Michigan Law Review Volume 84 Issue 3 1985 Cameras in the Courtroom: Guidelines for State Criminal Trials Nancy T. Gardner University of Michigan Law School Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mlr Part of the Communications Law Commons, Constitutional Law Commons, Courts Commons, and the State and Local Government Law Commons Recommended Citation Nancy T. Gardner, Cameras in the Courtroom: Guidelines for State Criminal Trials, 84 MICH. L. REV. 475 (1985). Available at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mlr/vol84/iss3/9 This Note is brought to you for free and open access by the Michigan Law Review at University of Michigan Law School Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Michigan Law Review by an authorized editor of University of Michigan Law School Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. Cameras in the Courtroom: Guidelines for State Criminal Trials In 1965, only two states permitted photographic and electronic media coverage1 of courtroom proceedings.2 Today, forty-three states permit television coverage of their appellate and/or trial proceedings on an experimental or permanent basis. 3 This development has not come about in a systematic or uniform fashion. Lacking guidance from the federal courts, the states have independently conducted ex periments and adopted their own guidelines in an attempt to accom modate the conflicting constitutional4 and policy interests5 involved. The development of state guidelines6 has stemmed largely from the belief that media self-discipline is insufficient to ensure fair treatment 1. The phrase "photographic and electronic media coverage," referred to herein as "televis ing" or "broadcasting," includes both the acquisition of information (through devices such as still news photography, audio taping, motion picture filming and videotaping), and the public dissemination and broadcast of that information.