The Association of American Publishers and a coalition of content providers, high-tech industries and public-interest groups have petitioned the federal district court in Philadelphia for permission to submit an amicus brief in support of the American Civil Liberties Union's ongoing court challenge to the Child Online Protection Act. The COP, also known as CDA II, would impose criminal and civil penalties on "commercial" Web sites for posting material deemed "harmful to minors."

The ACLU filed suit to block the COP in October 1998, charging that it is an unconstitutional restriction on First Amendment-protected materials. In November, federal judge Lowell A. Reed Jr., noting "a likelihood of success on the merits of at least some of their claims," granted the plaintiffs a temporary restraining order enjoining the Justice Department from "total enforcement" of the law pending a ruling on the ACLU's suit. This order has been extended to February 1 and the court is holding hearings on the plaintiff's request for a preliminary injunction. Despite congressional claims that the COP is drafted to apply to a narrower range of materials than its model, the 1996 Communications Decency Act, which was struck down in 1997 as unconstitutional, critics complain that it makes the same mistake: trying to protect children by blocking adults' access to constitutionally protected material.

Noting that "we care deeply about kids," Pat Schr der, president and CEO of the AAP, emphasized that "we've come together in the belief that the new law is totally ineffective in accomplishing its stated purpose. The responsibility for keeping age-inappropriate materials on the Internet out of children's reach belongs to their parents, not the government." Schr der stressed that the AAP's brief points to a wide variety of technologies that can be used by parents to block inappropriate material, without crippling the Internet as a medium of commerce and communication.

The brief notes that despite congressional arguments that the COP targets only "commercial pornographers," mainstream businesses and publishers are "faced with potential criminal penalties for guessing wrong as to what a local federal prosecutor might believe is `harmful to minors' in a given community." The brief was drafted by R. Bruce Rich and Elizabeth S. Weiswasser of Weil, Gotshal &Manges, counsel to the AAP's Freedom to Read Committee.

Among the amici signing on to the AAP's brief are the National Newspaper Association, the Magazine Publishers of America and the Internet Alliance. Among the original 16 plaintiffs in the ACLU's suit are A Different Light Bookstore, Powell's Bookstore, the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression, Time Inc. and Salon magazine.