Opinion ID: 38
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Porcelain Hearts

Text: The Supreme Court has recognized the particular sensitivity of people to targeted (plaintiff's) attorney advertisements during periods of trauma. To the extent that the attorney advertisements, regardless of the media through which they are communicated, are directed toward the same sensitive people, there is no reason to distinguish among the mode of communication. Depending on the individual recipient, the printed word may be a likely to offend as images on a screen or in newspapers. In Florida Bar, the Court recognized the state's substantial interest ... in protecting injured Floridians from invasive conduct by lawyers. 515 U.S. at 635, 115 S.Ct. 2371. As the dissent in Florida Bar pointed out, the primary distinction between the targeted letters at issue in Florida Bar and the untargeted letters at issue in Shapero v. Kentucky Bar Association, 486 U.S. 466, 108 S.Ct. 1916, 100 L.Ed.2d 475 (1988), was that victims or their families will be offended by receiving a [targeted] solicitation during their grief and trauma. Florida Bar, 515 U.S. at 638, 115 S.Ct. 2371. The dissent argued that the majority should not allow restrictions on speech to be justified on the ground that the expression might offend the listener. Id. But the majority of the Supreme Court in Florida Bar held otherwise. It focused on a subset of the public in analyzing the First Amendment: essentially, a First Amendment analogue to tort law's thin-skull plaintiffs, those who have a porcelain heart. Some accident victims and their families might welcome targeted solicitations that inform them of their legal rights immediately after the accident (particularly when insurance companies may already be knocking on their doors). Other accident victims and their families might be perturbed  but not outraged  by the targeted solicitations. The Supreme Court, however, tailored First Amendment law, in the context of attorney solicitations, to the most sensitive members of the public. It is with these porcelain hearts in mind that we must evaluate New York's moratorium.