ACLJ Preparing Supreme Court Brief to Protect Kids from Internet Porn

Jay Sekulow - ACLJ

I can’t often say “I’m furious,” but I am using this phrase very bluntly today. When someone endangers our children and grandchildren, when someone uses children for perverse sexual pleasure, and when a court allows such a travesty, I think anger is the appropriate response. Anger -- and action. Let me tell you what’s happening:

Our ACLJ team wrote The Protect Act to keep children from being victimized by the multi-million-dollar Internet pornography industry. The Protect Act prohibits anyone from distributing or soliciting any online images, photos, or messages which would be perceived as actual or obscene child pornography. Congress passed this constitutionally sound piece of legislation into law to protect America’s children.

Then a U.S. Court of Appeals declared The Protect Act unconstitutional. They misconstrued the law and relied on unusual and hypothetical reasoning, and they are wrong!

The good news is that the Supreme Court of the United States has agreed to hear this case, and to consider restoring The Protect Act to its rightful place among our nation’s laws. This means we are gearing up to return to the Supreme Court to help vigorously defend The Protect Act and our nation’s children. Without The Protect Act, our children and grandchildren are seriously at risk.

The attack on this legislation originally came from a man in Florida who was convicted of possessing and pandering child pornography depicting his own baby daughter. He is serving concurrent five-year prison terms on each charge; but he appealed his online pandering conviction, claiming that The Protect Act is “overly broad” and in violation of his constitutional rights.

Now the ACLU is supporting this convicted child pornographer—which means their big budget and extensive cadre of lawyers will be arrayed against us. This case is going to take significant amounts of research, a tremendous toll in staff hours, and a concentrated application of legal expertise. But we are willing and able to fight child porn, which is running rampant on the Internet.

Click the following link to read entire article: http://www.aclj.org/TrialNotebook/Read.aspx?id=475