Photo by erin m of the headquarters of the U.S. Department of Transportation, which has officers notorious for insisting photography of the building is illegal.

Last October, we wrote about this New York case, where a photographer was arrested, briefly detained and had his videotape confiscated for filming outside a federal courthouse in Manhattan. The New York Civil Liberties Union brought the case on the photographer’s behalf, ending in a settlement in which the Federal Protection Services, part of the Department of Homeland Security, admitted that citizens have the right to film outside federal courthouses and pledged to notify their officers in writing.

As reported on the New York Times’ Lens blog, the NYCLU recently received a redacted version of the statement, which (as it should) broadly applies to federal buildings nationwide, not just federal courthouses in Manhattan. As the Lens blog notes:

The three-page bulletin reminds officers, agents and employees that, “absent reasonable suspicion or probable cause,” they “must allow individuals to photograph the exterior of federally owned or leased facilities from publicly accessible spaces” like streets, sidewalks, parks and plazas. Even when there seems to be reason to intercede and conduct a “field interview,” the directive says, “Officers should not seize the camera or its contents, and must be cautious not to give such ‘orders’ to a photographer to erase the contents of a camera, as this constitutes a seizure or detention.”

As we’ll reiterate: this is not a new right, but it is a nice step forward in stopping federal officers from ad-libbing their own lines into this city’s security theater. So photographers, print this sucker out, tuck it into your camera bag and let us know how well the DHS-sanctioned permission slip works next time you get stopped.