Houchins, Sheriff of the County of Alameda, California v. KQED, Inc. 1978 U.S.

LEXIS 11 VOTE: 4-3 OPINIONS: Chief Justice Burger wrote the judgment of the Court and was in the majority. Justice White and
Justice Rehnquist joined the majority opinion. Justice Stewart wrote a concurrent opinion supporting the majority. Justice Stevens filed a dissenting opinion, which was joined on by Justice Brennan and Justice Powell. Justices Marshall and Blackmun did not participate in the decision of the case.

FACTS: Houchins is a sheriff who controls all access to the Alameda County Jail in Santa Rita, California.

KQED is an operation with various licensed television and radio broadcasting stations that frequently report on newsworthy events. On March 31, 1975, KQED reported a suicide of a prisoner in the Greystone part of the Santa Rita jail. KQED also reported a statement from a psychiatrist stating that the conditions at the Greystone facility were responsible for the illnesses of the prisoners residing there. KQED requested permission to inspect, take pictures and record within the Greystone facility. This request was denied. However, the jail did begin to conduct public tours of the jail but the areas that KQED sought were excluded. KQED and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People from the Alameda and Oakland branches decided to join together and filed a suit. They claimed that Houchins, the Sheriff, had violated the First Amendment by neglecting them access and by failing to provide the public any information about the conditions within Greystone facility. The court of Appeals had concluded that the public and the media had a right of access to prisons and jails protected by the First and Fourteenth Amendment therefore Houchins should allow them access into the Greystone facility.

DECISION: The Court sided with Houchins and declared that not all facilities can be accessible by people of the
media. The Court thus reversed and remanded the court of Appeals decision.

RATIONALE: The United States Supreme Court ruled that Houchins had to right to deny KQED entry into the

prison because it did not violate the First and Fourteenth Amendments. The Court stated that the news media do not have a constitutional right of access to a county jail over that of other people of the public. Additionally, even if the place is governmentally owned, it still does not give the media a right to access it. Though the Court did agree that KQEDs intention to show the conditions of the jails were a matter of great public importance, the Court pointed out that they like all other components of our society are subject to limits. The Court stated that the KQED intention to show the conditions of jails is vital since the media is the eyes and ears of the public. That, however, did not mean that the media was equipped to deal with problems of prison administration and that We must not confuse the role of the media with that of government. The Court also mentioned similar, previous cases such as Grosjean v. American Press Company to demonstrate the significance of having an informed public opinion. However, as the Court pointed out, these cases demonstrated that the media has the freedom to communicate information once it is acquired. However, this does that mean that the Constitution can force the government to supply information to the media because as previously stated, the media has its limits and should not think that they hold a higher access beyond those of the general public. In Justice Stevens dissent, he stated KQED did have some access but not as much as the lower court had established. There should be a more narrow definition of press access. He also expressed the difference between the news media and the general public by stating that the media is in place to inform and provide for the public.

IMPORTANCE: The case showed how the Court was protecting certain aspects of governmental property

against intrusion from the media. They also enforced the idea that the just because the media report on behalf of the eyes and ears of the public it does not mean they can go about and push through limitations. Limiting access does not violate any rights. The Court instituted the medias access is no different then the general publics. Additionally, the Court established that public access to jails is an issue meant for the legislature.