Opinion ID: 1374133
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Content-based v. Content-neutral

Text: In that a more stringent standard applies when the restriction imposed by the government is content-based rather than content-neutral, we begin with HERE's assertion that the preliminary injunction, in the case before us, is content-based because it directly limits their message. An argument similar to HERE's was made before the Supreme Court of the United States in Madsen v. Women's Health Center, Inc., 512 U.S. 753, 114 S.Ct. 2516, 129 L.Ed.2d 593 (1994). In Madsen the Supreme Court of the United States was confronted with whether an injunction entered by a Florida state court which prohibited antiabortion protestors from demonstrating outside of a health clinic in certain places and in certain ways violated the First Amendment guarantee of free speech. Id. The antiabortion protestors in Madsen argued that because the injunction restricted only the speech of antiabortion protestors, the restriction was content-based. The Supreme Court of the United States disagreed. The Supreme Court of the United States noted that [a]n injunction, by its very nature, applies only to a particular group (or individuals) and regulates the activities, and perhaps the speech, of that group. It does so, however, because of the group's past actions in the context of a specific dispute between real parties. Id. at 762, 114 S.Ct. at 2523, 129 L.Ed.2d at 606. The principal inquiry in determining content neutrality is whether the government has adopted a regulation of speech `without reference to the content of the regulated speech.' Id. (citing Ward v. Rock Against Racism, 491 U.S. 781, 791, 109 S.Ct. 2746, 2753, 105 L.Ed.2d 661 (1989); R.A.V. v. St. Paul, 505 U.S. 377, 112 S.Ct. 2538, 120 L.Ed.2d 305 (1992)). Thus, a court's threshold consideration is the government's purpose in restricting the communicative activity. Madsen, 512 U.S. at 761-62, 114 S.Ct. at 2523, 129 L.Ed.2d at 606. In the case before us, the preliminary injunction did not focus on the content of HERE's speech. Indeed, the preliminary injunction in no way restricts or dictates the content of HERE's message. Instead, the purpose of the preliminary injunction was to restrict HERE to certain locations and numbers of people within Oglebay Park. Thus, we conclude that the restrictions imposed on HERE's communicative activities by the injunction are not content-based. Therefore, we must apply the standard used to evaluate content-neutral restrictions imposed by the government on constitutionally protected communicative activity. Initially, however, we must examine whether the standard set forth in Perry Educ. Ass'n, supra, for analyzing whether a content-neutral statute, ordinance or regulation is constitutional applies to the case before us or whether content-neutral restrictions on communicative activity imposed by an injunction warrant a different analysis.