United States Book Publishing Flowchart

The Congressional-Executive Commission on China has prepared the following flowchart and its accompanying annotations in order to provide a comparison between what constitutes freedom of the press in China and the United States.

The chart assumes that the hypothetical author's book does not contain information that was obtained illegally or that has been clearly designated and treated by the government as classified. The chart also does not address copyright or trade secret issues, nor does it take into account certain types of speech that are generally not granted protection in most countries, such as obscenity, defamation, or incitements to or threats of violence.

Those interested in further researching United States case law in this area can find more information at the First Amendment Center.

Those interested in seeing how China's system differs from the United States can view a flow chart illustrating the choices and consequences facing Chinese authors here.

Click on a box below to see more information.

Appendix to

"Choices and Consequences Faced by Authors in the United States" Flowchart

Get government authorization to Publish your book yourself

Start your own publishing house to publish your book

The government cannot prevent individuals from engaging in book publishing. See Get government authorization to publish your book yourself above.

Can you getYou may need a business license from the government?

~~Can you get~~You may need a publishing license from the government?

The United States does not have any federal licensing system for book publishers. State and local governments cannot require authors, publishers, or distributors to obtain a license for non-commercial publishing activities. The Supreme Court characterized "the evil inherent in a licensing system" as follows:

The power of the licensor . . . is pernicious not merely by reason of the censure of particular comments but by reason of the threat to censure comments on matters of public concern. It is not merely the sporadic abuse of power by the censor but the pervasive threat inherent in its very existence that constitutes the danger to freedom of discussion.

Thornhill v. State of Alabama, 310 U.S. 88 (1940).

Schneider v. State of New Jersey, 308 U.S. 147 (1939) concerned the constitutional validity of a town ordinance requiring a license for the distribution of circulars. The police chief was permitted to refuse the license if the application for it or further investigation showed "that the canvasser is not of good character or is canvassing for a project not free from fraud. . . ." The Court said of that ordinance:

It bans unlicensed communication of any views or the advocacy of any cause from door to door, and permits canvassing only subject to the power of a police officer to determine, as a censor, what literature may be distributed from house to house and who may distribute it. The applicant must submit to that officer's judgment evidence as to his good character and as to the absence of fraud in the "project" he proposes to promote or the literature he intends to distribute, and must undergo a burdensome and inquisitorial examination, including photographing and fingerprinting. In the end, his liberty to communicate with the residents of the town at their homes depends upon the exercise of the officer's discretion.

In finding the ordinance unconstitutional a unanimous Court held:

[T]he ordinance imposes censorship, abuse of which engendered the struggle in England which eventuated in the establishment of the doctrine of the freedom of the press embodied in our Constitution. To require a censorship through license which makes impossible the free and unhampered distribution of pamphlets strikes at the very heart of the constitutional guarantees.

In Lakewood v. Plain Dealer Publishing Co., 486 U.S. 750 (1988) the city of Lakewood, Ohio enacted an ordinance permitting the placement of structures on city property under certain conditions, including newsracks. The ordinance provided that: "The Mayor shall either deny the application [for a permit], stating the reasons for such denial or grant said permit subject to the following terms . . . . (7) such other terms and conditions deemed necessary and reasonable by the Mayor." In holding the ordinance in violation of the First Amendment the Supreme Court identified two major risks associated with unbridled licensing schemes: self-censorship by speakers in order to avoid being denied a license to speak; and the difficulty of effectively detecting, reviewing, and correcting content-based censorship "as applied" without standards by which to measure the licensor's action. The Court stated:

[A] law or policy permitting communication in a certain manner for some but not for others raises the specter of content and viewpoint censorship. This danger is at its zenith when the determination of who may speak and who may not is left to the unbridled discretion of a government official. As demonstrated above, we have often and uniformly held that such statutes or policies impose censorship on the public or the press, and hence are unconstitutional, because without standards governing the exercise of discretion, a government official may decide who may speak and who may not based upon the content of the speech or viewpoint of the speaker. Therefore, even if the government may constitutionally impose content-neutral prohibitions on a particular manner of speech, it may not condition that speech on obtaining a license or permit from a government official in that official's boundless discretion.

It is apparent that the face of the ordinance itself contains no explicit limits on the mayor's discretion. Indeed, nothing in the law as written requires the mayor to do more than make the statement "it is not in the public interest" when denying a permit application. Similarly, the mayor could grant the application, but require the newsrack to be placed in an inaccessible location without providing any explanation whatever. To allow these illusory "constraints" to constitute the standards necessary to bound a licensor's discretion renders the guarantee against censorship little more than a high-sounding ideal.

Other cases in this area include:

Lovell v. Griffin, 303 U.S. 444, 451: "[the] struggle for the freedom of the press was primarily directed against the power of the licensor."
Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U.S. 296 (1940), 306:
[T]he availability of a judicial remedy for abuses in the system of licensing still leaves that system one of previous restraint which, in the field of free speech and press, we have held inadmissible. A statute authorizing previous restraint upon the exercise of the guaranteed freedom by judicial decision after trial is as obnoxious to the Constitution as one providing for like restraint by administrative action.

Local governments can and do require commercial publishers to conform to the same licensing and taxation requirements as other businesses.

The Supreme Court has held that commercial publishers are not immune from the ordinary forms of taxation for support of the government (see Grosjean v. American Press Co., 297 U.S. 233 (1936) and Associated Press v. N.L.R.B., 301 U.S. 103 (1937): "The publisher of a newspaper has no special immunity from the application of general laws. He has no special privilege to invade the rights and liberties of others. He must answer for libel. He may be punished for contempt of court. He is subject to the anti-trust laws. Like others he must pay equitable and nondiscriminatory taxes on his business."), and that license fees placed upon trades and occupations are a legitimate method of taxation, Allied Stores of Ohio v. Bowers, 358 U.S. 522, 526 (1959). Therefore, local governments in the United States may require those engaging in commercial publishing activities to acquire a business license and pay related taxes, provided the requirement does not act as a device in the guise of a tax to limit the circulation of information to which the public is entitled in virtue of the constitutional guaranties. Specifically:

The government may not exercise its taxing power to single out the press, because the press plays a unique role as a check on government abuse, and a tax limited to the press raises concerns about censorship of critical information and opinion.
A tax is suspect if it targets a small group of speakers.
A tax will trigger heightened scrutiny under the First Amendment if it discriminates on the basis of the content of taxpayer speech.

In Grosjean v. American Press Co., 297 U.S. 233 (1936) the U.S. Supreme Court held unconstitutional a license tax the Louisiana legislature had imposed on newspapers enjoying a circulation of more than 20,000 copies per week. The Court said that the tax operated as a restraint in a double sense. First, it curtailed the amount of revenue realized from advertising, and, second, it tended to restrict circulation.

In Minneapolis Star v. Minnesota Comm'r of Rev., 460 U.S. 575 (1983) Minnesota's government had imposed a 4% "use tax" on ink and paper. The tax exempted the first $100,000, leaving the 11 biggest publishers liable for tax. The Supreme Court held the tax unconstitutional for two reasons:

First, the tax singled out the press for special treatment: "Differential taxation of the press, then, places such a burden on the interests protected by the First Amendment," that it is presumptively unconstitutional.
Second, beyond singling out the press, the Minnesota tax targeted a small group of newspapers. The tax thus resembled a penalty for certain newspapers. The scheme appeared to have such potential for abuse that the Court concluded that it violated the First Amendment: "[W]hen the exemption selects such a narrowly defined group to bear the full burden of the tax, the tax begins to resemble more a penalty for a few of the largest newspapers than an attempt to favor struggling smaller enterprises."

In Arkansas Writers' Project, Inc. v. Ragland, 481 U.S. 221 (1987), the Arkansas Writers' Project sought a refund of state taxes it had paid on sales of the Arkansas Times, a general interest magazine, under Arkansas' Gross Receipts Act of 1941. Exempt from the sales tax were receipts from sales of religious, professional, trade and sports magazines. The Court held that Arkansas' magazine exemption, which meant that only "a few Arkansas magazines pay any sales tax," operated in much the same way as did the $100,000 exemption in Minneapolis Star, and therefore suffered from the same type of discrimination identified in that case. Moreover, the basis on which the tax differentiated among magazines depended entirely on their content.

In Leathers v. Medlock, 499 U.S. 439 (1991) Arkansas had amended its Gross Receipts Act, which imposed a tax on receipts from the sale of all tangible personal property and specified services, to include a tax on cable television. A cable television subscriber, a cable operator, and a cable trade organization, brought a class action contending that their expressive rights under the First Amendment had been infringed upon. The Court held that differential taxation of speakers, even members of the press, does not implicate the First Amendment unless the tax is directed at, or presents the danger of suppressing, particular ideas, and upheld the tax because it was a tax of general applicability covering all tangible personal property and a broad range of services and, thus, does not single out the press, and thereby threaten to hinder it as a watchdog of government activity.

Does your use of the information comply with your contractual obligations?

The Supreme Court has held that contractual agreements entered into by government employees requiring them to submit publications for screening do not violate the First Amendment. See Snepp v. United States, 444 U.S. 507 (1980) and United States v. Marchetti, 466 F.2d 1309 (4th Cir.), cert. denied, 409 U.S. 1063 (1972).

Did a judge deny the request for an injunction?

The Supreme Court has held that it is unconstitutional for the government to impose prior restraints on publishing by administrative fiat. See Get government authorization to publish your book yourself above. The government cannot screen publications (for political or any other kind of content) without notice, comment, and judicial superintendence, except pursuant to a contractual agreement. See Does your use of the information comply with your contractual obligations? above. Before the government may enjoin the publication of a book the author must be allowed to argue their case before a judge, and the government must show that the injunction is necessary to protect a "state interest of the highest order." See Smith v. Daily Mail Publishing, 443 U.S. 97 (1979) and Florida Star v. B.J.F., 491 U.S. 524 (1989).

For example, in U.S. v. The Progressive, Inc., 467 F. Supp. 990 (W.D. Wis. 1979) the government asked a lower court to issue an injunction against a book that contained detailed instructions on how to make a hydrogen bomb, in violation of the Atomic Energy Act, 42 USC 2011. The judge granted the injunction, noting that, "a mistake in ruling against the United States could pave the way for thermonuclear annihilation for us all. In that event, our right to life is extinguished and the right to publish becomes moot." The injunction was dropped while the publisher was in the process of appealing the verdict because similar information was published by another source.

In New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U.S. 713 (1971) the U.S. government had attempted to prevent The New York Times and The Washington Post from publishing the Pentagon Papers, a classified study of U.S. decision-making in Vietnam. A government official leaked the study of the growth of U.S military involvement in Vietnam. The holding of the Court was as follows:

Any system of prior restraints of expression comes to this Court bearing a heavy presumption against its constitutional validity. The Government thus carries a heavy burden of showing justification for the imposition of such a restraint. The District Court for the Southern District of New York in the New York Times case and the District Court for the District of Columbia and the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in the Washington Post case held that the Government had not met that burden. We agree.

Concurrence of Justice Black

In other words, we are asked to hold that despite the First Amendment's emphatic command, the Executive Branch, the Congress, and the Judiciary can make laws enjoining publication of current news and abridging freedom of the press in the name of "national security." . . . To find that the President has "inherent power" to halt the publication of news by resort to the courts would wipe out the First Amendment and destroy the fundamental liberty and security of the very people the Government hopes to make "secure." No one can read the history of the adoption of the First Amendment without being convinced beyond any doubt that it was injunctions like those sought here that Madison and his collaborators intended to outlaw in this Nation for all time.

The word "security" is a broad, vague generality whose contours should not be invoked to abrogate the fundamental law embodied in the First Amendment. The guarding of military and diplomatic secrets at the expense of informed representative government provides no real security for our Republic. The Framers of the First Amendment, fully aware of both the need to defend a new nation and the abuses of the English and Colonial governments, sought to give this new society strength and security by providing that freedom of speech, press, religion, and assembly should not be abridged. This thought was eloquently expressed in 1937 by Mr. Chief Justice Hughes - great man and great Chief Justice that he was - when the Court held a man could not be punished for attending a meeting run by Communists.

"The greater the importance of safeguarding the community from incitements to the overthrow of our institutions by force and violence, the more imperative is the need to preserve inviolate the constitutional rights of free speech, free press and free assembly in order to maintain the opportunity for free political discussion, to the end that government may be responsive to the will of the people and that changes, if desired, may be obtained by peaceful means. Therein lies the security of the Republic, the very foundation of constitutional government."

[citing De Jonge v. Oregon, 299 U.S. 353 (1937)]

Concurrence of Justice Douglas

There is, moreover, no statute barring the publication by the press of the material which the Times and the Post seek to use. Title 18 USC 793 (e) provides that "[w]hoever having unauthorized possession of, access to, or control over any document, writing . . . or information relating to the national defense which information the possessor has reason to believe could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation, willfully communicates . . . the same to any person not entitled to receive it . . . [s]hall be fined not more than $10,000 or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both."

The Government suggests that the word "communicates" is broad enough to encompass publication.

There are eight sections in the chapter on espionage and censorship, 792-799. In three of those eight "publish" is specifically mentioned: 794 (b) applies to "Whoever, in time of war, with intent that the same shall be communicated to the enemy, collects, records, publishes, or communicates . . . [the disposition of armed forces]."

Section 797 applies to whoever "reproduces, publishes, sells, or gives away" photographs of defense installations.

Section 798 relating to cryptography applies to whoever: "communicates, furnishes, transmits, or otherwise makes available . . . or publishes" the described material.

Thus it is apparent that Congress was capable of and did distinguish between publishing and communication in the various sections of the Espionage Act.

Concurrence of Justice Brennan

The error that has pervaded these cases from the outset was the granting of any injunctive relief whatsoever, interim or otherwise. The entire thrust of the Government's claim throughout these cases has been that publication of the material sought to be enjoined "could," or "might," or "may" prejudice the national interest in various ways. But the First Amendment tolerates absolutely no prior judicial restraints of the press predicated upon surmise or conjecture that untoward consequences may result. Our cases, it is true, have indicated that there is a single, extremely narrow class of cases in which the First Amendment's ban on prior judicial restraint may be overridden. Our cases have thus far indicated that such cases may arise only when the Nation "is at war," Schenck v. United States, 249 U.S. 47, 52 (1919), during which times "[n]o one would question but that a government might prevent actual obstruction to its recruiting service or the publication of the sailing dates of transports or the number and location of troops." Near v. Minnesota, 283 U.S. 697, 716 (1931). Even if the present world situation were assumed to be tantamount to a time of war, or if the power of presently available armaments would justify even in peacetime the suppression of information that would set in motion a nuclear holocaust, in neither of these actions has the Government presented or even alleged that publication of items from or based upon the material at issue would cause the happening of an event of that nature.

Concurrence of Justice Stewart

But in the cases before us we are asked neither to construe specific regulations nor to apply specific laws. We are asked, instead, to perform a function that the Constitution gave to the Executive, not the Judiciary. We are asked, quite simply, to prevent the publication by two newspapers of material that the Executive Branch insists should not, in the national interest, be published. I am convinced that the Executive is correct with respect to some of the documents involved. But I cannot say that disclosure of any of them will surely result in direct, immediate, and irreparable damage to our Nation or its people. That being so, there can under the First Amendment be but one judicial resolution of the issues before us. I join the judgments of the Court.

Concurrence of Justice White

The Criminal Code contains numerous provisions potentially relevant to these cases. Section 797 makes it a crime to publish certain photographs or drawings of military installations. Section 798, 6 also in precise language, proscribes knowing and willful publication of any classified information concerning the cryptographic systems or communication intelligence activities of the United States as well as any information obtained from communication intelligence operations. If any of the material here at issue is of this nature, the newspapers are presumably now on full notice of the position of the United States and must face the consequences if they publish. I would have no difficulty in sustaining convictions under these sections on facts that would not justify the intervention of equity and the imposition of a prior restraint.

The same would be true under those sections of the Criminal Code casting a wider net to protect the national defense. Section 793 (e) 8 makes it a criminal act for any unauthorized possessor of a document "relating to the national defense" either (1) willfully to communicate or cause to be communicated that document to any person not entitled to receive it or (2) willfully to retain the document and fail to deliver it to an officer of the United States entitled to receive it.

. . .

It is thus clear that Congress has addressed itself to the problems of protecting the security of the country and the national defense from unauthorized disclosure of potentially damaging information. It has not, however, authorized the injunctive remedy against threatened publication. It has apparently been satisfied to rely on criminal sanctions and their deterrent effect on the responsible as well as the irresponsible press.

Concurrence of Justice Marshall

The problem here is whether in these particular cases the Executive Branch has authority to invoke the equity jurisdiction of the courts to protect what it believes to be the national interest. See In re Debs, 158 U.S. 564, 584 (1895). The Government argues that in addition to the inherent power of any government to protect itself, the President's power to conduct foreign affairs and his position as Commander in Chief give him authority to impose censorship on the press to protect his ability to deal effectively with foreign nations and to conduct the military affairs of the country.

. . .

Either the Government has the power under statutory grant to use traditional criminal law to protect the country or, if there is no basis for arguing that Congress has made the activity a crime, it is plain that Congress has specifically refused to grant the authority the Government seeks from this Court. In either case this Court does not have authority to grant the requested relief.

For a discussion of U.S. jurisprudence with respect to standards employed in imposing prior restraints, See Whatever Happened to Freedom of Speech? A Defense of 'State Interest of the Highest Order' As a Unifying Standard for Erratic First Amendment Jurisprudence," Andrew P. Napolitano, Seton Hall Law Review Volume 29, Book 4.

Do the contents of your book violate Chapter 37 (Espionage) or Chapter 115 (Sedition) of Title 18 of the U.S. Code?

You may be subject to prosecution

Chapters 37 and 115 of the United States Code have never been used to impose prior restraints on book publishing, nor have they been used to punish the author of any book. However, the Supreme Court has ruled that espionage and seditious speech are not subject to First Amendment protection, and has upheld post-publication punishments for those who engaged in the publication of non-book materials, such as pamphlets.

As a general rule: "If a [publisher] lawfully obtains truthful information about a matter of public significance then state officials may not constitutionally punish publication of the information, absent a need to further a state interest of the highest order." Smith v. Daily Mail Publishing Co., 443 U.S. 97 (1979). Assuming such a state interest exists, the standard for whether or not speech may be punished was set forth in Schenck v. U.S., 249 U.S. 47 (1919): "The question in every case is whether the words used are used in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that Congress has a right to prevent." In Landmark Communications, Inc. v. Virginia, 435 U.S. 829 (1978), the Court stated: "The test requires a court to make its own inquiry into the imminence and magnitude of the danger said to flow from the particular utterance and then to balance the character of the evil, as well as its likelihood, against the need for free and unfettered expression."

Title 18 - Crimes and Criminal Procedure
Part I - Crimes
Chapter 37 Espionage and Censorship
Sections 792-799

In Gorin v. United States, 312 U.S. 19 (1941) the Court considered the constitutionality of the Espionage Act. The Court defined the statutory term "national defense" as a "generic concept of broad connotations, referring to the military and naval establishments and the related activities of national preparedness." In concluding that such a definition was not unconstitutionally vague, the Court noted the "obvious delimiting words in the statute . . . requiring 'intent or reason to believe that the information to be obtained is to be used to the injury of the United States, or to the advantage of any foreign nation.'" The Court explained that such language establishes a scienter element, which "requires those prosecuted to have acted in bad faith." In light of the scienter requirement, the Court concluded that the statutory language was "sufficiently definite to apprise the public of prohibited activities" and "consonant with due process."

In United States v. Heine, 151 F.2d 813 (2d Cir. 1945), cert. denied, 328 U.S. 833 (1946) the defendant provided a German company with reports about the aviation industry in the United States. The defendant did not obtain or transmit closely held government documents. Rather, the defendant "condensed and arranged" information that "came from sources that were lawfully accessible to anyone who was willing to take the pains to find, sift and collate it," including "ordinary magazines, books and newspapers," "technical catalogues, handbooks and journals," communications with airplane manufacturers and their employees, and "exhibits, and talks with attendants, at the World's Fair." The court noted that "no public authorities, naval, military or other, had ordered, or indeed suggested, that the manufacturers of airplanes- even including those made for the services-should withhold any facts which they were personally willing to give out." The Second Circuit reasoned that, just as the espionage statutes are not violated by the dissemination of "information about weapons and munitions of war which the [U.S. armed] services had themselves made public," the espionage statutes are not violated by the dissemination of "information which the services have never thought it necessary to withhold at all": "The services must be trusted to determine what information may be broadcast without prejudice to the 'national defense,' and their consent to its dissemination is as much evidenced by what they do not seek to suppress, as by what they utter".

See also the concurring opinions of Justices Douglas and White in "Did a judge deny the request for an injunction? above.

Title 18 - Crimes and Criminal Procedure
Part I - Crimes
Chapter 115 - Treason, Sedition, and Subversive Activities
Sections 2381-2390

In Dennis v. United States, 341 U.S. 494 (1951) the Supreme Court stated:

We reject any principle of governmental helplessness in the face of preparation for revolution, which principle, carried to its logical conclusion, must lead to anarchy. No one could conceive that it is not within the power of Congress to prohibit acts intended to overthrow the Government by force and violence.

In that case one of the "acts" which the Court found the government could prohibit was to knowingly and willfully "advocate and teach the duty and necessity of overthrowing and destroying the Government of the United States by force and violence."

The Court clarified what it meant to "advocate and teach" in Yates v. United States, 354 U.S. 298 (1957), where 14 petitioners, leaders of the Communist Party in California, were indicted in a Federal District Court under Section 3 of the Smith Act and 18 USC 371 [Conspiracy to commit offense or to defraud the United States] for conspiring, among other things, to advocate and teach the duty and necessity of overthrowing the Government of the United States by force and violence. In overturning the convictions of some of the defendants and ordering a retrial for the others, the Court held:

The Smith Act does not prohibit advocacy and teaching of forcible overthrow of the Government as an abstract principle, divorced from any effort to instigate action to that end; . . . The statute was aimed at the advocacy and teaching of concrete action for the forcible overthrow of the Government, and not of principles divorced from action.

The Court went on to say:

We recognize that distinctions between advocacy or teaching of abstract doctrines, with evil intent, and that which is directed to stirring people to action, are often subtle and difficult to grasp, for in a broad sense, as Mr. Justice Holmes said in his dissenting opinion in Gitlow: "Every idea is an incitement." But the very subtlety of these distinctions required the most clear and explicit instructions with reference to them, for they concerned an issue which went to the very heart of the charges against these petitioners. The need for precise and understandable instructions on this issue is further emphasized by the equivocal character of the evidence in this record, with which we deal in Part III of this opinion. Instances of speech that could be considered to amount to "advocacy of action" are so few and far between as to be almost completely overshadowed by the hundreds of instances in the record in which overthrow, if mentioned at all, occurs in the course of doctrinal disputation so remote from action as to be almost wholly lacking in probative value. Vague references to "revolutionary" or "militant" action of an unspecified character, which are found in the evidence, might in addition be given too great weight by the jury in the absence of more precise instructions.

Lower courts have also attempted to clarify what constitutes seditious speech. In United States v. Rahman, 189 F.3d 88 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 528 U.S. 982 (1999), a U.S. federal court dealt with appeals from convictions based on the Smith Act. The lead defendant, Rahman, had been found guilty of seditious conspiracy to wage a holy war against the United States and to forcibly oppose its authority, specifically by planning to blow up the Holland and Lincoln Tunnels and the United Nations Building in New York. Appellant Rahman argued that the Smith Act was overly broad in that it not only proscribed substantive acts involving crimes and violence, but also criminalized certain types of speech. The court dismissed this claim saying that:

[w]hile the state may not criminalize the expression of views - even including the view that violent overthrow of the government is desirable - it may nonetheless outlaw encouragement, inducement, or conspiracy to take violent action. . . . We recognize that laws targeting 'sedition' must be scrutinized with care to assure that the threat of prosecution will not deter expression of unpopular viewpoints by persons ideologically opposed to the government. But Section 2384 is drawn sufficiently narrowly that we perceive no unacceptable risk of such abuse.

Rahman also claimed that he was convicted "solely for his religious words and deeds" which, he contended, are protected by the First Amendment. In support of his claim, Rahman cited the Government's extensive use in evidence of his speeches and writings. The Court held that "the First Amendment fully protects Rahman's right to express hostility against the United States, and he may not be prosecuted for so speaking . . . ." The court then provided numerous specific examples of statements by Rahman, and concluded: "Words of this nature - ones that instruct, solicit, or persuade others to commit crimes of violence - violate the law and may be properly prosecuted regardless of whether they are uttered in private, or in a public speech, or in administering the duties of a religious ministry."

Do you have RMB 300,000?

Governments cannot require authors, publishers, or distributors to obtain a license for non-commercial publishing activities. State and local governments can, however, require commercial publishers to conform to the same licensing and taxation requirements as other businesses (See Can you get a business license from the government? above), provided the requirement does not act as a "device in the guise of a tax to limit the circulation of information to which the public is entitled in virtue of the constitutional guaranties." Grosjean v. American Press Co., 297 U.S. 233 (1936).

License fees for sole proprietorships are generally less than US$200 (RMB 1,800).

Are you well-connected?

The government cannot require authors, publishers, or distributors to have a political patron in order to publish. See Get government authorization to publish your book yourself above.

Are you a Chinese citizen?

The United States does not have any restrictions on foreign companies or individuals publishing or distributing books in the United States. For example, two of the largest book publishers in the United States - Penguin Books and Random House - are owned by foreign corporations: Pearson plc (United Kingdom) and Bertelsmann (Germany), respectively.

Can you get a publishing unit license from the government?

There is no separate licensing authority for book publishers in the United States. See Get government authorization to publish your book yourself above.

Can you get a book number from the government?

There is no requirement that book publishers in the United States include serial numbers on their publications.

Can you get a printer's license from the government?

There is no separate licensing authority for book printers in the United States. See Get government authorization to publish your book yourself above.

Does your book avoid addressing sensitive political issues?

Although the Supreme Court has held that some categories of speech are not subject to First Amendment protection, and that the government may impose post-publication punishments on individual's whose speech falls within these categories (see Do the contents of your book violate Chapter 37 (Espionage) or Chapter 115 (Sedition) of Title 18 of the US Code? above), the Court has held that the government cannot screen publications (for political or any other kind of content) without notice, comment, and judicial superintendence, except pursuant to a contractual agreement. See Does your use of the information comply with your contractual obligations? above. See also Did a judge deny the request for an injunction? above.

In Bantam Books, Inc. v. Sullivan, 372 U.S. 58 (1963) the Rhode Island legislature had created a Commission to "educate the public concerning any book, picture, pamphlet . . . containing obscene, indecent or impure language, or manifestly tending to the corruption of the youth . . . and to investigate and recommend the prosecution of all violations." Appellants were publishers that had received notices on official Commission stationery notifying them that certain designated books or magazines distributed by them had been reviewed by the Commission and had been declared by a majority of its members to be objectionable for sale, distribution or display to youths under 18 years of age. The notices requested the distributor's "cooperation" and advised him that copies of the lists of "objectionable" publications were circulated to local police departments and that it was the Commission's duty to recommend prosecution of purveyors of obscenity. The Court held:

What Rhode Island has done, in fact, has been to subject the distribution of publications to a system of prior administrative restraints, since the Commission is not a judicial body and its decisions to list particular publications as objectionable do not follow judicial determinations that such publications may lawfully be banned. Any system of prior restraints of expression comes to this Court bearing a heavy presumption against its constitutional validity. We have tolerated such a system only where it operated under judicial superintendence and assured an almost immediate judicial determination of the validity of the restraint. The system at bar includes no such saving features. On the contrary, its capacity for suppression of constitutionally protected publications is far in excess of that of the typical licensing scheme held constitutionally invalid by this Court. There is no provision whatever for judicial superintendence before notices issue or even for judicial review of the Commission's determinations of objectionableness. The publisher or distributor is not even entitled to notice and hearing before his publications are listed by the Commission as objectionable. Moreover, the Commission's statutory mandate is vague and uninformative, and the Commission has done nothing to make it more precise. Publications are listed as "objectionable" without further elucidation. The distributor is left to speculate whether the Commission considers his publication obscene or simply harmful to juvenile morality. For the Commission's domain is the whole of youthful morals. Finally, we note that although the Commission's supposed concern is limited to youthful readers, the "cooperation" it seeks from distributors invariably entails the complete suppression of the listed publications; adult readers are equally deprived of the opportunity to purchase the publications in the State.

Is your publisher authorized to publish books on politically sensitive issues?

See Does your book avoid addressing sensitive political issues? above.

Can you get permission from the State Secrecy Bureau?

There is no such agency in the United States government. Even if such an agency did exist, the Supreme Court has held that the government cannot screen publications (for political or any other kind of content) without notice, comment, and judicial superintendence, except pursuant to a contractual agreement. See Does your use of the information comply with your contractual obligations? above.

Can you get permission from the Communist Party?

No political parties in the United States exercise have any legal authority over publishing in the United States. See Get government authorization to publish your book yourself, You may need a business license from the government and Does your book avoid addressing sensitive political issues? above.

Can you get permission from the General Administration for Press and Publication?

There is no agency in the United States with the authority to regulation publishing. See Get government authorization to publish your book yourself, You may need a business license from the government and Does your book avoid addressing sensitive political issues? above.

Is the subject of your book dead?

Can you get permission from the subject of your book?

There is no law in the United States requiring publishers to submit their works to the subject of their book for screening.

In New York Times v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254 (1964) an elected official sued the New York Times alleging that he had been libeled by an advertisement in that newspaper that included statements, some of which were false, about police action allegedly directed against students who participated in a civil rights demonstration and against a leader of the civil rights movement; respondent claimed the statements referred to him because his duties included supervision of the police department. The Court found for the New York Times holding

A State cannot, under the First and Fourteenth Amendments, award damages to a public official for defamatory falsehood relating to his official conduct unless he proves "actual malice" -- that the statement was made with knowledge of its falsity or with reckless disregard of whether it was true or false.
Factual error, content defamatory of official reputation, or both, are insufficient to warrant an award of damages for false statements unless "actual malice" -- knowledge that statements are false or in reckless disregard of the truth -- is alleged and proved.

The Court stated that because "erroneous statement is inevitable in free debate," "neither factual error nor defamatory content suffices to remove the constitutional shield from criticism of official conduct."

In Time, Inc. v. Pape, 401 U.S. 279 (1971) the Civil Rights Commission had mentioned the case of Monroe v. Pape, 365 U.S. 167, and listed some of the allegations of Monroe's civil rights complaint filed against certain Chicago policemen headed by Deputy Chief of Detectives Pape. In an article about the report, Time magazine quoted from a summary of the complaint, without indicating that the charges were Monroe's and not the independent findings of the Commission. Pape sued Time for libel. The Supreme Court held that the magazine did not engage in a "falsification" sufficient in itself to sustain a jury finding of "actual malice, because the magazine's omission of the word "alleged" amounted to the adoption of one of several rational interpretations of a document bristling with ambiguities, and while that choice might reflect a misconception, it was not enough to create a jury issue of "malice" under the rule of New York Times, as it would impose a stricter standard of liability on errors of interpretation or judgment than on errors of historic fact.

See Get government authorization to publish your book yourself and You may need a business license from the government above.

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