NPR has a report this morning about the ACLU's efforts on the ground in Ferguson right now:
Anthony Rothert, the legal director for the ACLU in Missouri, is spending his time either in court or monitoring the late-night protests.
But Rothert says that's been difficult because the police have tried to prohibit recording and keep the media penned into areas outside of the action.
"Where there's a lack of trust between the community and the police, not having a record or any objective person viewing the interactions when things go badly just increases the distrust," he says.
Rothert has filed lawsuits to force the release of public records about the death of 18-year-old Michael Brown. And the ACLU helped reach an agreement with local police to allow reporters to record the protests.
But every time Rothert makes headway on one issue, he says, another crops up.
Rothert says the more fundamental problem in Ferguson now is that "no one knows what the rules are. That includes people who want to protest peacefully and obey the law, and the police officers on the ground who are supposed to be enforcing the law."
cont..
Floyd Abrams, who has practiced First Amendment law for decades, says because the streets are public places, "presumptively, anybody has the right to be anyplace on a street that he or she may choose to be."
Abrams says police do have authority to limit access to places where crimes are under way and to protect public safety.
But when it comes to infringing the First Amendment, he says, "The basic rule is it has to be as narrow as is possible to meet the ongoing and contemporaneous threat."
Abrams fought the former mayor of New York, Rudolph Giuliani, when Giuliani tried to rope off reporters from newsworthy events.
Ultimately, they brokered a deal. He says about Ferguson now, "A core problem of the events in Ferguson from the point of view of press coverage is that there appears to have been ... an effort to prevent press coverage. And that's just constitutionally and from a policy point of view unacceptable."
The ACLU agrees, and is considering more legal action in the days ahead.