The State of Missouri is buying its lethal injection drugs from a pharmacy.  The identity of that supplier is a secret.

Does Pharmacy Have Constitutionally Protected Speech Over Products It Sells?

The supplier has provided the drugs used in 16 executions in the State of Missouri.

Mississippi Death Row inmates have a court fight going on over Mississippi’s lethal injection methods, and in that suit they have subpoenaed the Missouri Department of Correction’s drug source information.  It’s a part of their arguments regarding Mississippi, and they are comparing what happens in other states, too.

Here’s the question:  is the drug supplier protected by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution? Can its identity be kept secret under an argument that it’s related to political speech?

Whattha? 

Read the analysis of this argument by Harvard Law Professor Noah Feldman as published in Bloomberg News here.