Michigan Law Bans Meth Recipes on Internet

[old hippie 56]

Little noticed among the package of anti-meth bills signed last week by Gov. Granholm was one that bans publication of recipes for cooking meth and provides civil sanctions for violating it. The bill does not specify that the web site be based in Michigan.
The attorney general could bring a civil action suit against anyone who published such info on the web. That is including injuctions against the site, actual damages, punitive damages and attorney fees and cost.

Now how much money this is going to cost the state when these First amendment lawsuits start hitting the court system?

Reputation Comments on this post:

Good find... dumb bill...

[fatal]

Freedom Of Speech!!!

Come And See The Violence Inherent In The System!!!
Help! Help! Im Being Opressed!

[Abrad]

The bill does not specify that the web site be based in Michigan.

So how will this be enforced?

[old hippie 56]

Swim was wondering the same thing, sounds like a big waste of taxpayers money and the legal system time.

[radiometer]

First Amendment: New Michigan Law Bans Methamphetamine Recipes on Internet

7/14/06
LINK

Little noticed among the package of anti-methamphetamine bills signed last week by Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm (D) was one that bans publication of recipes for cooking meth and provides civil sanctions for violating it. The bill does not specify that the web site be based in Michigan.

Under the new law, the state attorney general could bring a civil action against anyone who published such information on the Internet. Courts could order relief in various forms, including injunctions against the web site, actual damages sustained by the state or its residents, punitive damages, and attorney fees and costs.

The new law seems certain to be challenged on First Amendment grounds, a fact perhaps implicitly acknowledged by the state's fiscal analyst. "The bill would have an indeterminate fiscal impact on the judiciary," noted analyst Marilyn Peterson. "Any fiscal impact would depend on the number and complexity of lawsuits brought under the bill."

[radiometer]

I just added that because it had a bit more text than the original post.

[RPS]

Although I do not agree with the use of meth in total, I see no point of the government passing (or even suggesting, for that matter) this bill (or act, now) when the money could be used for rehabilitation opposed to incarsaration and/or paying lawyers and police officers.

Theres your tax dollars at work (if you are an American, that is)
Just My .02

Cheers,
RPS

[sadskills1987]

looks like another case for the ACLU!! i love how just because we are in a supposed "crisis" with meth use that they believe that they can use it as an excuse to take away rights that have very little to do with the issue at hand. its like just because you are browsing a food forum and somebody asks for a recepie for some kind of special homemade icecream that you know you have in some dusty old cookbook doesn't necessarily mean that you make your own ice cream at all or that anyone else will from your recepie, it's more of a refrence point. anybody seriously into drug manufacturing most likely has many people to consult on methods and probably doesn't trust what they can find on the web as far as they can throw it.

[old hippie 56]

What next, burning all the books with any reference to the making of illicit drugs. Most of the recipes on the web all got their start in a chemistry book somewhere.

Reputation Comments on this post:

siznizzle

[Jackyl]

This doesn´t make sense at all. There are hundreds of scientific publications which describe in detail how to make drugs of abuse. Derived from that there are hundreds of more or less similar recipes circulating on the Net. It is all part of science and there is now way you can control this.

[beentheredonethatagain]

Originally Posted by old hippie 56

What next, burning all the books with any reference to the making of illicit drugs. Most of the recipes on the web all got their start in a chemistry book somewhere.

dawg this I hope is not going to hold up in court

[jux]

hmm...trying to set a legal precedent on internet censorship in america perhaps?

just for the sake of arguement, lets say a lawsuit is brought up to the supreme court and the court says its not covered by the first ammendment (with the right group of justices, this could happen)...then what? now the government is easily set up to censor other things on the internet because of the previous ruling saying it doesnt violate the constitution. places like china have been successful at censoring the internet country-wide...the us could be facing the same type of thing...

not saying this is actually going to happen, but IMO its something to think about....

[izzy31]

Print Them Out While You Still Can All Other Residents!

[beentheredonethatagain]

Originally Posted by izzy31

Print Them Out While You Still Can All Other Residents!

I personally have the mind set to commit them to memory..

back in the mid 1990'z I have known people who tattoo the reciepe, synthesis. on their chest.

true story. swear to God on a stack of Bibles.

[fnord]

If i was a local i would print up tons of the recipes and wheatpaste them all over town.

Mwhahahahahaha!!!!!

[Panthers007]

Or put them to music and form a bad rock band.

Hmmm....Buzzcock & The Tweakers?

[Alfa]

A bit shocking, but I am glad that this is from 2006. Note that this bill only relates to webmasters, not to website users or those who post on forums.

(1) The attorney general may commence an action against a person who develops or maintains a website or page on a website for the purpose of publishing instructions for the manufacture or creation of methamphetamine or information on how to obtain substances that may be used in the manufacture or creation of methamphetamine.
(2) The court in an action brought under subsection (1) may order 1 or more of the following forms of relief:
(a) Injunctive or other equitable relief, as appropriate.
(b) Actual damages sustained by this state or the residents of this state that are caused by the publication.
(c) Punitive damages that the court determines are just and equitable.
(d) Actual attorney fees and costs.
(3) This section does not apply if the published information is only on how to obtain substances that may be lawfully possessed in this state and the purpose of the website is to provide information on obtaining the substances only for lawful purposes and in a lawful manner.
(4) As used in this section:
(a) "Internet" means that term as defined in 47 USC 230.
(b) "Methamphetamine" means the substance described in section 7214(c)(ii) of the public health code, 1978 PA 368, MCL 333.7214.
(c) "Website" means a collection of pages of the world wide web or internet, usually in HTML format.
Enacting section 1. This amendatory act takes effect October 1, 2006.

This act is ordered to take immediate effect.

[bcubed]

I'm going to take a contrary stance here: every man-hour of gov't time spent writing and enacting laws that, by their very nature, are unenforcable is time taken away from legislators who COULD be writing effective laws that constrict freedoms instead.

Thus, I'm actually in favor of this ineffectual drug law! The only thing BETTER would be if gov't would spend more time with the REALLY stupid stuff such as "...NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that henceforth, May 28th shall be known as 'Have sex with a librarian day' within the confines of Moosescat, MN."

(Actually, that doesn't sound half bad...perhaps I'll start a petition)

[Expat98]

Originally Posted by Alfa

A bit shocking, but I am glad that this is from 2006. Note that this bill only relates to webmasters, not to website users or those who post on forums.

I am not so sure about that. Look at the way the term "website" is defined:

c) "Website" means a collection of pages of the world wide web or internet, usually in HTML format.

So a person who develops or maintains a "website" is a person who develops or maintains a collection of HTML pages. It doesn't say anything about running a server.

It is also worded to say that the law applies to "a person who develops a ... page on a website". Think about the following example:

There are many blog sites where blogging software allows someone to publish a blog on the web. Suppose that someone publishes a blog containing various meth recipes. They are not involved with running the actual website that serves their blog. They are just using the software provided by the blogging site to publish the content on the blog web pages. But the way this law is worded, it seems to me that they could be construed as "a person who develops a page on a website".

From that blog example, it's not that far of a stretch to say that the law could also apply to posting meth recipes on a forum. It's basically the same thing. The forum software allows you to publish content on a web page just like the blogging software does. Does this count as "developing" a web page? I guess it's a question of how the word "develop" is interpreted.

[Alfa]

A thread is not maintained by one person. A blog is. With a blog you have your own part of a website that you maintain. Your blog is hosted by the webmaster, but maintained by you. On a forum many users post, but it seems odd to claim that they maintain it. On the other hand, it would be hard to say that the webmaster maintains it either. I dunno.

[Panthers007]

This reminds me of the uproar created when people found they could get the plans to build an atomic bomb - in their town library. Oh dear! Should we arrest the librarians? That was never enacted. But:

They did start keeping records on the people who took out books that contained information that the government thought be relevant to such. Followed by any information that might be relevant in...fill in the blank.

The Patriot Act makes this law. The FBI (and others in the alphabet-soup) are now authorized to go to bookstores, libraries, wherever, to find out what people are reading. I'd love to see a comprehensive list of titles considered "A threat to National Security." I wonder if Huckleberry Finn is on it. Sam Clemmens (aka Mark Twain) was an anti-war protester.

[Alfa]

I saw a documentary on that. Library systems that ping the gov if people lend several flagged books.