Opinion ID: 108136
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: first amendment contentions

Text: The essence of appellants' argument is that the statute violates their constitutional right to communicate. One sentence in appellants' brief perhaps characterizes their entire position: The freedom to communicate orally and by the written word and, indeed, in every manner whatsoever is imperative to a free and sane society. Brief for Appellants 15. Without doubt the public postal system is an indispensable adjunct of every civilized society and communication is imperative to a healthy social order. But the right of every person to be let alone must be placed in the scales with the right of others to communicate. In today's complex society we are inescapably captive audiences for many purposes, but a sufficient measure of individual autonomy must survive to permit every householder to exercise control over unwanted mail. To make the householder the exclusive and final judge of what will cross his threshold undoubtedly has the effect of impeding the flow of ideas, information, and arguments that, ideally, he should receive and consider. Today's merchandising methods, the plethora of mass mailings subsidized by low postal rates, and the growth of the sale of large mailing lists as an industry in itself have changed the mailman from a carrier of primarily private communications, as he was in a more leisurely day, and have made him an adjunct of the mass mailer who sends unsolicited and often unwanted mail into every home. It places no strain on the doctrine of judicial notice to observe that whether measured by pieces or pounds, Everyman's mail today is made up overwhelmingly of material he did not seek from persons he does not know. And all too often it is matter he finds offensive. In Martin v. Struthers, 319 U. S. 141 (1943), MR. JUSTICE BLACK, for the Court, while supporting the [f]reedom to distribute information to every citizen, id., at 146, acknowledged a limitation in terms of leaving with the homeowner himself the power to decide whether distributors of literature may lawfully call at a home. Id., at 148. Weighing the highly important right to communicate, but without trying to determine where it fits into constitutional imperatives, against the very basic right to be free from sights, sounds, and tangible matter we do not want, it seems to us that a mailer's right to communicate must stop at the mailbox of an unreceptive addressee. The Court has traditionally respected the right of a householder to bar, by order or notice, solicitors, hawkers, and peddlers from his property. See Martin v. Struthers, supra ; cf. Hall v. Commonwealth, 188 Va. 72, 49 S. E. 2d 369, appeal dismissed, 335 U. S. 875 (1948). In this case the mailer's right to communicate is circumscribed only by an affirmative act of the addressee giving notice that he wishes no further mailings from that mailer. To hold less would tend to license a form of trespass and would make hardly more sense than to say that a radio or television viewer may not twist the dial to cut off an offensive or boring communication and thus bar its entering his home. Nothing in the Constitution compels us to listen to or view any unwanted communication, whatever its merit; we see no basis for according the printed word or pictures a different or more preferred status because they are sent by mail. The ancient concept that a man's home is his castle into which not even the king may enter has lost none of its vitality, and none of the recognized exceptions includes any right to communicate offensively with another. See Camara v. Municipal Court, 387 U. S. 523 (1967). Both the absoluteness of the citizen's right under § 4009 and its finality are essential; what may not be provocative to one person may well be to another. In operative effect the power of the householder under the statute is unlimited; he may prohibit the mailing of a dry goods catalog because he objects to the contents or indeed the text of the language touting the merchandise. Congress provided this sweeping power not only to protect privacy but to avoid possible constitutional questions that might arise from vesting the power to make any discretionary evaluation of the material in a governmental official. In effect, Congress has erected a wallor more accurately permits a citizen to erect a wallthat no advertiser may penetrate without his acquiescence. The continuing operative effect of a mailing ban once imposed presents no constitutional obstacles; the citizen cannot be put to the burden of determining on repeated occasions whether the offending mailer has altered its material so as to make it acceptable. Nor should the householder have to risk that offensive material come into the hands of his children before it can be stopped. We therefore categorically reject the argument that a vendor has a right under the Constitution or otherwise to send unwanted material into the home of another. If this prohibition operates to impede the flow of even valid ideas, the answer is that no one has a right to press even good ideas on an unwilling recipient. That we are often captives outside the sanctuary of the home and subject to objectionable speech and other sound does not mean we must be captives everywhere. See Public Utilities Comm'n v. Pollak, 343 U. S. 451 (1952). The asserted right of a mailer, we repeat, stops at the outer boundary of every person's domain. The statutory scheme at issue accords to the sender an opportunity to be heard upon such notice and proceedings as are adequate to safeguard the right for which the constitutional protection is invoked. Anderson Nat. Bank v. Luckett, 321 U. S. 233, 246 (1944). It thus comports with the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment. The statutory scheme accomplishes this by providing that the Postmaster General shall issue a prohibitory order to the sender on the request of the complaining addressee. Only if the sender violates the terms of the order is the Postmaster General authorized to serve a complaint on the sender, who is then allowed 15 days to respond. The sender can then secure an administrative hearing. [5] The sender may question whether the initial material mailed to the addressee was an advertisement and whether he sent any subsequent mailings. If the Postmaster General thereafter determines that the prohibitory order has been violated, he is authorized to request the Attorney General to make application in a United States District Court for a compliance order; [6] a second hearing is required if an order is to be entered. The only administrative action not preceded by a full hearing is the initial issuance of the prohibitory order. Since the sender risks no immediate sanction by failing to comply with that orderit is only a predicate for later stepsit cannot be said that this aspect of the procedure denies due process. It is sufficient that all available defenses, such as proof that no mail was sent, may be presented to a competent tribunal before a contempt finding can be made. See Nickey v. Mississippi, 292 U. S. 393, 396 (1934). The appellants also contend that the requirement that the sender remove the addressee's name from all mailing lists in his possession violates the Fifth Amendment because it constitutes a taking without due process of law. The appellants are not prohibited from using, selling, or exchanging their mailing lists; they are simply required to delete the names of the complaining addressees from the lists and cease all mailings to those persons. Appellants next contend that compliance with the statute is confiscatory because the costs attending removal of the names are prohibitive. We agree with the conclusion of the District Court that the burden does not amount to a violation of due process guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution. Particularly when in the context presently before this Court it is being applied to commercial enterprises. 300 F. Supp., at 1041. See California State Auto Ins. Bureau v. Maloney, 341 U. S. 105 (1951). There is no merit to the appellants' allegations that the statute is unconstitutionally vague. A statute is fatally vague only when it exposes a potential actor to some risk or detriment without giving him fair warning of the nature of the proscribed conduct. United States v. Cardiff, 344 U. S. 174, 176 (1952). Here the appellants know precisely what they must do on receipt of a prohibitory order. The complainants' names must be removed from the sender's mailing lists and he must refrain from future mailings to the named addressees. The sender is exposed to a contempt sanction only if he continues to mail to a particular addressee after administrative and judicial proceedings. Appellants run no substantial risk of miscalculation. For the reasons stated, the judgment appealed from is affirmed. It is so ordered.