage. Senator Blumenthal, his colleagues and others feel the healthcare case would be a great opportunity to break down the barrier.
In their letter to Roberts, they argue that “modern technology would easily allow for instantaneous, real-time access to the audio and video of the oral argument proceedings…and such broadcasts would improve the public’s understanding of both this critical case and the role of the Court.” They argue further that the use of well-placed pool cameras and microphones would allow broadcast of the event “without intrusive or inappropriate display.”
Seating in the Supreme Court chamber for oral arguments obviously is limited and the Senators say the important health care case should not be “restricted to those privileged few” who can be in court.
The justices of the high court have heard the pitch to broadcast oral arguments for years yet the ban has continued. If a change comes, they may not want to be seen as responding to pressure on one specific case—no matter how high-profile. Also, the health care debate has been highly controversial, and oral arguments will be delivered smack dab in the middle of the 2012 presidential campaign year.
While Blumenthal, Durbin, and Schumer are Democrats, you can’t score their pitch for broadcast coverage as purely political, because Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA) also has made the same request.
C-SPAN, the national cable network that broadcasts many federal government meetings and events formally has asked the high court to allow broadcast coverage of the health care case. CEO Brian Lamb told Roberts C-SPAN could use its expertise in airing federal government events, offering to handle the broadcast and make it available to all media interested in carrying the court session.
The 3000-member Radio Television Digital News Association also asked the Supreme Court to open the health care oral arguments to broadcast coverage stating that “there is no better time in anticipation of this watershed case for the Supreme Court justices to suspend the ban on cameras in the courtroom and allow live electronic coverage of this and other proceedings of keen interest and import to the American public.”
Up to this point there has been no official comment from the justices or their administrative spokeswoman on the multiple requests for expanded media coverage.
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