filed a year ago there have been significant decisions handing down by a number of courts the supreme court on the topic is st amendment freedom of speech here in the context of war memorials who has the freedom of speech who controls it who defends it this case is an inversion of the common pattern in that the plaintiffs are not offended observers seeking to remove a monument as in american legion case in pensacola the th circuit case but rather they're trying to maintain their speech and restrain a government entity from suppressing it which is more like the alabama vs birmingham case and the alabama supreme court all of these cases have been submitted including the appeal it takes the risk of this case are certainly subject to reoccurrence and there isn't an adequate remedy without a decision without so this is just newsome without giving away any of your client confidences did you consider seeking a stay pending appeal and if and if not why not in this and if so why isn't your failure to do so well no i was positive the move this  we were under so under the understanding that is that a request for a stay was not necessary we wanted to move directly to the appeal and that a stay would be ineffective and was held on unpack that for me why were you under the impression that  unnecessary and separately why were you under the impression that a stay would have been ineffective it was it was not a requirement to bring the appeal the appeal was based on the issues that we wanted to bring forward to this court the second the nd part of the question you said that you didn't think it was necessary in that you didn't think it would be effective and sound like two different things to me one is we don't need district court said the city can move it did you seek a stay pending appeal to prevent from happening precisely what happened because it had actually happened by that time the timeframe was very short here traditional public forum for the expression of political d speech if not in the historical district it's been pushed off to applause it there's a very distinct difference between to the monument still stands how is your free speech being violated because the free speech was removed from a traditional public forum moved to a different your clients have standing and we've said in the supreme court has said that it has to be a particular arised injury something that they suffer different distinctly and apart from lots of other people and it seems like what you're saying are things sort of like you know the advocate for southern heritage or history the most specific it seems to me that you get us to say that some of your clients have deceased confederate veterans in their lineage but i mean lots of other people can say that too so why is the in particularized their part of that group gesture but that particularized injury is enough that they are descendants and the original speech of the monument continues through the generations they do have their particular interest injury because of their relationship to the original monument different meaning and do you mean anyone who has in his or her lineage confederate soldiers standing with respect to the monument good afternoon and may it please the court my name is christy hatcher bolen and i represent what i will refer to as the city apple e's mayor matts city manager delgado as well as commissioner selvage trawler and walker there are two primary issues before this court and they are both premised upon the relocation of the confederate monument and those are whether appellant stated a cause of action for a violation of their free speech rights based upon that relocation and whether the appellant's had standing to assert to prosecute process client and whether they state a due process claim based on the relocation of the monument from one city park to another the answer to both of those questions is  no st there is no standing appellants have no legally cognizable interest in the monument and they cannot demonstrate an injury in fact caused by the relocation of that monument from one park to another at best appellants are merely bystanders  sympathize with the monument but they can still express their free speech rights regardless of where the city has moved it and it did just move it from one city park to another nd there's something simply new claim here the monument is government that's that's very clear under some i'm an under walker and under this court's decision in mac and so whatever the city decided to do with it is not subject to scrutiny under the free speech clause likewise because it's government speech appellants do not have a property or liberty interest in the monument and they have no due process claim the district court properly dismissed these claims and so we're asking this court to affirm now i want to just pick up briefly on something that the court picked up on immediately and physically possible to move the monument obviously you moved it once it could be moved again what is your thought they say went to great expense to do that because the city this is this is not a destruction case by the way i just want to point that out so the city went all right if that's the case all the more reason that technically this may not be moot because if we were to side with although admittedly we do believe that they presented a very thorough complaint that explained you know why this is government speech and yes i do agree with you judge that that it would be of great expense to the city to do that but but they technically could but this is this really doesn't fall under one of those exceptions it's not we're talking about one monument here so it's not something that's capable of repetition but evading review and plaintiffs importantly they did not take all steps necessary to perfect their appeal and preserve the status quo as this point court pointed out there was no motion for stay and the notice of appeal was actually filed on february sis and it was not moved until march t that's actually set forth in our supplemental appendix there is an affidavit there of bob donna hey that sets forth the timeline for this news than just a follow on judge scanlan's question is it your position then that the failure to this don't apply there have been a passage of time and i think i think the case i'd most like in this too is the brooks the georgia state board of elections case where you basically had a settlement agreement and there were certain timelines in the settlement agreement  and certain things were supposed to be done by certain time periods and the time period can passed and those things weren't done and the plaintiffs came back and said well but but they didn't do these by the time frame and now we've reverted back to the old old style of how we appoint judges and the court basically said it's still new well that that is something like we have here they could have pressed beforehand and they didn't and it is technically possible to move it back but again they are under an obligation to preserve the status quo and they could have done that easily at least attempted to through the filing of a motion for stay and for injunction and they simply did not do that but in addition to any injury and any conduct complained of and again we're focused here what judge martin pointed out is that the only relief they sought was to prevent the monument from being relocated from month park to veterans park to have that injury in fact he's got to show the invasion of a legally protected interest that's concrete and particularized actual or imminent not conjectural in their initial brief appellants claim they were denied freedom of speech based upon the relocation the monument but still that they cannot prevent injury to their feet free speech rights based upon the relocation because they can still exercise those rights nothing has changed they are free to go to mung park to veterans park to any park to express their their pride in southern history to vindicate the cause of the confederate soldier they are free to do that the monument has nothing to do with that and they also can still visit the monument it's not in the closet it's a public park it's  me ask you a question this is the suggestion is that again i mean i guess i worry a little bit about if we're just going to argue about standing sort of in the abstract in the absence of an injury that you do worry about sort of the merging of standing of the standing analysis on  tell me if i'm wrong but it seems to be the simpler way to do this so that the standing and merits analyses don't overlap as simply to focus on particular as they should and and ask whether these plaintiffs really have an injury is separate apart from a different from the injury that might be suffered by lots of other people and then you don't have to worry about like whether the monument still stands whether they can the beginning of that stuff and i wrong about that no no i think you know no you're not wrong i  think that that's a fair point absolutely they they are there they're more of a concerned bystander i mean they may be descendants of confederate soldiers and have descendants of members of the united daughters the confederacy confederacy who st petition to have this here but i'm sure there's hundreds and thousands of people just like that hundreds and thousands of people who sympathize with human who look at that monument and they feel the same way and they have the same thoughts about preserving it but that's not particular enough a particular as injury has to affect you in a personal and an individual way and they don't have that here i think actually at least in this circuit one of the best examples of that is this court's decision and i'm going to murder the name because urrea versus city of castleberry it's the case in which this court determined that an exotic dancer lacks standing to challenge the city's revocation of her employer's business license because it was the employer's license that was revoked and it was the employer's business activities that were shut down she could still go dance elsewhere she could express her free speech elsewhere it did not touch her in a particular way the dancer in city of castleberry suffered no particularized injury because the action against her employer did not affect her the revocation of her employer's business license did not if the impactor in a personal and individual way she was more just a concerned bystander and the same is true here they certain interest in preserving the history of the south they assert an interest in vindicating the cause for which the confederate veteran fought for protecting and preserving the morals to american veterans but like that dancer in city of castleberry their free speech rights are not affected whatsoever so relocating the monument does not restrain or prevent them from exercising their free speech rights and money park or any other public public park they can still visit the monument nor does relocating that monument compel them to do or say anything they can still continue to advocate for the preservation of southern history so while they have tried to distinguish themselves based upon being descent descendants that special interest is not particular enough and basically it's a generalized grievance about what the city has decided to do and the has said over and over again that you cannot have a generalized grievance even if it's sincere that's not enough for standing then vacating the public interest is simply not the function of the judicial branch but even if appellant had standing they have no claim for violation of their free speech rights based upon some  they they cannot avoid some of the factual differences with some and some do not render its holding in a political and that holding is that permanent monuments placed on public property with the government's permission our government speech the supreme court reiterated that the free speech clause restricts government regulation of private speech it does not regulate government speech and it does not matter that a private group donated that monument to the city the supreme court in some and rejected the very same argument appellants have made here and that is a monument can convey only one message and that's the message intended by the donor the supreme court rejected that they basically said look at doesn't it can be a donated monument but when the city accept it and the city places it on it's own property that becomes government speech and i just want to kind of suck wait to something that has been stated and that's in some of the in the briefs as well as the supplemental authority there's been an argument here that this is a mixed government and private speech and know i don't really researched it in the ground but i don't know that that we've sort of privilege one over the other standings in some respects seems to me more fundamental because it's something that has to exist at the very outset of litigation this is something that might happen later but do  you have you know you have thoughts about that or a position about how a court ought to order its consideration of just disability issues i think that probably standing is is a bit takes a bit more precedence over this over new business because it is obvious obviously something that may change but standing you have to have it at every stage of the litigation and so i think that's something that the court really would naturally take up st and as i said i think standing is not i think it's it's more concrete in some respects especially in a case like this then mootness is standing is something i think the court can can basically latch on to and in this case i'd like to point this out it's a lot different than say that the court's opinion in the clear not clear water the cambridge christian case i apologize that was one of the most recent government speech cases here we have a complaint that is incredibly particularized and it lays out history association endorsement and it also l out the selection and control by the government it lays out all of those things that this is not a case where you're going to have to worry about are there more facts the plaintiffs provided a very kind of pull  thank you we're asking this court to affirm because we we believe that the dismissal was absolutely appropriate thank you thank you ma'am please the court ashley davis on behalf of state florida secretary of state after disposing of all the federal claims the district court declined to exercise its supplemental jurisdiction over the remaining state claims and therefore dismissed the sole claim against the florida secretary of state is declamation and mitchell was without error and therefore is a palace have not altogether waived arguments the contrary you again your honors this is david mcallister i'd like to address that issue to reaffirm that basically the city took the risk of the move after it made its decision and after the case was filed that's the case is not moot it stays as a case in controversy the injury in fact the injury here to these particular clients they have our particular sensitivity to the freedom of speech to the speech that the monument is expressing as especially in a political context which has a very high revue in our legal system they issue really should be whether the city has the unfettered ability to repress the speech of the monument in the public forum the location matters location does matter and in fact that it was the taxpayers that paid to move the monument not the city so called it was the taxpayers and we have a tax payer plan if here he wants it back the psychological damage to the other plane is is just as serious as it was in the reagan case i know raven is a thin reed to stand on the religion freedom of religion issue st amendment issues in american legion in pensacola and say now that applies to free speech another st amendment issue the city should not have the rights and ability to remove the historical war memorial out of the traditional public square form unless it gives a compelling reason there should be a strict proview strict scrutiny in this case because in removing the monument the city exhibited an impermissible hostility to the speech of the monument and of its advocates and at least one expression of that speech was the highly protected political speech of the monument history matters we've seen that in the line of cases coming from you know the distinguished sumo and come from the american legion and pensacola who has it as if these says is not protected by the st amendment so we're living in an autocracy and no one ever question what government does and that's not the law in this country governments anyone here was hostile and had no good in the light of the line of cases that is perceived concerning monument protection i think it would help to establish an as a standard for a test that applies in st amendment cases as it does and establishment cases