Strong Message to Censors

By Ezra Bowen

The decision came quietly, but the reverberations are now sounding around the world. On Nov. 14, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, an autonomous judicial arm of the 32-member Organization of American States, ruled 7 to 0 that a law requiring the licensing of journa lists violated the right to free expression. Stephen Schmidt, an American reporter, had been found guilty in 1983 of practicing journalism in Costa Rica without a required license and had received a three-month suspended sentence from that nation's Supreme Court. In its landmark ruling, the human rights court, which sits in San Jose, Costa Rica, held that "the compulsory licensing of journalists is incompatible with Article 13 of the American Convention on Human Rights insofar as it denies some persons access to the full use of the news media as a means of expressing themselves or imparting information." In Washington, Executive Director Dana Bullen of the World Press Freedom Committee declared, "The ruling should have great impact. It's the best thing since the zipper." Eleven Latin nations* and Spain are among the countries that require journalists to be licensed, typically through a colegio (similar to a trade union) controlled by the government. Advocates of licensing say the practice helps limit the profession to qualified candidates. Some journalists within the license-granting countries agree. Since doctors and lawyers must get their credentials certified, they argue, that requirement should be extended to professional journalists. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization has debated licensing as a way to protect journalists operating in such dangerous circumstances as wars and riots. UNESCO has even considered issuing internationally recognized press cards that would identify journalists in hazardous areas. But after acknowledging the threat to press freedom inherent in any licensing scheme, the U.N. agency has repeatedly rejected all such proposals. %

Opponents of licensing argue that it is merely a cloak to cover government censorship and that it threatens independent reporting. As one example, they point to the 1983 expulsion from Honduras of John Lantigua, an American reporter for United Press International, on the ground that he was not a union member. Lantigua was expelled while working on a story about a secret jail where political prisoners were said to be tortured. In a deliberate effort to break the system, Schmidt, then an investigative reporter for San Jose's English language Tico Times and for the Spanish language daily La Prensa Libre, challenged the Costa Rican colegio at a San Jose meeting of the Inter- American Press Association (IAPA) in 1980. "I'm covering this meeting illegally," he announced. "Let me work or sue me." The colegio responded to the dare, and a criminal suit followed. At his first trial in 1983, Schmidt was acquitted; a lower court ruled that he had indeed violated local law, but that he was exonerated by the higher authority of Article 13.

While the case was being appealed to Costa Rica's Supreme Court, Schmidt left the country--and journalism--to become a financial consultant in Dallas. But he continued the fight. When the Supreme Court released its decision, Schmidt rejected the judges' stipulation that the sentence would be suspended if he returned to Costa Rica and apologized to the colegio. Government attorneys indicated that he could receive a pardon.

"Of course I did not return," Schmidt snapped. "I didn't want a pardon." What he wanted was a test before the human rights tribunal. He got it after the IAPA persuaded Costa Rican President Luis Alberto Monge Alvarez to petition the human rights court for a ruling. Schmidt triumphed, thanks in part to a number of amicus briefs filed on behalf of groups that support freedom of the press, including one by noted Washington Lawyer Leonard Marks and another by Floyd Abrams, one of the U.S.'s foremost experts on press freedom. Nonetheless, President Monge has pointed out, "the opinion of the court is not binding," and in fact he is correct. The human rights court has no enforcement mechanism. Says Marks: "There are no troops to back it up."

Even so, free-press advocates are hopeful that the ruling will send a powerful message, starting in Costa Rica. "We cannot imagine," editorialized La Prensa Libre, "that we requested an opinion only to lightly ignore it." Elsewhere, evidence is mounting that the message will not be discounted. In the Dominican Republic, six publishers are pressing a court challenge against that nation's colegio. And in Peru, Editor Enrique Zileri sees the Schmidt decision as the end of any oppressive threat from licensing. He exulted, "It can't happen here." Although gratified about the victory, Attorney Marks feels the battle has barely been joined. Said he: "Now we've got to go to work on the legislatures of those other countries."

FOOTNOTE: *Bolivia, Brazil, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Panama, Peru and Venezuela.

With reporting by Martin Casey/Miami and Hays Gorey/ Washington