Usually at ALM we report on legal news.  But sometimes we actually make legal news.

Last week, just as the National Law Journal was ready to go to press, we received word that the subject of one of our stories was headed to court to secure a temporary restraining order against us.  Here's how editor-in-chief David Brown explained the situation in his editor's note:

What appears here is not the full story. Minutes before our deadline Friday, D.C. Superior Court Judge Judith Bartnoff signed a temporary restraining order against The National Law Journal enjoining it from publishing certain details that we legally obtained from court documents. Specifically, we are not allowed to name a government agency conducting a regulatory inquiry into one of the subjects of the article, POM Wonderful. We fought this order vigorously in court; we thought and continue to think that it is a violation of the First Amendment, and we are working on an appeal. Bartnoff, as she considered the order, said, "If I am throwing 80 years of First Amendment jurisprudence on its head, so be it." She said the court's interest in maintaining the "integrity" of its docket trumped the First Amendment concern. We strongly believe Bartnoff's action harms the integrity of the court by placing process concerns over fundamental constitutional rights. Sadly, however, because of Bartnoff's order, we were forced to scrub this article of any reference to the agency. We apologize to our readers for being unable to provide the fullest report possible.

You can read the full story as published in this week's NLJ here: http://tinyurl.com/2c7oqoj

Prior restraint -- that is, a court telling a newspaper that it cannot publish a piece of information that it legally obtained -- is a serious matter.  It gets to the heart of what a free press is all about.  We intend to fight Judge Bartnoff's ruling not just because we want to publish the full story as originally written, but because her ruling raises fundamental first amendment questions that, as a newspaper publisher, we simply cannot allow to stand without argument.

Let's be clear -- our reporter, Jeff Jeffries, did a terrific job reporting on this story.  He obtained information by digging through open records, and he gave the subjects ample opportunity to confirm or correct the information he had obtained.  Both Jeff and the National Law Journal demonstrated their commitment to our Core Values, and now we need to support their efforts to publish the full story. 

To that end, this morning we filed an Emergency Appeal of the Temporary Restraining Order in the District of Columbia Court of Appeals.  Our attorney, Bruce Brown of Baker & Hostetler in Washington, is awaiting word from the court on when we will receive a response.  I'll update this posting as soon as we hear any news.

Update (12:10):  The Blog of Legal Times just posted a good summary about the Emergency Appeal that we filed this morning.   http://legaltimes.typepad.com/blt/2010/07/the-national-law-journal-files-appeal-in-first-amendment-fight.html