Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

Like the pigs in George Orwell’s Animal Farm, journalists at the Hartford Courant want to be equal to everyone else – only more so. That is why they need a shield law protecting them from giving evidence at trial. Ordinary folk, the other animals in the barnyard of humanity, do not need such protections. And why not? Well, see now, there’s this here thing called the US Constitution. And the US Constitution provides that all the animals in the human barnyard should have an equal right to a fair trial by jury. But rights depend on obligations. There can be no right to a fair trial unless testifiers are obliged to cough up what they know on demand, which is why judges are empowered to find in contempt of court those animals in the human barnyard who have information necessary to assure fairness at court but refuse, for perverse reasons, to depart with it. Traditionally, some exceptions have been allowed: Wives and husbands, for example, cannot be compelled to testify against each other, ...