Vote by Liberal Bates Aids Bill to Curb Pornography

One of the Legislature’s most liberal Democrats cast the deciding vote Tuesday enabling the Assembly Public Safety Committee to pass legislation that would all but ban the sale of graphic pornography from street-side vending machines.

Assemblyman Tom Bates (D-Oakland), who almost always votes in line with the American Civil Liberties Union, said he believes it makes sense to keep such explicit pornography out of the hands of children. Democrat Curtis Tucker Jr. of Inglewood also voted for the bill, giving the three Republicans on the committee the five-vote majority needed to send the measure to the Assembly floor.

The bill, by Assemblyman Gil Ferguson (R-Newport Beach), is aimed at curbing pornography sales from coin-operated sidewalk vending machines commonly found along downtown streets and increasingly in suburban areas. The machines and the magazines and newspapers they display have raised the ire of community and religious groups throughout the state, mainly because they are easily accessible to children.

The measure would allow the sale of “harmful matter” from these vending machines only in areas supervised by an adult, a change that would probably end their use in public areas. Harmful matter is already defined in current law and includes photographs of the acts of sodomy, oral copulation, sexual intercourse, masturbation and bestiality.

The bill is a follow-up to a measure passed and signed by the governor in 1988 that prohibited the sale of pornography from vending machines if children would be able to view the material.

Ferguson, one of the most conservative members of the Legislature, said he was surprised but pleased by Bates’ support. “We have always been antagonists,” Ferguson said. “I didn’t even ask him for his vote because I didn’t think he would give it to me.”

After the hearing, Bates fended off criticism from the ACLU lobbyist and Assemblyman John Burton (D-San Francisco), the committee’s chairman, who voted against the bill.

“Do you know what this bill does?” Burton asked Bates. “It’s garbage.”

Margaret Pena, the ACLU representative, asked Bates how he planned to defend his vote in his liberal district, which includes the Berkeley.

“I don’t have to defend it,” Bates replied. “I’m concerned about the First Amendment. But I’m convinced that this is not going to restrict the access (for adults) to the material. It is simply going to make it more difficult for kids. I think there’s a real problem going on out there with kids. I just don’t think they should be exposed to this material.”

During the hearing, Pena told the committee that the material the bill would regulate is “protected speech” under the U.S. Constitution.

“This bill would make that material inaccessible to adults in coin-operated machines, since no one is going to hire an adult to supervise the machines,” she said.

The bill was also opposed by the publisher of Spectator Magazine, which is sold from vending machines. But the measure had the support of the city and county of Los Angeles.

Ferguson said he believes the bill will fare well on the Assembly floor and in the Senate because lawmakers are increasingly attuned to a concern among the electorate about moral values. He cited the results of two recent Los Angeles Times Polls, one of which found that the public believes most legislators are corrupt and the other that showed 65% of Americans expressing dissatisfaction about “moral values these days.”

“Most elected officials do not want to be cast as something they are not,” he said. “And most of them are not crooks. The large majority are honest and are trying to be perceived as attentive to the public’s concerns, even if it means doing something this year that they wouldn’t have done last year--like voting for an anti-pornography bill.”