Daily Business Review
March 15, 2011
The American Civil Liberties Union of Florida has asked the U.S. Supreme
Court to review the constitutionality of a state law banning public
universities from using any funds for research and travel to Cuba.
The ACLU, representing the faculty of Florida International University
and other professors, is appealing a ruling by the 11th U.S. Circuit
Court of Appeals, which reversed a 2006 decision by U.S. District Judge
Patricia Seitz in Miami declaring the law unconstitutional.
"This law allows Florida to be the only state in the country with its
own foreign policy which runs over, above and contrary to the foreign
policy of the United States," said Howard Simon, executive director of
the Florida ACLU.
The state law prohibits professors, scientists and students from using
public university funds for work in Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Sudan and
Syria.
The 11th Circuit decided restricting publicly funded travel was "not
beyond a state's valid powers."
The petition filed Friday claims the law "meddles with foreign commerce
by imposing restrictions on commerce with certain foreign nations that
exceed the restrictions already imposed by federal law."
Paul F. Brinkman of Alston & Bird in Washington is serving as ACLU
counsel in the case along with the Flordia ACLU legal director Randall
Marshall.
"Crude censorship like this only serves to keep Americans uninformed,"
Simon said.
The state attorney general's office, which has defended the law, did not
respond to a call for comment by deadline.
No comments:
Post a Comment