© Efraín M. Padró, All Rights Reserved
One of the most common questions I get when teaching my “legal issues” class is whether it’s OK to photograph subjects like courthouses, airports, train stations, and other facilities that are considered important to national security and could therefore become the subject of a terrorist attack. Many of these buildings are quite photogenic, and if you enjoy photographing them, sooner or later you will be approached by a law enforcement type asking what you are doing, or worse – I was once confronted by two police offecers, guns drawn, while photographing landscapes outside of Deming, New Mexico.
According to a recent post by the American Civil Liberties Union, “[t]aking photographs of things that are plainly visible from public spaces is a constitutional right–and that includes federal buildings, transportation facilities, and police or other government officials carrying out their duties.” (From Know Your Rights: Photographers, by the ACLU).
Unfortunately there is no standardized approach by local, state and federal agencies when handling photography of public buildings, so photographers are likely to encounter quite a variety of responses depending on where they are. Some law enforcement agencies understand how the law works – I once called the Denver Police Department to let them know I would be photographing in and around the local airport, and the response was a gruff “go ahead; it’s a free country”; while others have no clue (see the guns-drawn episode above).
The ACLU article does an excellent job in clarifying photographers’ rights in these situations, so I thought I’d share it with you. Click here to view the two-page article.
Whatever your rights, however, courtesy and a little common sense go a long way in handling uncomfortable situations in the field. When approach
ed by a law enforcement officer, I am always polite and respectful, but do let them know I have a right to be there and take my pictures. But once it becomes clear that the officer won’t budge, I simply walk away. My motto in these situations is “the guy with the gun always wins.”
The picture here is of the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals building in Denver. I was there photographing columns, when suddenly three federal vehicles pulled up and “serious-looking” men approached me. I explained who I was and what I was doing, they explained why I had attracted their attention (the tripod did it). I was able to finish my shoot (though they still wrote an incident report–rules are rules). This time things worked out, but be prepared for when they don’t.
Now go out and shoot something.