Reading Room Document

Constitutionality of the Proposed Revision of the International Traffic in Arms Regulations

Proposed revision of the "technical data" provision of the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) redefines and narrows the class of transactions that are subject to a licensing requirement under the Arms Export Control Act of 1976, in an attempt to avoid imposing a prior restraint on speech protected by the First Amendment; however, even as revised the ITAR can have a number of constitutionally impermissible applications. The licensing requirement in the ITAR may constitutionally be applied to transactions involving arrangements entered into by exporters to assist foreign enterprises in the acquisition or use of technology; it may also be applied to transactions involving the dissemination of technical data for the purpose of promoting the sale of technical data or items on the Munitions List, since the prior restraint doctrine has only limited applicability to "commercial speech." However, insofar as it could be applied to persons who have no connection with any foreign enterprise, who disseminate technical data in circumstances in which there is no more than a belief or a reasonable basis for believing that the data might be taken abroad by foreign nationals and used there in the manufacture of arms, the licensing requirement is presumptively unconstitutional as a prior restraint on speech protected by the First Amendment. It is not certain whether a court would find that the revised ITAR are so substantially overbroad as to be void and unenforceable in all their applications, or decide to save the regulations through a narrowing construction. The best legal solution is for the Department of State, not the courts, to narrow the ITAR so as to make it less likely that they will apply to protected speech in constitutionally impermissible circumstances. The OLC does not provide release dates for its opinions, so the release date listed is the date on which the opinion was authored. The original opinion is available at www.justice.gov/file/22696/download.

July 1, 1981