Editorial: Blowing the whistle on the enemy

Saturday, Oct. 15, 2005 | 10:03 a.m.

If the Bush administration gets its way, the U.S. Supreme Court will issue a ruling that makes it more difficult for government whistleblowers to file lawsuits claiming retaliation on the job.

"We live in a world where people are leaking things all the time," Justice Stephen Breyer said Wednesday during the high court's review of a lower court's ruling, adding that government employees should not receive blanket protection for speaking up.

Breyer's comments were among those made as justices reviewed a ruling that favored a Los Angeles County prosecutor who said he was demoted and denied a promotion for trying to reveal that a sheriff's deputy lied in a search warrant affidavit. The Bush administration's lawyer maintained the prosecutor could have filed a civil service complaint, adding that government employees don't have free-speech rights when speaking within the scopes of their jobs.

It's not surprising that the Bush administration, which has worked exhaustively to cover its tracks and keep government discussions and decisions out of public view, would want to stem the flow of information that could unveil corrupt or questionable behavior. Leaks have happened anyway, resulting in laying open to scrutiny such issues as the sketchy reasons we are at war in Iraq, the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib, the internal cronyism that threatens to dismantle crucial federal departments and the role of insiders who illegally leaked the identity of a covert CIA operative.

Stephen M. Kohn of the National Whistleblower Center told the Associated Press that a ruling favoring the Bush administration's position would give whistleblowers who expose government corruption "less constitutional protection than Ku Klux Klan members who burn crosses on their front lawns."

Citizens have not only the right but also a responsibility to speak up when they witness waste, fraud and corruption on the part of government. Free speech is among our nation's founding principles. To not fully protect those with the courage to speak up -- no matter where they work -- would be disgraceful.