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ELECTION 2000
C-SPAN drops suit
against GOP candidate
Gephardt objected to
broadcast of
promises to promote
homosexual agenda
By Jon E. Dougherty
© 2000 WorldNetDaily.com
C-SPAN -- the cable television
channel that features
congressional and governmental
hearings and testimony -- said
it would drop its lawsuit
against a former Republican
congressional candidate that
the network said illegally used
its footage in a campaign ad
against House Minority Leader
Dick Gephardt, D-Mo.
The suit claimed
that Bill Federer,
a St. Louis-area
real estate
executive and
author who ran an
unsuccessful
campaign to unseat
Gephardt, violated
copyright law
because his
campaign developed
an ad using C-SPAN
footage showing a
speech the House minority
leader gave to the National Gay
and Lesbian Task Force Oct. 5,
1999.
Attorneys for the cable channel
said the network would drop its
suit against Federer and not
ask him to pay any damages if
he agreed to drop an appeal he
had filed against C-SPAN in the
U.S. Eighth Circuit Court of
Appeals.
"This is a
tremendous victory
for the American
people," Federer
said in a statement
released Thursday,
after both parties
agreed to settle
the matter out of
court. "It is vital
to the life of the
nation that the
political processes
be open to the public."
"We are pleased that C-SPAN has
thought better of suing Mr.
Federer for
constitutionally-protected
speech," added Stephen M.
Crampton, chief counsel for the
American Family Associated
Center for Law & Policy, which
represented Federer.
In his speech before the
homosexual group, Gephardt
said, "If I have anything to
say about it, I can assure you
that these measures -- that
make good sense and represent
the right values for America --
will be on the agenda and will
be passed."
That portion of Gephardt's
speech was included in the
Federer ad. The agenda Gephardt
referenced includes the
National Gay and Lesbian Task
Force's support for legislation
promoting, or approving of --
on the federal level --
homosexual marriage,
homosexuals in the Boy Scouts,
government-funded
needle-exchange programs for
drug addicts, homosexual
recruitment programs in the
public schools and opposition
to any law that would
criminalize the purposeful
transmission of AIDS.
Federer has charged the
Gephardt campaign with
encouraging C-SPAN to initiate
legal action -- much in the
same way Gephardt campaign
officials initially encouraged
St. Louis television stations
to pull Federer's campaign ads.
The ads first aired Oct. 24,
but were ordered off the air by
U.S. District Judge Charles A.
Shaw Oct. 27 after Gephardt
officials complained to local
television stations that an ad
featuring the C-SPAN footage
violated copyright laws.
"We understand that C-SPAN does
not authorize their footage to
be used in political television
ads and the Federer campaign
may be violating a copyright
and other intellectual property
rights," said Kevin Gunn of the
Gephardt campaign, in letters
to KDNL-TV and KSDK-TV.
Officials at C-SPAN, said Tom
Federer -- a campaign spokesman
and the candidate's brother --
faxed a warning to the Federer
campaign within a day of the
ad's first airing, threatening
legal action if campaign
officials did not have it
pulled.
However, Federer's campaign
appealed Shaw's ruling to the
Eighth Circuit Court of
Appeals, and Nov. 2 the appeals
court reversed the district
court's ruling, supporting the
Federer campaign's claims that
barring use of C-SPAN video
footage was a violation of the
First Amendment right to free
speech.
"The attempt to block Federer
from publicizing Gephardt's
pandering to a left-wing
special interest group amounted
to little more than
censorship," said Bryan J.
Brown, litigation counsel for
the law center and lead Federer
counsel on Thursday. "If C-SPAN
had prevailed, it would have
made [the network] not a mere
reporter of the news but the
owner" of it.
Due to Friday's congressional
recess, Gephardt was
unavailable for comment.
Gephardt and Federer squared
off in Missouri's Third
District. According to official
state results, Gephardt
defeated Federer by a margin of
57.8 percent (147,222 votes) to
39.7 percent (100,967 votes). |
