McGRAW-HILL COS., INC. v. PROCTER & GAMBLE CO. Et Al.
Headline: Emergency request by Business Week to block a district-court gag order is denied, keeping the restraining order on publication of sealed court documents while lower courts sort out facts.
Holding: The application to stay the district court’s restraining order is denied, leaving the lower-court order barring publication of sealed attachments in effect while factual issues are resolved.
- Leaves the district court restraining order in place, blocking publication of sealed attachments.
- Requires lower courts to resolve factual disputes before any Supreme Court review.
- Denies immediate Supreme Court intervention and likely delays public access to contested materials.
Summary
Background
On September 13, 1995, a federal district court in Ohio issued an order restraining the publisher of Business Week from publishing an article that disclosed documents filed under seal or their contents without the court’s prior consent. On September 19, 1995, the publisher filed an emergency application with Justice Stevens, acting as the circuit justice for the Sixth Circuit, asking him to stay that restraining order pending a petition for Supreme Court review. The publisher said the documents were attachments to a motion filed by Procter & Gamble on September 1, and that the motion itself gave no indication the attachments were filed under seal.
Reasoning
Justice Stevens denied the emergency stay. He found the application focused on the merits instead of explaining why the Court of Appeals erred about its jurisdiction or why four Justices would agree to review that jurisdictional question. He also said a stay was unnecessary to preserve Supreme Court review and might actually make review moot. Memoranda opposing the stay suggested the publisher’s account of how it obtained the documents might be misleading and that factual disputes exist. Because those factual questions could affect the publisher’s right to publish, Stevens concluded it was wiser to let the district court make factual findings and allow the Court of Appeals to address the merits before this Court intervenes.
Real world impact
The denial leaves the district-court restraining order in effect for now, blocking publication of the sealed attachments while the lower courts resolve factual and constitutional issues. This decision is procedural and not a final ruling on the First Amendment questions; the dispute may continue in the lower courts or be raised again later for review.
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