Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/12pdf/12-10_21p3.pdf
Page Number: 20

2 

AGENCY FOR INT’L DEVELOPMENT v. ALLIANCE FOR 

OPEN SOCIETY INT’L, INC. 

SCALIA, J., dissenting 

tance,  no  one  could  reasonably  object.  And  that  would 
remain  true  if  Hamas  were  an  organization  of  United 
States  citizens  entitled  to  the  protection  of  the  Constitu-
tion.  So long as the unfunded organization remains free to 
engage  in  its  activities  (including  anti-American  propa-
ganda)  “without  federal  assistance,”  United  States  v. 
American  Library  Assn.,  Inc.,  539  U. S.  194,  212  (2003) 
(plurality),  refusing  to  make  use  of  its  assistance  for  an
enterprise  to  which  it  is  opposed  does  not  abridge  its
speech.  And the same is true when the rejected organiza-
tion is not affirmatively opposed to, but merely unsupport-
ive of, the object of the federal program, which appears to 
be  the  case  here.  (Respondents  do  not  promote  prostitu-
tion,  but  neither  do  they  wish  to  oppose  it.)    A  federal  
program  to  encourage  healthy  eating  habits  need  not 
be  administered  by  the  American  Gourmet  Society,
which has nothing against healthy food but does not insist 
upon it.

The  argument  is  that  this  commonsense  principle  will 
enable the government to discriminate against, and injure, 
points of view to which it is opposed.  Of course the Consti-
tution  does  not  prohibit  government  spending  that  dis-
criminates  against,  and  injures,  points  of  view  to  which
the  government  is  opposed;  every  government  program 
which  takes  a  position  on  a  controversial  issue  does  that. 
Anti-smoking programs injure cigar aficionados, programs
encouraging  sexual  abstinence  injure  free-love  advocates, 
etc.  The  constitutional  prohibition  at  issue  here  is  not  a 
prohibition  against  discriminating  against  or  injuring
opposing points of view, but the First Amendment’s prohi-
bition  against  the  coercing  of  speech.    I  am  frankly  dubi-
ous that a condition for eligibility to participate in a minor 
federal program such as this one runs afoul of that prohi-
bition even when the condition is irrelevant to the goals of
the program.  Not every disadvantage is a coercion. 

But that is not the issue before us here.  Here the views