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Global Gag Rule

Global Gag Rule

Posted Nov 8, 2018 16:40 UTC (Thu) by nybble41 (subscriber, #55106)
In reply to: Global Gag Rule by anselm
Parent article: A "joke" in the glibc manual

> It doesn't prohibit speech *in the USA*, because that would make it unconstitutional.

There is no such qualifier anywhere in the Constitution. It would violate the 1st Amendment for Congress to make any law abridging anyone's freedom of speech, domestically or abroad. In the latter case, of course, there is the further issue of jurisdiction: Congress has no power to make laws for non-citizens outside US territory, so any law which attempted to prohibit speech by non-citizens abroad would be null and void. The same applies to the executive and judicial branches; anyone attempting to enforce such a rule cannot claim any authority to do so based on the US Constitution. Any special status they might claim as an agent of the US government (which would include members of the military as well as diplomats) is conditioned on adhering to the restrictions set down in the Constitution, including the Bill of Rights; Congress authorizing or directing anyone to abridge the freedom of speech—anywhere in the world—would constitute passing an unconstitutional law in violation of the 1st Amendment.

Of course, a person could act *without* any blessing from Congress or the Constitution, but at that point they they're just acting as private individuals outside US jurisdiction on their own initiative and without any special protection, not as representatives of the US government.


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Global Gag Rule

Posted Nov 8, 2018 18:01 UTC (Thu) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link]

Of course the “global gag rule” doesn't try to limit freedom of speech directly. What it does instead (in its most recent, Trump-enacted, version) is withdraw US government funding from any non-US health organisation that promotes voluntary family-planning activities, including but not limited to abortion, even in jurisdictions where, e.g., abortion is legal. This amounts to almost $9 billion/year, and can reasonably be considered an indirect damper on freedom of speech for those organisations.

Global Gag Rule

Posted Nov 18, 2018 20:59 UTC (Sun) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link]

> Congress has no power to make laws for non-citizens outside US territory,

So how come UK citizens have been extradited to, charged, and imprisoned, in the US for crimes against US law, which were perfectly legal when they were committed *in the UK*.

Cheers,
Wol


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