by Mary Curtis

Created on: May 10, 2009   Last Updated: May 18, 2009

This question is important right now because some Democrats in Washington, including Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, are pushing to restore the Fairness Doctrine across the media in an effort to restrict conservative opinion and to impinge upon the popularity of opposing viewpoints, including talk radio.

But lawmakers should say "no" and should not restore the Fairness Doctrine, either in full or in part, because the regulations that would be imposed by its restoration would threaten free speech and opinion on the Internet, personal web sites including blogs, plus radio, television, and other media.

When asked by a conservative journalist, John Gizzi of Human Events, whether she was personally in favor of reviving the Fairness Doctrine, Pelosi answered "yes" and said that she and her caucus would stand in the way of any legislation that would block its return.

In 2008, shortly before the Presidential election, Senator Jeff Bingaman, incumbent democratic and senior senator from New Mexico, told an Albuquerque conservative talk radio host that he would require that radio station to change its programming.

"I would want this station ... to have to present ... different points of view," Bingaman told the radio host. Regarding the Fairness Doctrine, Bingaman said that the media in the United States "for many, many years ... operated under a Fairness Doctrine" and that he felt that the people were "well-served" under these regulations.

Not true. The Fairness Doctrine, during those years, was anything but "fair" and, if it is revived today in any form, will result in the loss of a free exchange of ideas and opinions.

For almost forty years, television and radio were restricted in their editorial opinions, and, as a result were reduced to bland and insipid coverage of news, political, and controversial subjects.

From 1949 to late summer 1987, when the Fairness Doctrine was finally repealed during the Reagan Administration, these restrictive regulations on opinion required all broadcasters, if they engaged in any political opinion or controversial material, to present equal and opposite viewpoints.

Following the end of World War II, radio was at its peak of popularity and television was just beginning to receive national attention. In 1949, the Federal Government imposed the Fairness Doctrine on these media as a way, the government claimed, to keep editorial and political opinion balanced. However, these new broadcasting regulations were also a way for

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