Famed attorney Floyd Abrams, who represented The New York Times in many important First Amendment cases including the landmark Pentagon Papers case, is none too happy with his former client. Abrams wrote to the letters section of the paper to blast it for its coverage of the Charlie Hebdo terrorist attack.
Abrams, a partner in the New York firm Cahill, Gordon and Reindel, LLP, was upset by the Times’ decision not to publish the controversial French cartoons depicting Mohammad. Those cartoons are widely believed to have been a major force behind the motivation for the terrorist attack that led to the murder of 10 magazine employees, two police officers, and four patrons of a Jewish deli.
Here is Abrams’ letter as it appeared in the Times:
To the Editor:
The decision of The New York Times to report on the murders in Paris of journalists who worked for Charlie Hebdo while not showing a single example of the cartoons that led to their executions is regrettable. There are times for self-restraint, but in the immediate wake of the most threatening assault on journalism in living memory, you would have served the cause of free expression best by engaging in it.
FLOYD ABRAMS
New York, Jan. 8, 2015
The writer, a First Amendment lawyer, represented The Times in the Pentagon Papers case.