Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/18pdf/18-302_e29g.pdf
Page Number: 37

12 

IANCU v. BRUNETTI 

Opinion of SOTOMAYOR, J. 

(kinds of speech like “obscenity, defamation, etc.” may “be 
regulated  because  of  their  constitutionally  proscribable 
content”  (emphasis  deleted));  see  also  Bethel  School  Dist. 
No.  403  v.  Fraser,  478  U. S.  675,  685  (1986)  (treating 
punishment  of  “offensively  lewd  and  indecent  speech”  as
viewpoint  neutral);  Pacifica,  438  U. S.,  at  745–746,  and 
n. 22  (treating  regulation  of  profane  monologue  as  view-
point neutral).  Indeed, the statute that the Court upheld 
in  Chaplinsky  itself  had  been  construed  to  cover,  among 
other  kinds  of  “disorderly  words,”  “profanity,  obscenity
and threats,” 315 U. S., at 573, despite the fact that such 
words  had  been  used  in  that  case  to  communicate  an 
expressive  message,  id.,  at  574.  To  treat  a  restriction  on 
vulgarity, profanity, or obscenity as viewpoint discrimina-
tion would upend decades of precedent.7
  Brunetti  invokes  Cohen  v.  California,  403  U. S.  15 
(1971), to argue that the restriction at issue here is view-
point  discriminatory.  But  Cohen—which  did  not  employ 
the  precise  taxonomy  that  is  more  common  today—does 
not  reach  as  far  as  Brunetti  wants.  Cohen  arose  in  the 
criminal context: Cohen had been arrested and imprisoned 
under a California criminal statute targeting disturbances
of the peace because he was “wearing a jacket bearing the
words ‘F[***] the Draft.’ ”  Id., at 16.  The Court held that 
applying  that  statute  to  Cohen  because  of  his  jacket  vio-
lated the First Amendment.  Id., at 26.  But the Court did 
—————— 

the  regulated  speech’ ”  in  the  way  that  a  simple  regulation  of  time, 
place, or manner is.  Ward v. Rock Against Racism, 491 U. S. 781, 791 
(1989) (emphasis deleted). 

7 It would also risk destabilizing government practice in a number of 
other  contexts.    Governments  regulate  vulgarity  and  profanity,  for 
example,  on  city-owned  buses  and  billboards,  e.g.,  American  Freedom 
Defense Initiative v. Massachusetts Bay Transp. Auth., 989 F. Supp. 2d 
182, 183 (Mass. 2013) (noting such a prohibition), on registered vessels,
46  CFR  §67.117(b)(3)  (Coast  Guard  regulations),  and  at  school  events, 
e.g., Bethel School Dist. No. 403 v. Fraser, 478 U. S. 675, 677–678, 685 
(1986) (upholding discipline of high school student).