Sunshine Week (March 13-19) is a six-year-old initiative of the American Society of Newspaper Editors, funded by the Knight Foundation. It is a week-long celebration of open government, freedom of information, and the right to access that empowers public participation in democracy.

It coincides with the birthday of James Madison, who authored the First Amendment and whose writings inspired movements for open record and open meeting laws, culminating in the 1966 Freedom of Information Act