West Launches PR Blitz Against Public Domain cites and database

[James Love <love@tap.org>]

(TAP-INFO subscription requests to listproc@tap.org) 

TAXPAYER ASSETS PROJECT - INFORMATION POLICY NOTE
CROWN JEWELS CAMPAIGN - Juris, Legal Information
October 19, 1994

     WEST PUBLISHING LAUNCHES LARGE PUBLIC RELATIONS BLITZ AGAINST ATTORNEY
     GENERAL'S PROPOSAL FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN CITATION SYSTEM AND DATABASE OF
     JUDICIAL OPINIONS.

     [note: more than 2 dozen publishers met in Washington on October 19 to
     discuss the creation of a vendor neutral public domain system of
     citation to judicial opinions]

     James Love (202/387-8030; jamie@tap.org)

     West Publishing has mounted an intensive public relations and lobbying
blitz against the Attorney General's proposal to broaden public access to
legal information. 

     [TAP note:  The Attorney General is asking for public comments on
     proposals to create a public domain vendor-neutral system of
     citation and a public domain database for judicial opinions.  At
     present, West Publishing asserts a copyright on the "page
     numbers" of published judicial decisions, giving the firm a
     monopoly on so called "Blue Book" approved citations to much of
     the U.S. case law.  This has prevented many new firms from
     offering new services in competition with West.  To our
     knowledge, West has never given a non-fortune 500 company a
     license to use the West page numbers.  The Department of Justice
     has also launched an antitrust investigation which is focusing on
     the citations issue.  See, "Computer-Aided Legal Research Subject
     of Probe, WSJ, Oct 3, 1994.]

The following are some of the components of the West PR campaign:

-    West has hired at least two public relations firms to battle the DOJ
     public access initiatives, the Cordia Companies, from Alexandra,
     Virginia (voice: 703/684-4874), and the Kamber Group (voice:  202/223-
     8700).  According to Lou Cordia, the president of the Cordia Companies,
     his firm has been hired by West to encourage various legal groups to
     oppose the DOJ initiatives.  This organizing effort is targeted at law
     firms, law schools, publishers and other who are willing to oppose a
     public domain citation.  Mr. Cordia says that he is encouraging these
     groups to submit public comments to the Department of Justice and
     appear at public forums on the topic.

     According to another official from Cordia, the Kamber Group was
     retained by West to deal with the "left side," which was clarified as
     the "liberals."  Mr. Cordia said that Kamber was working with "the
     media."  Kamber is a public relations firm that represents a large
     number of labor unions, non-profits and democratic party organizations,
     as well as several businesses, including West publishing.  Among
     Kamber's other clients include such groups as the Corporation for
     Public Broadcasting, Hand Gun Control, Inc. the Nature Conservancy and
     more than 2 dozen labor unions.  Kamber is holding several press
     briefings, editorial board meetings, and other activities.  One Kamber
     event is an October 19th, 8am press briefing at the West Room of the
     National Press Club, complete with a nice breakfast, providing a West
     spin on the 9 am meeting that TAP is holding with several legal
     publishers.  There are also a number of press briefings for regional
     press.

     West's nationwide effort to generate press opposition to the DOJ
     proposals has  resulted in some editorials and news stories helpful to
     West, such as a recent Op-ed by former Reagan advisor Paul Craig
     Roberts in the Washington Times.  However, in some cases, the PR effort
     has backfired.  The most notable example was an October 16, editorial
     in the Sunday Minneapolis Star-Tribune entitled "Cyber-justice:  West
     Fear of on-line changes groundless."  Portions of the Star-Tribune
     editorial are given below:

          West Publishing Co., fearing a threat to its dominate
          position in legal publishing, has launched a
          relentless assault on a Justice Department effort to
          improve public access to state and federal judicial
          opinions.  In reality, the greatest threat to West
          comes from its own irrational fears and bullying
          behavior...

          ...West wants somehow to prevent the inevitable use of
          these new technologies to create a vendor-neutral, medium
          neutral databases for judicial opinions and citation
          systems.  . . . 

          As every other segment of the information industry is
          discovering, it makes no sense to stand in front of
          this new-technology freight train.  If West were
          smart, it would suspend its paranoid attacks on the
          Justice Department and continue to grow by
          maintaining and adding to the services that have
          become the industry standard.
          [Star-Tribune, October 16, 1994]

     The West PR campaign has been plagued by confusing and conflicting
     claims.  For example, several reporters and government officials report
     that West is saying that TAP is "fronting for LEXIS," while other West
     attacks claim TAP wants the government to put private publishers,
     including LEXIS, out of business.  In fact, LEXIS is one of several
     dozen publishers who support the development of a public domain
     citation system, but since LEXIS owns its own database of case law, it
     opposes efforts to establish a public database of court decisions.  TAP
     supports both a public domain citation system and a public domain
     database of court decision.

-    West has called upon the entire Minnesota congressional delegation and
     other key members of Congress that have received significant campaign
     contributions from West Publishing to oppose the DOJ initiatives on the
     public domain citations and database.  DOJ reports that it has been
     deluged with letters from members of Congress opposing a public domain
     citation and database.  Among the key letters is a September 26, 1994
     letter from Representative John Conyers (D-MI, recipient of $17,262 in
     West campaign contributions) and Representative Martin Sabo (D-MN,
     recipient of $18,470 in West campaign contributions), "questioning" the
     basis for the DOJ initiatives as wasteful and unnecessary, expressing
     "serious concerns," and asking DOJ to submit any decisions to their
     committees for review before implementation.

     Most of the letters from Congress show a very stark misunderstanding of
     the DOJ initiative.  The Attorney General's proposal for a public
     domain citation system is widely supported by non-West publishers and
     is seen as an initiative to enhance private sector entry into legal
     publishing.  The proposal for a public domain database comes one year
     after the Air Force FLITE and Department of Justice JURIS systems were
     crippled after historical records of case law were lost, following a
     dispute with West Publishing over controversial Reagan era contracts
     which gave West ownership over the government's own databases.  The
     first public database of court decisions was created by the Air Force
     in 1964, more than a decade before WESTLAW became a product.  The
     proposal for a public domain repository for court decisions was made by
     the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts in 1990, but defeated
     after and aggressive lobbying campaign by West.  At present many courts
     disseminate opinions electronically, but only keep opinions of bulletin
     boards for a short time, without archiving older opinions.  Lack of
     ready access to historical opinions has deterred entry by new firms in
     the legal publishing industry, as has the West practice of modifying
     printed opinions to contain slight grammatical changes, asserting a
     copyright.

-    West has undertaken a major effort to stack an October 19 meeting
     organized by TAP with West supporters.  West has contacted journalists,
     publishers and law librarians, offering to pay plane tickets, hotels,
     meals and other travel expenses to attend a meeting that TAP has
     organized for supporters of a public domain citation system.  One
     reporter told TAP that she was offered two tickets to attend, but
     declined the offer on ethical grounds.  A number of persons who
     contacted TAP reported that they were told the meeting was a West
     event, even though it is being held at the TAP offices.  Earlier, West
     had asked TAP to attend the meeting, and TAP agreed, with the
     understanding that the purpose of the meeting was to discuss how a
     public domain citation system would be implemented, rather than debate
     whether or not it was in the public interest to have a citation system
     that was not owned and controlled by West.  [West's surprising decision
     to call press attention to this meeting, which was called to discuss
     rather technical and dry issues concerning paragraph numbering and case
     numbers, has probably increased the importance of the gathering, and
     for that, TAP is grateful to West.]

-    West has written 6,000 West employees and retirees, urging them to
     write Attorney General Janet Reno in opposition to the DOJ proposals
     for a public domain citation and a public domain database of federal
     legal information.  DOJ reports that it has received about 500 letters
     in opposition to its public access initiative.

[Some information about the West efforts can be found on the West gopher, at
gopher.westpub.com, under the directory, "West Issues."  For additional
information, check out the TAP archives at CPSR.ORG, the "Who Owns the Law"
article by Gary Wolf from the May 1994 issue of Wired, or Susan Hansen's
September 1994 article "Fending Off the Future," in the American Lawyer.]


WHAT YOU CAN DO


If you support a public domain citation system and/or a public domain
database of judicial opinions, contact you own member of Congress and ask
them to become engaged in this issue, and to support both proposals.  This is
important, and you help is needed.


jamie love
jamie@tap.org  202/387-8030

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