Boehner Calls House Passage of Pence Amendment a Victory for Free Speech

Via email:

WASHINGTON, D.C. – House Republican Leader John Boehner (R-OH) today highlighted House passage of an amendment offered by Reps. Mike Pence (R-IN), Jeb Hensarling (R-TX), and Jeff Flake (R-AZ) to prevent the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) from funding efforts to reinstate speech regulation known as the ‘Fairness Doctrine’ that was abandoned in 1985. The important amendment responds to new calls by Democrats to reinstate such regulation on talk radio. Boehner issued the following statement:

“The U.S. Constitution guarantees and spells out our rights as citizens. Among those rights is the freedom of speech. Government regulation of speech is a bad idea and leads to the rationing of political thought and expression. If we revive regulation of radio content, should we not regulate film, television, print media and the Internet, media forms many believe the liberal point of view dominates? Wouldn’t that be ‘fair’ as well? Of course not. Government regulating speech is like the fox guarding the hen house.

“I want to thank Mike Pence, Jeb Hensarling, and Jeff Flake for leading the effort to ensure government regulation of talk radio does not become a reality. Reviving the so-called ‘Fairness Doctrine’ would amount to government control over political thought expressed on the public airwaves. It is a dangerous idea and would be a setback for the cause of free speech and the constitutional rights our Founding Fathers put in place at the beginning of the Republic.”

NOTE: The Pence-Hensarling-Flake amendment to the Financial Services appropriations bill would prevent the FCC from funding efforts to reinstate speech regulation known as the ‘Fairness Doctrine.’