Former Journal editor Charles M. Hauser wrote a prophetic commentary in 1983 about "the toughest decision a newspaper editor has to make in the course of his career: whether to exercise what he believes to be his constitutional right to print a news story, or to yield to a judge who says he can't."
Hauser was speaking of an editor in Massachusetts who had faced such a choice. The Journal editor imagined himself in the same pickle, and wrote about what he might do:
"As much as I would like to think the public would cheer the crusading editor who refuses to bend his constitutional principles to the will of a misguided judge, it doesn't always work that way," Hauser wrote in a column published Sept. 4, 1983.
Two years later, Hauser's hypothetical became real.
Using the Freedom of Information Act, The Journal in 1985 received transcripts of taped conversations obtained by the FBI, which from 1962 to 1965 had illegally bugged the Atwells Avenue offices of Raymond L.S. Patriarca, boss of the New England mob.
Patriarca's son, Raymond J. "Junior" Patriarca, filed suit in November 1985, saying that any stories written from those tapes would violate his privacy. Judge Francis J. Boyle, chief judge of the U.S. District Court in Providence, issued a temporary restraining order on Nov. 13 barring publication of the information.
The Journal had to decide: obey the judge and wait for a hearing, or publish the story.
It published.
Hauser explained the decision in this public statement:
"The strength and integrity of the American press are based on the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which guarantees freedom of speech and of the press.
"According to the U.S. Supreme Court, that amendment prohibits what is known as prior restraint -- imposing censorship in advance of publication.
"We have the greatest respect for Judge Boyle, but in this case we are convinced that his order would impose a prior restraint in violation of the Constitution. For that reason, we have decided to publish in today's Journal-Bulletin our article about Raymond J. 'Junior' Patriarca, the first of a series of stories based on the Patriarca tapes.
"Our lawyers have assured us that Judge Boyle has acted unconstitutionally. However, the decision to publish is solely an editorial judgment.
"While not relevant to the constitutional issue, it is worth noting that the Journal-Bulletin obtained the Patriarca tapes in a legal and proper manner after fighting to get them for nine years. They involve people and activities of high public interest, and we believe it is in the best interest of the public to read this material."
The story about Patriarca described conversations between the older Patriarca and his son. "What they show," The Journal wrote, "is a father worried about his son getting into college and the boy's relations with girls, a father full of advice on how to be a man and pick a woman."
Judge Boyle sought to punish the paper. He ruled that The Journal "willfully and deliberately" violated a federal order.
In writing about The Journal, the judge stated: "Its view of the First Amendment is clearly that it has an irrevocable license to publish whatever it pleases whenever it wishes to do so. Although its statement professed respect for the Judge, its words and actions were those of utter defiance of the constitutional system of justice. It is a system of justice that requires respect. The Journal set itself above the law."
Boyle fined the paper $100,000 and placed Hauser on 18 months' probation with 200 hours of community service.
But the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overruled Boyle and threw out the penalties against Hauser and the paper. The case went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled in 1988 that Boyle's court-appointed prosecutor had no jurisdiction to appeal the decision dismissing the charges against the paper.
"Finally," Hauser wrote in a commentary published May 6, 1988, "the 'Patriarca Tapes' case is over, and the contempt convictions of the Journal-Bulletin and this writer have been put to rest."
Hauser wrote that he had been sure The Journal had the law on its side when it chose to publish the Patriarca story in 1985. "Even though the content of this story had no real significance or timeliness, we felt that giving up even one day of publication under an unconstitutional court order would have caused irrevocable damage to the First Amendment, and would have opened the door to future misuse of judicial power . . ."
