LAT: Cameras Could Get Rolling on High Court Sessions (televised SC)

[DeepModem Mom]

Cameras Could Get Rolling on High Court Sessions
A Senate panel looks at proposals to let federal and Supreme Court proceedings be televised.
By Emma Vaughn, Times Staff Writer


WASHINGTON — With the Supreme Court nomination process for Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr. on hold until hearings in early January, the Senate Judiciary Committee changed course Wednesday to address whether sessions of the court Alito hopes to join should be televised.

Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), the committee's chairman, told a hearing that opening the Supreme Court to television coverage would be "an enormously useful tool for public understanding" and would allow the American people to properly evaluate how their government functions.

Under his proposal, which he introduced last month, cameras would be removed only if a majority of the justices determined that their presence would undermine the due process of a litigant in a specific case.

The Supreme Court makes audio recordings of its proceedings, but releases them immediately only on rare occasions — such as after the arguments in Bush vs. Gore, the case that decided the 2000 presidential election.

In addition to Specter's legislation, the panel also considered a broader bill first introduced by Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) in 2001 and reintroduced again this year....


http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-cameras10nov10,0,2752813.story?coll=la-tot-promo&track=morenews

[underpants]

1. Wow C-Span 4 is going to be WAY more exciting than C-Span 1 thru 3

:eyes:

[DeepModem Mom]

3. Clarence Thomas will send ratings sky high.

:sarcasm:

[meegbear]

2. They should have already!

This shouldv'e happened a long time ago.