Public exposure

Government behind the veil is a bit shady

Secrecy in government is as old as the establishment of such institutions among men. Nobody gave the idea of an informed public much sway in the days of monarchs who supposedly ruled by divine decree and certainly not in the realms of dictators. But since its founding, the United States has represented a people unified in certain beliefs and values, those self-evident truths so richly declared in our separation from a king.

Our roots, recognized years later by a gentleman named Abraham Lincoln, are in government of the people, by the people and for the people that our 16th president hoped would not “perish from this earth.” But in expressing such hope, Mr. Lincoln acknowledged that it very well could. If it ever does, we’d bet secrecy will have something to do with it.

That, our fellow Americans, is why we go on and on sometimes about open government. Too much, for some people’s taste, and we hear from them. But it is our conviction that secrecy in government runs counter to freedom.

Naturally, there are no absolutes. One Donald J. Trump isn’t entirely off base when he speaks of a need to not broadcast to the world any future military or diplomatic plans of action involving our adversaries. Keep them guessing, right?

But the secrecy this and other newspapers eschew is the kind that pulls the shade on Americans knowing what their own government is up to. If you need a dramatization, go see Stephen Spielberg’s which tells the story of newspaper battles to publish secret government documents that clearly demonstrated the American government had intentionally misled its people about the conduct of the Vietnam War.

“Only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government,” wrote U.S. Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black. “And paramount among the responsibilities of a free press is the duty to prevent any part of the government from deceiving the people and sending them off to distant lands to die of foreign fevers and foreign shot and shell.”

Yes, in the bureaucratic concoction of government, secrecy must be an ingredient of the rarest sort.

The lofty ideals can, admittedly, get lost at the local level. It is hard to mentally connect a seemingly small infraction against open government in Arkansas to the principles that ensure government serves the people. If there is not open government about smaller things, one can hardly expect open government to be valued when it comes to the big things.

A Sebastian County judge a few days ago ruled email exchanged among Fort Smith city leaders constituted a meeting on issues that are “clearly matters that should have occurred in a public setting.” The judge sided with a citizen who filed two lawsuits against the city over emails circulated among city directors and the city administrator. In one, the judge ruled email exchanges over whether the Civil Service Commission should be dissolved violated the state’s open government law. The city was also held responsible for a violation of the law arising from an email exchange over a legal settlement, ironically, of the first lawsuit.

Such exchanges by their very nature tend to shield from public view discussions of public policy matters that Fort Smith’s residents have every right to witness.

Washington County officials teetered at least near the same line recently when County Attorney Brian Lester individually emailed all 15 members of the Quorum Court to gauge whether they wanted to discuss the legal settlement. The lawsuit involves the Quorum Court’s rejection of a permit for an wedding barn and event center on Shaeffer Road. County Judge Joseph Wood “favors a compromise that benefits everyone involved,” Lester wrote.

The Quorum Court denied the permit in what was rightfully a public meeting. Any discussions that might lead to reversal of that decision deserves to be in public, but Lester’s email solicitation on whether the Quorum Court members wanted to discuss created potential for a decision without any public discussion at all. Rejecting discussion of the proposal is, in and of itself, a policy decision that should be carried out in full view of the public from which the Quorum Court gets its authority.

It is a short leap from what Lester was doing to the violation that occurred in Fort Smith. Both scenarios lack appreciation for the public’s involvement.

Concerns about secrecy aren’t just about government meetings. In the public corruption case against former state Sen. Jon Woods and two other men, a federal judge ordered reporters and the public out of a hearing and took testimony for hours in private. This in a case that has already involved a significant amount of secrecy.

It is hard to convincingly argue that one of the best ways to fight public corruption is to engage in secret court hearings and sealed records.

Advocates for open government have long declared that sunshine is one of the best disinfectants. Corruption and abuse of public trust happens in the shadows. And yet some of our neighbors who take elective office or serve in appointed positions somehow convince themselves that secrecy serves the public’s interests. Most of the time, that’s not true. It’s serving someone’s interests, but not the public’s.