An intolerable lack of tolerance


Tolerance is in short supply nowadays.

That is obvious in two situations where the First Amendment is under assault in Tennessee. Basic freedom of speech and expression and the right to publish are in a crossfire and face threats of prior restraint.

— Frank Gibson, executive director of the Tennessee Coalition for Open Government.

That’s the beginning of a blog post by Gibson on efforts by defense attorneys in a murder trial to prevent The Knoxville News Sentinel from posting public comments on its Web site about their clients and multiple bills in the General Assembly to close access to state gun carry permits, an effort sparked by the posting of the state database of those permits by the Memphis Commercial Appeal.

“It’s hard to image any state with two cases of this magnitude going on at the same time,” Gibson writes.

Indeed!