АҚШ радио хабар тарату саясаты және әділеттілік доктринасы

Former US broadcasting policy (1949 87)
the concept of sovereign immunity

The fairness doctrine of the United States Federal Communications Commission (FCC), introduced in 1949, was a policy that required the holders of broadcast licenses both to present controversial issues of public importance and to do so in a manner that fairly reflected differing viewpoints. In 1987, the FCC abolished the fairness doctrine, prompting some to urge its reintroduction through either Commission policy or congressional legislation. The FCC removed the rule that implemented the policy from the Federal Register in August 2011. The fairness doctrine had two basic elements: It required broadcasters to devote some of their airtime to discussing controversial matters of public interest, and to air contrasting views regarding those matters. Stations were given wide latitude as to how to provide contrasting views: It could be done through news segments, public affairs shows, or editorials. The doctrine did not require equal time for opposing views but required that contrasting viewpoints be presented. The demise of this FCC rule has been cited as a contributing factor in the rising level of party polarization in the United States. While the original purpose of the doctrine was to ensure that viewers were exposed to a diversity of viewpoints, it was used by both the Kennedy and later the Johnson administration to combat political opponents operating on talk radio. In 1969 the United States Supreme Court, in Red Lion Broadcasting Co. v. FCC, upheld the FCC's general right to enforce the fairness doctrine where channels were limited. However, the court did not rule that the FCC was obliged to do so. The courts reasoned that the scarcity of the broadcast spectrum, which limited the opportunity for access to the airwaves, created a need for the doctrine. The fairness doctrine is not the same as the equal time rule, which is still in place. The fairness doctrine deals with discussion of controversial issues, while the equal time rule deals only with political candidates.

In 1938, a former Yankee Network employee named Lawrence J. Flynn challenged the license of John Shepard III's WAAB in Boston, and also lodged a complaint about WNAC. Flynn asserted that these stations were being used to air one sided political viewpoints and broadcast attacks (including editorials) against local (and federal) politicians that Shepard opposed. The FCC requested that Shepard provide details about these programs, and to appease the commission, the Yankee Network agreed to drop the editorials. But Flynn created a company called Mayflower Broadcasting and tried to get the FCC to award him WAAB's license; however, the FCC refused. Instead, in 1941, the commission made a ruling that came to be known as the Mayflower Decision which declared that radio stations, due to their public interest obligations, must remain neutral in matters of news and politics, and they were not allowed to give editorial support to any particular political position or candidate. In 1949, the FCC's Editorializing Report repealed the Mayflower doctrine, which had forbidden editorializing on the radio since 1941, and laid the foundation for the fairness doctrine by reaffirming the FCC's holding that licensees must not use their stations "for the private interest, whims or caprices [of licensees], but in a manner which will serve the community generally." The FCC Report established two forms of regulation on broadcasters: to provide adequate coverage of public issues, and to ensure that coverage fairly represented opposing views. The second rule required broadcasters to provide reply time to issue oriented citizens. Broadcasters could therefore trigger fairness doctrine complaints without editorializing. The commission required neither of the fairness doctrine's obligations before 1949. Until then broadcasters had to satisfy only general "public interest" standards of the Communications Act. The doctrine remained a matter of general policy and was applied on a case by case basis until 1967, when certain provisions of the doctrine were incorporated into FCC regulations. In 1969, the United States courts of appeals, in an opinion written by Warren Burger, directed the FCC to revoke Lamar Broadcasting's license for television station WLBT due to the station's segregationist politics and ongoing censorship of NBC network news coverage of the U. S. civil rights movement.

In 1974, the Federal Communications Commission stated that the Congress had delegated the power to mandate a system of "access, either free or paid, for person or groups wishing to express a viewpoint on a controversial public issue" but that it had not yet exercised that power because licensed broadcasters had "voluntarily" complied with the "spirit" of the doctrine. It warned that:

In one landmark case, the FCC argued that teletext was a new technology that created soaring demand for a limited resource, and thus could be exempt from the fairness doctrine. The Telecommunications Research and Action Center (TRAC) and Media Access Project (MAP) argued that teletext transmissions should be regulated like any other airwave technology, hence the fairness doctrine was applicable (and must be enforced by the FCC). In 1986, Judges Robert Bork and Antonin Scalia of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit concluded that the fairness doctrine did apply to teletext but that the FCC was not required to apply it. In a 1987 case, Meredith Corp. v. FCC, two other judges on the same court declared that Congress did not mandate the doctrine and the FCC did not have to continue to enforce it.

The fairness doctrine has been used by various administrations to harass political opponents on the radio. Bill Ruder, Assistant Secretary of Commerce in the Kennedy administration, acknowledged that "Our massive strategy [in the early 1960s] was to use the Fairness Doctrine to challenge and harass right wing broadcasters and hope that the challenges would be so costly to them that they would be inhibited and decide it was too expensive to continue." Former Kennedy FCC staffer Martin Firestone wrote a memo to the Democratic National Committee on strategies to combat small rural radio stations unfriendly to Democrats:

The right wingers operate on a strictly cash basis and it is for this reason that they are carried by so many small stations. Were our efforts to be continued on a year round basis, we would find that many of these stations would consider the broadcasts of these programs bothersome and burdensome (especially if they are ultimately required to give us free time) and would start dropping the programs from their broadcast schedule. Democratic Party operatives were deeply involved in the Red Lion case since the start of the litigation. Wayne Phillips, a Democratic National Committee staffer described the aftermath of the ruling, explaining that "Even more important than the free radio time was the effectiveness of this operation in inhibiting the political activity of these right wing broadcasts". The use of the fairness doctrine by the National Council for Civic Responsibility (NCCR) was to force right wing radio stations to air rebuttals against the opinions expressed on their radio stations.

The 1987 repeal of the fairness doctrine enabled the rise of talk radio that has been described as "unfiltered" divisive and/or vicious: "In 1988, a savvy former ABC Radio executive named Ed McLaughlin signed Rush Limbaugh — then working at a little known Sacramento station — to a nationwide syndication contract. McLaughlin offered Limbaugh to stations at an unbeatable price: free. All they had to do to carry his program was to set aside four minutes per hour for ads that McLaughlin's company sold to national sponsors. The stations got to sell the remaining commercial time to local advertisers." According to The Washington Post, "From his earliest days on the air, Limbaugh trafficked in conspiracy theories, divisiveness, even viciousness" (e. g., "feminazis"). Prior to 1987 people using much less controversial verbiage had been taken off the air as obvious violations of the fairness doctrine.

Two corollary rules of the doctrine, the personal attack rule and the "political editorial" rule, remained in practice until 2000. The "personal attack" rule applied whenever a person (or small group) was subject to a personal attack during a broadcast. Stations had to notify such persons (or groups) within a week of the attack, send them transcripts of what was said and offer the opportunity to respond on the air. The "political editorial" rule applied when a station broadcast editorials endorsing or opposing candidates for public office, and stipulated that the unendorsed candidates be notified and allowed a reasonable opportunity to respond. The U. S. Court of Appeals for the D. C. Circuit ordered the FCC to justify these corollary rules in light of the decision to repeal the fairness doctrine. The FCC did not provide prompt justification so both corollary rules were repealed in October 2000.

In February 2005, U. S. Representative Louise Slaughter (D NY) and 23 co sponsors introduced the Fairness and Accountability in Broadcasting Act (H. R. 501) in the 1st session of the 109th Congress of 2005 2007 (when Republicans held a majority of both Houses). The bill would have shortened a station's license term from eight years to four, with the requirement that a license holder cover important issues fairly, hold local public hearings about its coverage twice a year, and document to the FCC how it was meeting its obligations. The bill was referred to committee, but progressed no further. In the same Congress, Representative Maurice Hinchey (D NY) introduced legislation "to restore the Fairness Doctrine". H. R. 3302, also known as the "Media Ownership Reform Act of 2005" or MORA, had 16 co sponsors in Congress. In June 2007, Senator Richard Durbin (D Ill.) said, "It's time to reinstitute the Fairness Doctrine", an opinion shared by his Democratic colleague, Senator John Kerry (D Mass.). However, according to Marin Cogan of The New Republic in late 2008:
On June 24, 2008, U. S. Representative Nancy Pelosi (D Calif.), the Speaker of the House at the time, told reporters that her fellow Democratic representatives did not want to forbid reintroduction of the fairness doctrine, adding "the interest in my caucus is the reverse." When asked by John Gizzi of Human Events, "Do you personally support revival of the 'Fairness Doctrine?, the Speaker replied "Yes". On December 15, 2008, U. S. Representative Anna Eshoo (D Calif.) told The Daily Post in Palo Alto, California that she thought it should also apply to cable and satellite broadcasters, stating:

On February 11, 2009, Senator Tom Harkin (D Iowa) told radio host Bill Press, "we gotta get the Fairness Doctrine back in law again." Later in response to Press's assertion that "they are just shutting down progressive talk from one city after another", Senator Harkin responded, "Exactly, and that's why we need the fairthat's why we need the Fairness Doctrine back." Former President Bill Clinton has also shown support for the fairness doctrine. During a February 13, 2009, appearance on the Mario Solis Marich radio show, Clinton said:

Clinton cited the "blatant drumbeat" against the stimulus program from conservative talk radio, suggesting that it does not reflect economic reality. On September 19, 2019, Representative Tulsi Gabbard (D HI) introduced H. R. 4401 Restore the Fairness Doctrine Act of 2019 in the House of Representatives, 116th Congress. Rep. Gabbard was the only sponsor. H. R. 4401 was immediately referred to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce on the same day. It was then referred to the Subcommittee on Communications and Technology on September 20, 2019. H. R. 4401 would mandate equal media discussion of key political and social topics, requiring television and radio broadcasters to give airtime to opposing sides of issues of civic interest. The summary reads: "Restore the Fairness Doctrine Act of 2019. This bill requires a broadcast radio or television licensee to provide reasonable opportunity for discussion of conflicting views on matters of public importance. The Restore the Fairness Doctrine Act would once again mandate television and radio broadcasters present both sides when discussing political or social issues, reinstituting the rule in place from 1949 to 1987  Supporters argue that the doctrine allowed for a more robust public debate and affected positive political change as a result, rather than allowing only the loudest voices or deepest pockets to win."

Media reform organizations such as Free Press feel that a return to the fairness doctrine is not as important as setting stronger station ownership caps and stronger "public interest" standards enforcement (with funding from fines given to public broadcasting).

In an August 13, 2008, telephone poll released by Rasmussen Reports, 47% of 1,000 likely voters supported a government requirement that broadcasters offer equal amounts of liberal and conservative commentary, while 39% opposed such a requirement. In the same poll, 57% opposed and 31% favored requiring Internet websites and bloggers that offer political commentary to present opposing points of view. By a margin of 71–20% the respondents agreed that it is "possible for just about any political view to be heard in today's media" (including the Internet, newspapers, cable TV and satellite radio), but only half the sample said they had followed recent news stories about the fairness doctrine closely. The margin of error was 3%, with a 95% confidence interval.

In June 2011, the chairman and a subcommittee chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, both Republicans, said that the FCC, in response to their requests, had set a target date of August 2011 for removing the fairness doctrine and other "outdated" regulations from the FCC's rulebook. On August 22, 2011, the FCC voted to remove the rule that implemented the fairness doctrine, along with more than 80 other rules and regulations, from the Federal Register following an executive order by President Obama directing a "government wide review of regulations already on the books" to eliminate unnecessary regulations.