Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/21-476_c185.pdf
Page Number: 24

18 

303 CREATIVE LLC v. ELENIS 

Opinion of the Court 

(1977) (per curiam) (upholding free-speech rights of partic-
ipants  in  a  Nazi  parade);  Snyder,  562  U. S.,  at  456–457 
(same for protestors of a soldier’s funeral).3 

Failing all else, Colorado suggests that this Court’s deci-
sion in FAIR supports affirmance.  See also post, at 25–26 
(opinion  of  SOTOMAYOR, J.)  (making  the  same  argument).
In  FAIR,  a  group  of  schools  challenged  a  law  requiring
them,  as  a condition  of  accepting  federal  funds,  to  permit
military  recruiters  space  on  campus  on  equal  terms  with 
other  potential  employers.    547  U. S.,  at  51–52,  58.  The 
only  expressive  activity  required  of  the  law  schools,  the
Court found, involved the posting of logistical notices along
these lines:  “ ‘The U. S. Army recruiter will meet interested 
students in Room 123 at 11 a.m.’ ”  Id., at 61–62.  And, the 
Court  reasoned,  compelled  speech  of  this  sort  was  “inci-
dental” and a “far cry” from the speech at issue in our “lead-
ing  First  Amendment  precedents  [that]  have  established 
the principle that freedom of speech prohibits the govern-
ment  from  telling  people  what  they  must  say.”    Ibid.;  see 
also NIFLA, 585 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 8). 

It is a far cry from this case too.  To be sure, our cases 
have  held  that  the  government  may  sometimes  “requir[e] 

—————— 

3 The dissent labels the distinction between status and message “amus-
ing” and “embarrassing.”  Post, at 32.  But in doing so, the dissent ignores
a fundamental feature of the Free Speech Clause.  While it does not pro-
tect  status-based  discrimination  unrelated  to  expression,  generally  it 
does protect a speaker’s right to control her own message—even when we
may disapprove of the speaker’s motive or the message itself.  The dis-
sent’s derision is no answer to any of this.  It ignores, too, the fact that 
Colorado  itself  has,  in  other  contexts,  distinguished  status-based  dis-
crimination  (forbidden)  from  the  right  of  a  speaker  to  control  his  own 
message  (protected).    See  App.  131,  137,  140,  143–144,  149,  152,  154.
(Truth  be  told,  even  the  dissent  acknowledges  “th[is]  distinction”  else-
where in its opinion.  Post, at 31, n. 11.)  Nor is the distinction unusual 
in societies committed both to nondiscrimination rules and free expres-
sion.  See, e.g., Lee v. Ashers Baking Co. Ltd., [2018] UKSC 49, p. 14 (“The 
less favourable treatment was afforded to the message not to the man.”). 
Does the dissent really find all that amusing and embarrassing?