Hugo Black Quotes
The Press was protected so that it could bare the secrets of the government and inform the people. Only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government. And paramount among the responsibilities of a free press is the duty to prevent any part of the government from deceiving the people.
Black, Hugo. New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U.S. 713. Supreme Court of the United States, 1971, p. 717.
The George W. Bush Administration had initiated a secret wiretapping program without informing the Congressional Intelligence Committees as required by the statute or requesting a change in the law from the Judiciary Committee. New York Times, however, had discovered the program and published its existence. This was the way that Congress found out about the program that seemed to violate the law. The Attorney General however was critical of New York Times, and expressed concern that the press had published secret material.
Hugo Lafayette Black was an American lawyer, politician, and jurist who served as a U.S. Senator from 1927 to 1937 and as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1937 to 1971. A member of the Democratic Party and a devoted New Dealer, Black endorsed Franklin D. Roosevelt in both the 1932 and 1936 presidential elections. Having gained a reputation in the Senate as a reformer, Black was nominated to the Supreme Court by President Roosevelt and confirmed by the Senate by a vote of 63 to 16 (six Democratic Senators and 10 Republican Senators voted against him). He was the first of nine Roosevelt appointees to the Court, and he outlasted all except for William O. Douglas.
