![]() “Information is the currency of democracy.” “The same prudence, which, in private life, would forbid our paying our money for unexplained projects, forbids it in the disposition of public moneys.” It was designed to keep your actions legal.” ![]() “This law wasn’t designed to make your job easy. The principle that government information belongs to the people is more than a quaint idea.” “…assurances mean little without accurate information and accountability. “The liberties of a people never were, nor ever will be, secure, when the transactions of their rulers may be concealed from them.” “Information is our most valuable commodity.” “As a general rule, the most successful man in life is the man who has the best information.” Making the situation worse, requesters have few alternatives to lawsuits to appeal an agency’s decision.” Federal agencies can routinely and repeatedly deny requests for information with near impunity. “Far too often when citizens seek records from our government, they are met with long delays, denials and difficulty. “Nothing so diminishes democracy as secrecy.” State and federal freedom of information (or “sunshine”) laws, which include laws that guarantee access to both public meetings and public records, are one of the primary ways of ensuring such accountability.” Inherent in our system of self-government is the idea that the People have the right to know what our government and government officials are doing and to hold them accountable for their actions. “In America, the government belongs to the people. It deserves more serious consideration for it raises Fundamental questions about government-press relations in a time of international peril - a condition likely to continue for the indefinite future.” Too frequently it is discussed in public print in connection with the misguided efforts of a bureaucrat to cover up stupidity or wrongdoing. ![]() “The struggle of the government’s need for secrecy versus the public’s right to know and the press’s duty to find out and tell is unending. “Examining public records should never require extraordinary legal or bureaucratic efforts. “Everything secret degenerates, even the administration of justice nothing is safe that does not show how it can bear discussion and publicity.” “The basic purpose of FOIA is to ensure an informed citizenry, vital to the functioning of a democratic society, needed to check against corruption and to hold the governors accountable to the governed.”
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