Top Secret: When Our Government Keeps in the Dark? (Free Expression in America) - Hardcover

This superb volume provides an exceptionally lucid account of the legal landscape of government secrecy. Geoffrey Stone helps readers to think through the conundrums of national security law in pursuit of a sensible secrecy policy that can be reconciled with the democracy it is supposed to protect. -- Steven Aftergood, director of the Project on Government Secrecy, Federation of American Scientists In a rigorous and insightful analysis, Geoffrey Stone's Top Secret explores one of the fundamental and most difficult constitutional tensions of a self-governing society: the conflict between the need of citizens to know what their government is up to and the need of government sometimes to maintain the secrecy of its actions. -- Nadine Strossen, president, American Civil Liberties Union and professor of law, New York Law School The subject, government secrecy, is crucial to our freedom. Geoffrey Stone has tackled all its complexities with admirable clarity and force. He has given us an essential guide to resisting silence and suppression. -- Anthony Lewis, former New York Times columnist This a great book of cartography as well as legal reasoning. Geoffrey Stone has charted the elusive lines between national security and the public's right to know in a straightforward, thought-provoking way that will illuminate the path for judges, journalists and policy-makers for years to come. -- Tony Mauro, Supreme Court correspondent, American Lawyer Media

Top Secret explores the government, the press, and the tension that has escalated between the two since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. This book addresses the executive branch's attempts to prevent and punish the public disclosure of classified information and questions whether or not these attempts are consistent with the rights upheld by the First Amendment.