Protests & Demonstrations

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An inflatable rat in Grand Chute, Wisconsin.
An inflatable rat in Grand Chute, Wisconsin.

In 2014, a labor union decided to protest the practices of an employer in Grand Chute, Wisconsin by placing large inflatables in public right-of-ways.  These inflatables included a giant rat and a large cat wearing a suit and strangling a worker.  Grand Chute’s sign code prohibited the placement of private signs in the right-of-way.  After the town government took enforcement action against the union, a federal district court denied the union’s request for a preliminary injunction and granted summary judgment in favor of the town.

On appeal from the summary judgment order, however, Judge Easterbrook, writing for the panel, questioned whether the case involved a live controversy. 
Continue Reading Seventh Circuit: Wisconsin “Rats and Cats” Case May Be Moot

The City of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania enacted a “buffer zone” ordinance that disallows an individual to “knowingly congregate, patrol, picket or demonstrate in a zone extending 20 feet from any portion of an entrance to, exit from, or driveway of a health care facility.”  A group of plaintiffs, protesters and sidewalk counselors near abortion clinics, challenged…

A member of the street ministry of the Seminole Baptist Church, the plaintiff in the case. Source: Seminole Baptist Church
A member of the street ministry of the Seminole Baptist Church, the plaintiff in the case. Source: Seminole Baptist Church

The plaintiff in Williamson v. City of Foley was a Baptist pastor whose congregation periodically engaged in evangelistic street ministry by preaching and witnessing orally and with signs on public sidewalks at the intersection of two major highways.
Continue Reading Evidence of Less-Restrictive Alternatives Do Not (Necessarily) Violate the Narrow Tailoring Requirement

Paula Soto speaking before the Cambridge City Council. Source: Cambridge Day.

This post was authored by Otten Johnson summer law clerk Alex Gano.  Alex is a rising third-year law student at the University of Colorado Law School.

Last week, a federal magistrate judge in Boston denied a plaintiff’s motion for summary judgment against the City of Cambridge, Massachusetts, in a case involving a municipal ordinance and state law that (might) prohibit non-commercial leafletting of parked cars. The court held that the plaintiff’s case against the City was moot because the City had recently amended its ordinance to allow non-commercial leafletting on private property.  The court also considered and rejected the City’s motion to join the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to the case citing the Eleventh Amendment.  The order in Soto v. City of Cambridge acknowledges a circuit split over the constitutionality of laws banning non-commercial leafletting, but the court ultimately declined to weigh in on the controversy.
Continue Reading Federal Court in Massachusetts Rejects First Amendment Leafletting Challenge

As organizers here in Denver make final preparations for PrideFest this weekend, we report on a case stemming from a similar event scheduled in Syracuse, New York.

A plaintiff who had been prevented from protesting Pride Week in Syracuse in both 2014 and 2015 filed a motion in federal court seeking a preliminary injunction to enjoin the city from restricting the plaintiff’s ability to demonstrate at the upcoming Pride Week festival.  In 2014 and 2015, the plaintiff positioned himself on the sidewalk immediately adjacent to the festival’s entrance with a banner and a voice amplifier, and attempted to “explain[] [his] beliefs to those nearby.”  However, each year, city police officers approached the plaintiff and asked him to move across the street from the festival entrance.  According to video footage taken by the plaintiff, the police officer who approached the plaintiff in 2014 justified his request by stating that the festival organizers’ permit entitled them to exclusive use of the sidewalk area immediately adjacent to the festival entrance.  The police officer who approached the plaintiff in 2015 explained that the festival organizers were entitled to a 40-foot buffer on the area surrounding the festival entrance.
Continue Reading Court Grants Preliminary Injunction in Connection with Syracuse Pride Week Festivities; Buffer Zone Not a Narrowly Tailored Restriction on Speech

Abortion protesters outside of a Planned Parenthood clinic in Portland, Maine. Source: Bangor Daily News.

This post was authored by Otten Johnson summer law clerk Alex Gano.  Alex is a rising third-year law student at the University of Colorado Law School.

On May 23, a federal judge in Maine issued a preliminary injunction against enforcement of a portion of that State’s Civil Rights Act that prohibited “making noise” with the intention of either “jeopardize[ing] the health of persons receiving health services” or “interfer[ing] with the safe and effective delivery” of health services. The ruling in March v. Mills—together with another opinion issued by a federal appellate court in Pennsylvania nine days later—mark the latest chapter in a twenty-year jurisprudential saga on the constitutionality of speech restrictions around abortion clinics.
Continue Reading Federal Judge Enjoins Enforcement of Maine “Noise Provision” as Not Content-Neutral

Late last month, a federal court found that a group of animal rights activists was entitled to a preliminary injunction relating to the group’s protest activities outside of Mohegan Sun Arena in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania.

Protesters outside of the Barnum and Bailey Circus in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. Source: ACLU of Pennsylvania.

The arena in question is owned by a public convention center authority but is operated by a private management company, SMG.  In 2008, SMG promulgated a protest policy that required protestors to remain located in a parking area outside of the arena.  The protest policy limited protestors’ ability to approach attendees at public events and to distribute literature.  In March 2016, SMG revised the protest policy to allow two designated protest areas of approximately 500 to 700 square feet, and located closer to the entrance gates of the arena.  The plaintiffs, including Silvie Pomicter and Last Chance for Animals sought to protest outside of the arena during the Barnum and Bailey Circus, which took place at the arena between April 28 and May 1.
Continue Reading Preliminary Injunction Granted to Animal Rights Activists in Pennsylvania Convention Center Case

Last week, in a case we previously covered here, a federal district court in Colorado considered whether plaintiffs have standing to seek permanent injunctive relief when the defendant has stipulated that it has no intention of enforcing a restriction on expressive conduct.

In Verlo v. City and County of Denver, plaintiffs desired to distribute leaflets regarding jury nullification in the plaza outside of Denver’s Lindsey-Flanigan Courthouse.  However, the Colorado Second Judicial District, which operates in the courthouse, issued an order essentially prohibiting all expressive activities in the courthouse plaza.  The City and County of Denver, the entity responsible for enforcing the order, stipulated that it would not do so.  Furthermore, the city stipulated that it would not interfere with plaintiffs’ peaceful distribution of leaflets in the plaza.  Notwithstanding the stipulation, plaintiffs sued the city and the Colorado Second Judicial District, claiming that the order was an unconstitutional restriction on their First Amendment rights.  In an earlier decision, the federal district court granted plaintiffs’ motion for preliminary injunction, barring enforcement of the order.
Continue Reading Denver Courthouse Case Continued: Plaintiffs Lack Standing

Protesters outside a New Hampshire reproductive health clinic. Source: watchdog.org.

Last week, a federal district court judge in New Hampshire ruled that a group of protesters lacked standing to challenge a state law prohibiting them from entering within a 25-foot radius of the entrance to an abortion clinic. The law, which was similar to a Massachusetts law that the U.S. Supreme Court struck down in 2014, stated that “[n]o person shall knowingly enter or remain on a public way or sidewalk adjacent to a reproductive health care facility within a radius up to 25 feet of any portion of an entrance, exit, or driveway of a reproductive health care facility.”  The law also required clinics to “clearly demarcate” the buffer zone.
Continue Reading Abortion Protesters Lack Standing to Challenge New Hampshire Law

The Lindsey-Flanigan Courthouse plaza should be open to expressive activity, at least according to the federal district court in Colorado. Source: Glass Magazine.

In a case close to home (for us, at least), a group of citizen pamphleteers sued the City and County of Denver and the Colorado Second Judicial District court, claiming that prohibitions on expressive activity in the plaza outside of Denver’s Lindsey-Flanigan Courthouse violated the First Amendment.
Continue Reading Federal Court Finds Plaintiffs Likely to Prevail in Denver Courthouse Free Speech Case