Constitutional Law – Freedom of the press – legislative immunity

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U.S. Court of Appeals  For the Seventh Circuit

Civil

Constitutional Law – Freedom of the press – legislative immunity

A state legislature’s decision to deny press credentials to a reporter is entitled to legislative immunity.

“Reeder’s primary argument to the contrary—that the action to deny him credentials was administrative in nature, not legislative—finds little support in the case law or in the slim record before us. Reeder’s conception of the scope of legislative immunity is too restrictive. He argues, for example, that denial of media credentials is unlike speaking, debating, voting on the legislative floor, or conducting a legislative investigation. That set of activities, he assumes, exhausts the possibilities for legislative activity, and so anything not within the set must be administrative. Yet the Supreme Court has never held that the Speech or Debate Clause is so limited. Although it has stated that the Clause does not confer immunity upon absolutely everything done in the legislature, it also has said that the Clause should receive ‘a practical rather than a strictly literal reading.’ Hutchinson v. Proxmire, 443 U.S. 111, 124 (1979).”

Affirmed.

14-1923 Reeder v. Madigan

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of Illinois, Bruce, J., Wood, J.

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