Rebel with
a cause
P o rtla n d te e n takes on
th e fed eral g o v e rn m en t
by
J onathan K ipp
mma Rood is in the throes of a very
big story, especially for a 15-year-old.
E
Greatest need, riskiest behavior
sum up CAP's bottom line by T imothy K rause
Page 26
Her purple hair and trendy black
eyeglasses likely help her fit in at her
Southwest Portland high school. But
this is no ordinary teen-ager.
She is bright and articulate and wise
beyond her years. If nothing else, the gregar­
ious sophomore is braver than most adults.
Rood is suing the federal government.
“Emma Rood vs. the United States of
America,” she says with almost every one of
her newly de-braced teeth showing.
She is not the alone, though. She and
a group o f plaintiffs
from coast to coast
are suing the gov­
ernm ent to ch al­
lenge a new law
forcing
libraries
to censor online
information.
Childrens
Internet
£ mma
They say A the
Protection
ct,
recently
passed
which goes into effect April 20, censors con­
stitutionally protected free speech, a slippery
slope for the First Amendment. If upheld by
the courts, the law would require all libraries
receiving federal funding to use Internet fil­
tering software on all o f their online com­
puters or risk losing that money.
The American Civil Liberties Union
made the lawsuit public March 20, when
Rood and her fellow plaintiffs held a press
conference on the steps o f Central Library
downtown. Multnomah County Library is
the lead plaintiff.
Experts anticipate the case eventually
will go before the U .S. Supreme Court.
The A C L U ’s Chris Hansen, a senior staff
attorney in New York Cit\ had been looking
for library patrons to join he lawsuit when
he found out about Rood. She used public
libraries for almost all her life.
She also understood and appreciated the
issues of free speech and intellectual free­
dom. Her mother, Joanna, is director of the
library system in Clackamas County, so she
picked up a thing or two about the impor­
tance of books and access to information.
W hat Hansen didn’t know about the
potential litigant was the compelling story
she would tell him that would make her “the
perfect plaintiff.”
Continued on Page 11