Right Of Access To The Media And Legal Protection

The freedom of speech and of the press is one of the fundamental rights of citizen. The First Amendenment of U.S. constitution stipulates clearly that Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press. As the mass media is the most effective tool and means for free speech, the freedom of speech and of the press will be greatly restricted when it is controlled by a handful of people to decide which kind of idea would be expressed according to their commercial interest. So, in order to realize the pluralism of idea and view, it is necessary to admit and protect the right of access to the media. The so-called right of access to the media means the right of using the mass media to express ideal, view and put out information. The right of access to the media is a constitutional right and is protected by the First Amendenment of U.S. constitution. The theoretical foundation of the right is the theory of revised "free market of idea". According to the theory, right of access to the media would not be realized without the limited intervention of government to the mass media. It is an undeniable fact that there are conflicts between the right of access to the media and the freedom of Journalism of the mass media. When the government makes interference to the mass media to protect the right of access to the media, the mass media usually brings a suit against the government on the grounds that the government infringes its freedom of Journalism. The judicial practice of U.S.A indicates that the legal protection to the right of access to the media depends on the nature of the media, the identity of the speaker and the content of speech, etc. This paper analyses the legal system of America related to the right of access to the media by study of the specific cases in detail. At current China, the speech discrimination phenomenon on the media is popular and a lot of view in the interest of public is difficult to be expressed. The affirmation and the protection of the right of access to the media is imperative. However, there are few researches on the right of access to the media in current China and the relative laws demand perfection urgently. It is hoped that this paper will service the research on the right of access to the media and the legislation to it.