Opinion ID: 218050
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: California Constitutional Claim

Text: Plaintiff challenges the City's supergraphic and offsite sign bans on the ground that they violate the California constitutional guarantee of free speech. Cal. Const, art. I, § 2. Plaintiff relies on dicta in a California Supreme Court decision that suggests, unlike the First Amendment, the California Constitution does not afford any lesser protection to commercial speech than non-commercial speech. Plaintiff reasons that the banning of supergraphic offsite signs, a prohibition on commercial speech, would not withstand scrutiny under the California Constitution. Cf. Gerawan Farming, Inc. v. Lyons, 24 Cal.4th 468, 497, 101 Cal.Rptr.2d 470, 12. P.3d 720 (2000). Indeed, as a general matter, the California liberty of speech clause is broader and more protective than the free speech clause of the First Amendment. See Los Angeles Alliance for Survival v. City of Los Angeles, 22 Cal.4th 352, 366, 93 Cal.Rptr.2d 1, 993 P.2d 334 (2000). The City argues that a decision after Gerawan, Kasky v. Nike, Inc., 27 Cal.4th 939, 959, 119 Cal.Rptr.2d 296, 45 P.3d 243 (2002), recognized that the protections for commercial speech under the California Constitution are co-terminus with the protections under the First Amendment. Kasky, 27 Cal.4th at 959, 119 Cal.Rptr.2d 296, 45 P.3d 243. The City also claims that, notwithstanding any distinction between commercial and noncommercial speech or any greater protection afforded by the California Constitution, the California Constitution requires that the Court to apply the same standard as the First Amendment for content-neutral time, place, and manner restrictions like the supergraphic and offsite sign bans. See Los Angeles Alliance for Survival, 22 Cal.4th at 364-65, 93 Cal.Rptr.2d 1, 993 P.2d 334. In the City's view, then, the supergraphic and offsite sign bans would pass muster under the California Constitution as content-neutral restrictions. The Court will follow Kasky, which defeats Plaintiff's argument that the protections for commercial speech under the California Constitution are different than the protections under the First Amendment. In that case, the California Supreme Court addressed whether allegedly false statements by a corporation could be subject to false advertising and unfair competition claims without running afoul of either the First Amendment or the California Constitution. Kasky, 27 Cal.4th at 946, 119 Cal. Rptr.2d 296, 45 P.3d 243. In order to decide the question, the court had to determine whether the speech at issue was commercial or non-commercial because commercial speech receives a lesser degree of constitutional protection than many other forms of expression, and because governments may entirely prohibit commercial speech that is false or misleading. Id. The court extensively analyzed the distinction between commercial and non-commercial speech under the First Amendment, id. at 951-58, 119 Cal.Rptr.2d 296, 45 P.3d 243, and explained that the scope of the free speech clause in the California Constitution was co-extensive with the First Amendment: [t]his court has never suggested that the state and federal Constitutions impose different boundaries between the categories of commercial and noncommercial speech, id. at 959, 119 Cal.Rptr.2d 296, 45 P.3d 243 (emphasis in original). The court cited the dicta from Gerawan that Plaintiff relies on, namely, that the free speech clause of the California Constitution is at least as broad in scope as the First Amendment, but the court nevertheless drew a distinction in Kasky between protection for commercial speech and non-commercial speech in order to determine whether the defendant's false advertising was actionable. Id. The court then extensively analyzed the issue under the First Amendment and concluded that the defendant's allegedly false advertising was commercial speech that could be subject to false advertising and unfair competition claims without violating the First Amendment. Id. at 960-69, 119 Cal.Rptr.2d 296, 45 P.3d 243. Importantly, the court also reached the same conclusion under the California Constitution in a brief passage, explaining that, [i]n the few cases in which this court has addressed the distinction between commercial and non-commercial speech, we have not articulated a separate test for determining what constitutes commercial speech under the state Constitution, but instead we have used the tests fashioned by the United States Supreme Court. Id. at 969, 119 Cal.Rptr.2d 296, 45 P.3d 243. Thus, the court's holding under the First Amendment was dispositive of the issue under the California Constitution. Id. In light of Kasky, Plaintiff's argument that enhanced protection exists for commercial speech under the California Constitution is unpersuasive and Plaintiff's California constitutional claim fails for the same reasons his First Amendment claims fail. Plaintiff has not raised serious questions on the merits of this claim to justify issuance of a preliminary injunction.