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MONTANA FREE PRESS AWARD
McGiffert recognized for vigorous defense of
First Amendment
J-School Professor Emeritus Bob McGiffert, who taught First Amendment
Law to a generation of UM students and has battled passionately
for open government, is the recipient of the 2002 Montana Free
Press Award.
"I was stunned, surprised, touched and totally pleased,"
said McGiffert, who retired from full-time teaching in 1991. He
accepted the award at the J-school’s annual Dean Stone Night
on April 5. The annual award is given jointly by UM’s schools
of journalism and law.
McGiffert’s legacy of pushing for open government lives on
in Montana journalists who were once his students, noted Professor
Clem Work, who now teaches the Media Law class. McGiffert also
served for many years on the board of directors of the Montana
Freedom of Information Hotline.
| 
Professor
Emeritus Bob McGiffert, here accepting the 2002 Montana
Free Press Award, once wrote, "To paraphrase Thomas Jefferson,
the doors of government must be unhinged from time to time
by the sledgehammer of a free press." |
"For years, while teaching media law here at UM, he was
pretty much Montana's lone expert in mass media law, with his
special passion being the people's right to know about their government,"
Work said in presenting the award. (Read complete
text of Work’s presentation )
As a recent indication of McGiffert’s influence, Work said,
one need only look to the investigation into the car crash last
August that killed Montana House Majority Leader Paul Sliter.
The driver of the car was Shane Hedges, a top aide to Gov. Judy
Martz.
The investigation revealed that Hedges was drunk at the time,
and that some state officials may have tried to cover up his role
in the crash. It also revealed that Martz had taken Hedges home
from the hospital, against police orders, and had washed his blood-stained
clothes before police could collect them as evidence.
Members of the Montana press corps went to court to get access
to the investigation files. One of those who led the fight was
Chuck Johnson, head of the Lee State Bureau in Helena and a former
student of McGiffert’s.
"The man whom we are honoring tonight did not play a direct
role in any of this, but his fingerprints, so to speak, are all
over it," Work said.
In 1972, when Montana’s Constitutional Convention was framing
the Right to Know provision, McGiffert opposed it as too weak.
The provision says the public should be able to attend government
meetings and examine public documents except when the demands
of individual privacy clearly exceed the public's right to know.
McGiffert warned that the privacy exclusion would invite public
officials to keep meetings and records closed and would trigger
lawsuits, but he lost the battle.
In the 30 years since, Work noted, the courts have heard many
costly and indecisive lawsuits.
"The press has been successful with many of them," he
said, "but it's like treading water."
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