Free Republic is a moderated Internet forum and chat site for self-described conservatives, primarily within the United States. It presents articles and comments posted pseudonymously by registered members, known as "Freepers", using screen names. The site is supported entirely by donations, with pledge drives known as "Freepathons" held each quarter.
Free Republic has been involved in several organized conservative campaigns including against CBS anchor Dan Rather after Rather reported on documents about President George W. Bush's service record which turned out to be forgeries, and against the Dixie Chicks for their antiwar statements. Freepers were instrumental in raising the question of a lack of authenticity in the so-called "Killian memos".
Local chapters and forum policies There are local chapters "unconnected with Free Republic", organized through ping lists, e-mail, and Free Republic mail."Free Republic's Reply Memorandum." Los Angeles Times v. Free Republic. U.S. District Court, C.D.Cal., Case No. 98-7840. November 1, 1999. Some are only "ping list" groups, members who include their names in a list to be "pinged" on news articles of a certain nature. Some cover presidential events (daily picture, prayer, and speech threads), some focus on contemporary conservative issues such as the Second Amendment, the anti-abortion movement, or opposing gay marriage. The more active chapters organize live protests, which they call "Freeps." Since the 2000 election, these are often counter-protests, responses to protests by opposition groups, or small rallies.
As concerns policies and purpose, the main page of Free Republic states,
"Opinions expressed on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Free Republic or its operators. Please enjoy our forum, but also please remember to use common courtesy when posting and refrain from posting personal attacks, profanity, vulgarity, threats, racial or religious bigotry, or any other materials offensive or otherwise inappropriate for a conservative family audience."
"Free Republic does not advocate or condone racism, violence, rebellion, secession, or an overthrow of the government. Free Republic advocates a return to constitutionally limited government, reserving all government powers not expressly delegated by the constitution to the United States to the States respectively, or the people, emphasizing sovereign state governments, local government, self-government and self-rule, while restricting government powers to only those enumerated in the constitution and maximizing individual rights and liberty as originally envisioned and established by our Founding Fathers and secured and defended by the blood of patriots and statesmen for over two hundred years."
Site funding The FreeRepublic.com website is funded through individual contributions each quarter through fundraising on the website. The website generates approximately $250,000 each year by its own admission.
History
1996–2000: Clinton Administration Founded in September 1996 as a sole proprietorship by Founder, Chairman and President James C. "Jim" RobinsonRobinson, James C. Biographical Resume of Fresno, California, Free Republic opened to the general public in February 1997. Robinson filed for LLC status on September 11, 1998.California LP/LLC Search Number 199825410007 Free Republic LLC It has always been a for-profit company and thus donations have never been tax exempt.Morrow, Margaret M., J. Tentative Order Case No. CV 98-7840-MMM (AJWx) Los Angeles Times et al. vs. Free Republic et al.
Free Republic gained popularity during the Clinton impeachment from 1997 till 1999, a time when it was linked on the Drudge Report as "Whitewater Archives," when protests and write-in campaigns were organized through the website. Many were also introduced to the site through an impeachment rally in Washington, attended by over 3000 participants, called the "March for Justice," broadcast live on Halloween 1998 by C-SPAN. Featured speakers included Alan Keyes, Bob Barr, Reverend Jesse Lee Peterson of B.O.N.D. and Larry Klayman; Ann Coulter, Lucianne Goldberg and Matt Drudge also attended.Political Research Associates The Public Eye Spring 1999, Volume XIII, No. 1 Other Free Republic events over the years have also been televised by C-SPAN.fetched 2006-12-30York, Anthony April 2, 2001 Katherine Harris, woman of the year? Salon.com, fetched 2006-12-30
Drudge dropped the link to Free Republic by February 1999, "because they were doing racist stuff over the [Clinton love child]... I click on and I see this headline, 'Nigger Baby.'" Drudge quickly restored the link, but later dropped it again for unknown reasons. As of April 2008 the Free Republic link is back on Drudge.
In its early years, Free Republic generally allowed its members to post copyrighted news stories in entirety to its forum, regardless of whether permission had been granted by content owners, until the site was sued in 1998 by The Washington Post and The Los Angeles Times for copyright infringement. The newspapers obtained a permanent injunction, although stipulated damages of $1 million were reduced to $10,000 during settlement negotiations which allowed the defendants to drop their appeal.Techlawjournal.com The case, often cited when arguing cyberlaw, is called L.A. Times v. Free Republic.
From 1996 to 2000, the bulletin board was virtually unmoderated. This policy was central to the website's "fair use" defense in the copyright infringement litigation, wherein it stated "(t)he website operated by the defendants, www.freerepublic.com, permits anyone who wishes to post news articles or other items and to post commentary about the article as well ... no censorship is made and all views are permitted.". This supposed light moderating hand did not prevent the permanent banishment from the site of such "controversial" contributors as crime author Dan E. Moldea, novelist Todd Brendan Fahey, "What Really Happened" website host Mike Rivero, and Internet poet David Martin. Salon.com's Jeff Stein observed in 1999 that: "[A] swelling number of haters have turned up the volume of death threats, gay-bashing, name-calling and conspiracy theories tying the father of Republican front-runner George W. Bush to drug-dealing by the CIA." Robinson "famously blasted George W. Bush's presidential candidacy back in 2000, before a dramatic late-campaign about-face that saw him emerge as one of the GOP ticket's biggest supporters." These shifts signalled internal battles comparable to the nomination controversies of 2007 "as its founder and chief administrator first cleansed commenting ranks of Bush supporters, then, later, rallied to his support."
White House Press Secretary and former Fox News commentator Tony Snow was a registered member of Free Republic. Snow was not afraid to 'mix it up' with the Freepers who sometimes disagreed with his political philosophy and who called him a "pansy".
Free Republic had been criticized during the pre-moderation period for the actions of several of its members. In 1999, FReepers ran a campaign to make fake donations to the legal defense fund of Julie Hiatt Steele, who had been charged with obstruction of justice during then-President Bill Clinton's impeachment trial. Hundreds of fraudulent transactions from this campaign cost Ms. Steele around $4000. Some threatened to assassinate Clinton, like this from February 2001: "If he keeps on he's going to make me come up there. There is only one solution to the Klintons, two 45 rounds and a nice little spot in Marcy Park."
When the bar manager of an Austin, Texas restaurant called 9-1-1 to notify authorities that an underage Jenna Bush had attempted to purchase liquor in June 2001, the bar manager's personal information including her home address, date of birth, driver's license number and physical description was posted on FreeRepublic, along with calls for punitive action. The Clinton threat and some of the bar manager's personal information were removed by Robinson when brought to his attention, and the authors' posting privileges were revoked. He said that the site had had to "delete relatively few posts" over time for violations of its "no-violence" policy despite Free Republic's popularity and ease of registration.
2001–2004: Bush's first term and Killian documents In January 2001, the forum organized the inaugural "Free Republic Gala and Count the Silverware Ball". It was attended by radio personality James Golden, who was one of the first high-profile conservatives to invest in the site and the Reverend Jesse Lee Peterson of B.O.N.D.The FreeRepublic Inaugural Ball & Count The White House Silverware Party
During the 2004 election, Jerome Corsi, a Swift Boat Vet and co-author of the book Unfit for Command that attacked the Vietnam War record of Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, apologized in the national media for comments that he made on Free Republic under the user name "jrlc."
One of the first responses to "Memogate", the controversy surrounding CBS News' use of documents of questionable origin during the 2004 presidential campaign, came on Free Republic the night of the broadcast.CBS News Report of the Investigative Panel p 163 When the "Killian memos" (which were allegedly created during the 1970s) were shown during a CBS News broadcast, a Republican lawyer going by the pseudonym of "Buckhead"Wallsten, Peter. "Blogger alleging CBS memos as frauds is GOP lawyer." Los Angeles Times, 18 September 2004. mentioned the memos' proportional spacing and made the claim that such printing was "not widespread until the mid to late 90s". Buckhead's post and some responses spread across the blogosphere rapidly, and were picked up by the Drudge Report the following afternoon." '60 Minutes' Documents on Bush Might Be Fake." Drudge Report Archives. (Retrieved February 5, 2007.) Within minutes of Buckhead's post, there was some dispute as to whether the Executive line of IBM typewriters had proportionally spaced fonts at the time, arising from a comment on the Power Line blog. The dispute made headlines when an investigative panel set up to examine authenticity issues with the documents "was not able to reach a definitive conclusion".Dobbs, Michael, and Allen, Mike. "Some Question Authenticity of Papers on Bush." The Washington Post, September 10, 2004. Canadian journalist Ivor Tossell later opined that Free Republic was "central to the network of websites that uncovered the forged memos about Bush's Vietnam service that appeared on CBS News and ultimately cost Dan Rather his job."Tossell, Ivor. "Free Republic: glass ant farm for zealots" The Globe And Mail, 20 October 2006.
MD4Bush Incident In October 2004, the "MD4Bush" account was created to investigate the source of false rumors that Democratic Mayor of Baltimore Martin O'Malley had committed adultery.Snyder, David and Mosk, Matthew. "Uproar Brings Focus on Role Of Bloggers." Washington Post, 11 February 2005. These rumors were suspected to be coming from the camp of Governor of Maryland Robert Ehrlich. O'Malley was a likely (and eventual) opponent of Ehrlich in the 2006 gubernatorial race. Using this alias, MD4Bush allegedly lured Joseph Steffen, aide to Ehrlich, who had a Free Republic membership as "NCPAC," into contact. MD4Bush then allegedly brought up the O'Malley rumors, and baited Steffen into giving responses on the Free Republic "private message" system, appearing to take credit for spreading the rumors.