Court Opinion

ID: 9786594
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-30 23:58:56.889264+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:36:46.582428
License: Public Domain

CHIN, J., Dissenting.
I dissent.
By a bare four-to-three majority, Robins v. Pruneyard Shopping Center (1979) 23 Cal.3d 899 [153 Cal.Rptr. 854, 592 P.2d 341] (Pruneyard)1 overruled a decision then only five years old and held that public free speech rights exist on private property under the California Constitution. Pruneyard was wrong when decided. In the nearly three decades that have since elapsed, jurisdictions throughout the nation have overwhelmingly rejected it. We should no longer ignore this tide of history. The time has come for us to forthrightly overrule Pruneyard and rejoin the rest of the nation in this important area of the law. Private property should be treated as private property, not as a public free speech zone.
Even if we do not overrule Pruneyard, supra, 23 Cal.3d 899, we should at least not carry it to the extreme that the majority does. Pruneyard is easily distinguished. The free speech activity that Pruneyard sanctioned was compatible with normal use of the property. The opposite is true here. Fashion Valley Mall is a privately owned shopping center. A shopping center exists for the individual businesses on the premises to do business. Urging a boycott of those businesses contradicts the very purpose of the shopping center’s existence. It is wrong to compel a private property owner to allow an activity that contravenes the property’s purpose.
*871I. The Facts
Fashion Valley Mall, LLC (Fashion Valley), owns a large shopping mall in San Diego (the mall). Fashion Valley permits expressive activities inside the mall by those who apply for a permit and agree to abide by its regulations. An applicant for a permit must state the purpose of the proposed expressive activity, submit a copy or a description of any materials and signs to be used, list the participants, provide a $50 refundable cleaning deposit, and purchase insurance as necessary. Additionally, pursuant to Fashion Valley’s rule 5.6.2 (rule 5.6.2), the applicant must agree to abstain from “Urging, or encouraging in any manner, customers not to purchase the merchandise or services offered by any one or more of the stores or merchants in the shopping center.”
In October 1998, approximately 30 members and supporters of the Graphic Communications International Union, Local 432-M (Union) gathered outside the Robinsons-May department store at the mall to protest actions taken by The San Diego Union-Tribune newspaper. The Union decided to stage the protest there because the store advertises in the newspaper and is located not far from the newspaper’s premises. The protestors distributed a handbill addressed, “Dear customer of Robinsons-May,” that outlined the Union’s grievances against the newspaper. The handbill made clear “[t]o the employees of Robinsons-May . . . [the] dispute is with The San Diego Union-Tribune. We are not asking you to cease working for your employer.” The Union encouraged patrons and employees to call the newspaper’s chief executive officer. The handbill stated that “Robinsons-May advertises with the Union-Tribune.” After about 15 minutes, a representative of Fashion Valley approached the protestors, explained that a permit was required for expressive activity, and told them to leave the premises, which they did.
Later, instead of applying for a permit, the Union filed a charge with the National Labor Relations Board (Board) alleging that Fashion Valley had violated section 8(a)(1) of the National Labor Relations Act (29 U.S.C. § 158(a)(1)), which makes it an unfair labor practice to “interfere with, restrain, or coerce employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed in section 7” of the act. That section guarantees “the right to self-organization, to form, join, or assist labor organizations, to bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing, and to engage in other concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection.” (29 U.S.C. § 157.) An administrative law judge, and later the Board, held that Fashion Valley did violate section 8(a)(1). The Board ordered Fashion Valley to rescind rule 5.6.2.
Fashion Valley petitioned the District of Columbia Circuit to review the Board’s decision. The court “h[e]ld that whether Fashion Valley violated the *872[National Labor Relations Act] depends upon whether it had the right, under California law, to maintain and enforce its anti-boycott rule.” (Fashion Valley Mall, LLC. v. N.L.R.B. (D.C.Cir. 2006) 371 U.S. App.D.C. 322 [451 F.3d 241, 242] (Fashion Valley).) Pursuant to California Rules of Court, former rule 29.8 (now rule 8.548), it requested us to answer the following question: “Under California law may Fashion Valley maintain and enforce against the Union its Rule 5.6.2?” (Fashion Valley, supra, at p. 246.) We granted the request. Later, we permitted the Union to intervene in the action. (Code Civ. Proc., § 387, subd. (a).)
II. Discussion
The issue here is straightforward: Does the California Constitution compel the owner of a private shopping center to allow persons on its property to urge potential customers to boycott businesses within the center? Saying yes, the majority relies primarily on Pruneyard, supra, 23 Cal.3d 899. To place this issue in perspective, I first provide a historical review. Then I will explain why we should overrule Pruneyard. Finally, I will show that Pruneyard, even if still considered the law in California, is entirely distinguishable.
A. Historical Review
At one time, both this court and the United States Supreme Court held that, in some situations, constitutional free speech rights existed on private property. (E.g., Food Employees v. Logan Plaza (1968) 391 U.S. 308 [20 L.Ed.2d 603, 88 S.Ct. 1601] (Logan) [private shopping center]; Marsh v. Alabama (1946) 326 U.S. 501 [90 L.Ed. 265, 66 S.Ct. 276] (Marsh) [company town]; Diamond v. Bland (1970) 3 Cal.3d 653 [91 Cal.Rptr. 501, 477 P.2d 733] (Diamond I) [private shopping center]; In re Lane (1969) 71 Cal.2d 872 [79 Cal.Rptr. 729, 457 P.2d 561] (Lane) [stand-alone grocery store]; Schwartz-Torrance Investment Corp. v. Bakery & Confectionery Workers’ Union (1964) 61 Cal.2d 766 [40 Cal.Rptr. 233, 394 P.2d 921] (Schwartz-Torrance) [private shopping center].) Because both the United States and the California Constitutions seemed to be the same in this regard, this court did not clearly establish which Constitution it relied on in finding free speech rights. We treated the two Constitutions as essentially interchangeable. For example, our opinion in Schwartz-Torrance, supra, at pages 771-773, relied in part on Marsh, as well as cases from other states, and our opinions in Lane, supra, at pages 874-877, and Diamond I, supra, at pages 658-660, relied heavily on Marsh and Logan. As of 1970, our jurisprudence was consistent with high court jurisprudence in this area.
All this changed in the decade of the 1970’s regarding private shopping centers. In two decisions, the United States Supreme Court reversed Logan, *873supra, 391 U.S. 308, and held that no free speech rights exist in private shopping centers under the United States Constitution. (Hudgens v. NLRB (1976) 424 U.S. 507 [47 L.Ed.2d 196, 96 S.Ct. 1029] (Hudgens); Lloyd Corp. v. Tanner (1972) 407 U.S. 551 [33 L.Ed.2d 131, 92 S.Ct. 2219] (Lloyd Corp.).) As we recently explained, the Hudgens court “held that a union had no federal constitutional right to picket in a shopping center because the actions of the private owner of the shopping center did not constitute state action.” (Golden Gateway, supra, 26 Cal.4th at p. 1019 (plur. opn. of Brown, J.).)
The question whether the new high court decisions affected California law arose promptly. Even before the second of these decisions, we reconsidered our decision in Diamond I, supra, 3 Cal.3d 653, in a second case of the same name. In Diamond v. Bland (1974) 11 Cal.3d 331 [113 Cal.Rptr. 468, 521 P.2d 460] (Diamond II), we followed the high court and held that “defendants’ private property interests outweigh plaintiffs’ own interests in exercising First Amendment rights in the manner sought herein.” (Id. at p. 335.) We noted that “[o]ur prior holding in [Diamond I\ was based primarily upon our interpretation of the rationale of two cases of the United States Supreme Court, namely, Marsh v. Alabama, 326 U.S. 501 [90 L.Ed. 265, 66 S.Ct. 276], and Food Employees v. Logan Plaza, 391 U.S. 308 [20 L.Ed.2d 603, 88 S.Ct. 1601].” (Id. at pp. 333-334.) Diamond II was decided by a vote of four to three. Justice Burke authored the majority opinion and was joined by Chief Justice Wright and Justices McComb and Clark. Justice Mosk, the author of Diamond I, dissented in Diamond II and was joined by Justice Tobriner and, in part, Justice Sullivan. Justice Mosk would have reaffirmed the holding of Diamond I but grounded it solely on California constitutional law.
Our adherence to high court jurisprudence in this area did not last long. Shortly after our 1974 decision in Diamond II, supra, 11 Cal.3d 331, the composition of this court changed. This change led, in 1979, to another four-to-three decision. In Pruneyard, supra, 23 Cal.3d 899, we overruled Diamond II, supra, 11 Cal.3d 331, and effectively reinstated Diamond I, supra, 3 Cal.3d 653. The majority opinion, authored by Justice Newman and joined by Chief Justice Bird and Justices Tobriner and Mosk, relied heavily on Justice Mosk’s dissenting opinion in Diamond II. It noted that the California Constitution uses different language than does the United States Constitution in guaranteeing free speech rights. California Constitution, article I, section 2, subdivision (a) provides: “Every person may freely speak, write and publish his or her sentiments on all subjects, being responsible for the abuse of this right. A law may not restrain or abridge liberty of speech or press.” The First Amendment to the United States Constitution more concisely protects “the freedom of speech.”
*874Pruneyard held “that the soliciting at a shopping center of signatures for a petition to the government is an activity protected by the California Constitution.” (Pruneyard, supra, 23 Cal.3d at p. 902.) More generally, it stated that the California Constitution “protect[s] speech and petitioning, reasonably exercised, in shopping centers even when the centers are privately owned.” (Id. at p. 910.) Justice Richardson, joined by Justices Clark and Manuel dissented. (Id. at pp. 911-916.) The United States Supreme Court later affirmed Pruneyard (sub nom. Pruneyard Shopping Center v. Robins (1980) 447 U.S. 74 [64 L.Ed.2d 741, 100 S.Ct. 2035]), but only to the extent of holding that federal law did not prevent California from providing greater speech rights on private shopping centers than .the federal Constitution provides.
As I show in the next section, history has not been kind to the majority opinion in Pruneyard.
B. Pruneyard Revisited
Pruneyard, supra, 23 Cal.3d 899, was controversial when decided. In the three decades since then, it has received scant support and overwhelming rejection around the country. As the 2001 plurality opinion in Golden Gateway noted, “most of our sister courts interpreting state constitutional provisions similar in wording to California’s free speech provision have declined to follow [Pruneyard]. [Fn. omitted.] Indeed, some of these courts have been less than kind in their criticism of [Pruneyard].” (Golden Gateway, supra, 26 Cal.4th at pp. 1020-1021.)2 The opinion fully supported these statements with citations to decisions from the many jurisdictions that have considered but rejected Pruneyard, and the few that have followed its lead to a limited extent. I need not repeat those citations. (Golden Gateway, supra, 26 Cal.4th at pp. 1021-1022, fn. 5.)
As of the time we decided Golden Gateway, the following states, many with constitutional free speech language essentially identical to California’s, had rejected any form of a Pruneyard approach regarding shopping centers and free speech rights: Arizona, Connecticut, Georgia, Michigan, Minnesota, *875New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, and Wisconsin. (See Golden Gateway, supra, 26 Cal.4th at pp. 1020-1021 & fn. 5; United Food & Commercial Workers Union, Local 919, AFL-CIO v. Crystal Mall Associates, L.P. (Conn. 2004) 852 A.2d 659, 667-668 (United Food); Annot., Validity, Under State Constitutions, of Private Shopping Center’s Prohibition or Regulation of Political, Social, or Religious Expression or Activity (1997) 52 A.L.R.5th 195.) Nevertheless, the Golden Gateway court followed Pruneyard as the law of California. The plurality, which I joined, did so reluctantly, and only due to principles of stare decisis. (Golden Gateway, supra, 26 Cal.4th at p. 1022.)
In the six years since we decided Golden Gateway, supra, 26 Cal.4th 1013, we have become yet more isolated. No new state has followed our lead. Two more states have refused to follow the Pruneyard approach: Hawaii and Iowa. (State v. Viglielmo (2004) 105 Haw. 197 [95 P.3d 952]; City of West Des Moines v. Engler (Iowa 2002) 641 N.W.2d 803.) Moreover, as I explain, the few states that previously adopted an approach like Pruneyard are generally retreating.3
I need not review all of the cases because three years ago the Connecticut Supreme Court did so. (United Food, supra, 852 A.2d 659, 667-668.) In United Food, the court unanimously refused to reconsider its earlier decision of Cologne v. Westfarms Associates (1984) 192 Conn. 48 [469 A.2d 1201] (Cologne), which had rejected Pruneyard even though Connecticut’s constitutional free speech provisions are essentially identical to California's. (United Food, supra, 852 A.2d 659.)4 It explained that “[s]ince the decision in Cologne, courts in other jurisdictions that have considered this issue overwhelmingly have chosen not to interpret their state constitutions as requiring private property owners, such as those who own large shopping malls, to permit certain types of speech, even political speech, on their premises.” (United Food, at p. 667.) It summarized the law that most of the country has adopted: “Under Cologne, as in the overwhelming majority of our sister jurisdictions, the size of the mall, the number of patrons it serves, and the fact that the general public is invited to enter the mall free of charge do not, even *876when considered together, advance the plaintiff’s cause in converting private action into government action.” (Id. at p. 673.)
As explained in United Food, supra, 852 A.2d at pages 668-670, only four other states (Colorado, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Washington) retain any form of independent state grounds in this area. Washington has very narrowly confined its original independent state ground decision. (Southcenter Joint Venture v. NDPC (1989) 113 Wn.2d 413 [780 P.2d 1282]; see the discussions in Golden Gateway, supra, 26 Cal.4th at p. 1021, fn. 5; United Food, supra, 852 A.2d at pp. 668, 669 & fns. 13, 16; and State v. Viglielmo, supra, 95 P.3d at pp. 964—965.) Regarding Massachusetts, the Connecticut Supreme Court explained, “ ‘The Massachusetts decision was expressly limited to the solicitation of signatures needed by political candidates for access to the ballot and relied, not upon its freedom of speech provision, but upon a state constitutional guarantiee] of an equal right to elect officers and to be elected, for public employments. [Citation.]’ ” (United Food, supra, 852 A.2d at p. 669, quoting the court’s earlier decision in Cologne, supra, 469 A.2d 1201.) Colorado recently permitted a shopping center to adopt substantial restraints on the exercise of free speech on its property despite its earlier Pruneyard-like stance. (Robertson v. Westminster Mall Co. (Colo.Ct.App. 2001) 43 P.3d 622.) That leaves New Jersey; and even that state has not, to my knowledge, carried its jurisprudence to the extreme to which the majority is leading California.
The time has come to recognize that we are virtually alone, and that Pruneyard was ill conceived. Oregon originally had its own version of Pruneyard, albeit one based on a different constitutional provision. (Lloyd Corporation v. Whiffen (1993) 315 Ore. 500 [849 R2d 446].) That decision, also by a four-to-three vote, relied in part on “the decision by the California Supreme Court in [Pruneyard] . . . .” (Id. at p. 454.) Later the Oregon Supreme Court concluded that Lloyd Corporation v. Whiffen, supra, 849 P.2d 446, was erroneous and “disavowed” it. (Stranahan v. Fred Meyer, Inc. (2000) 331 Ore. 38 [11 P.3d 228, 243]; see Golden Gateway, supra, 26 Cal.4th at p. 1021, fn. 5.) It also refused to find free speech rights on private property under the Oregon Constitution’s free speech provision, which, like Connecticut’s, is essentially identical to California’s. (Stranahan v. Fred Meyer, Inc., supra, at pp. 243-244, fn. 19.)5 We should do what Oregon did and disavow Pruneyard.
In Lloyd Corp., the high court distinguished its earlier decision of Marsh, supra, 326 U.S. 501, which involved a company town. It explained that *877Marsh “involved the assumption by a private enterprise of all of the attributes of a state-created municipality and the exercise by that enterprise of semiofficial municipal functions as a delegate of the State. In effect, the owner of the company town was performing the full spectrum of municipal powers and stood in the shoes of the State.” (Lloyd Corp., supra, 407 U.S. at p. 569, fn. omitted.) But a shopping center is different from a company town. “[Property [does not] lose its private character merely because the public is generally invited to use it for designated purposes. Few would argue that a free-standing store, with abutting parking space for customers, assumes significant public attributes merely because the public is invited to shop there. Nor is size alone the controlling factor. The essentially private character of a store and its privately owned abutting property does not change by virtue of being large or clustered with other stores in a modem shopping center.” (Ibid.) I, along with the many jurisdictions that have followed the high court, agree.
As the plurality opinion in Golden Gateway explained, principles of stare decisis should make us cautious before we overrule a previous case. There should be a special justification for doing so. (Golden Gateway, supra, 26 Cal.4th at p. 1022.) But we do sometimes overrule our prior decisions, and appropriately so. In this case it would be entirely proper to do so, especially in light of our increasing isolation in the six years since Golden Gateway was decided. The Pruneyard court itself ignored stare decisis. It overruled a decision of this court that was only five years old at the time. Why should a decision that overruled a recent decision, and that identified nothing that occurred in the intervening years to justify the action, be sheltered from reconsideration? In essence, there were two four-to-three decisions in the 1970’s that reached opposite results. Indeed, of the 11 justices who participated in Diamond II, supra, 11 Cal.3d 331, or Pruneyard, supra, 23 Cal.3d 899, or both, a majority of six followed or would have followed the high court (Chief Justice Wright and Justices McComb, Burke, Clark, Richardson, and Manuel), and only five urged or joined what would become the Pruneyard approach (Chief Justice Bird, and Justices Tobriner, Mosk, Sullivan, and Newman). I would join the majority of six, as have most of the jurisdictions that have considered the question.
Moreover, the Pruneyard court made no effort to find anything in the text of article I, section 2, subdivision (a) of the California Constitution, its historical sources, or the process that led to its adoption, that suggests any intent to extend its terms to private property. Instead, as the Wisconsin Supreme Court observed in a case that rejected Pruneyard even though Wisconsin’s constitutional free speech provision is essentially identical to California’s, “the majority [in Pruneyard] did not analyze the constitutional *878sections, but rather summarily stated the protections granted by those sections. It appears to be more a decision of desire rather than analytical conviction.” (Jacobs v. Major (1987) 139 Wis.2d 492 [407 N.W.2d 832, 841].)6
I do not denigrate free speech rights. As the New York Court of Appeal stated in its opinion rejecting Pruneyard, “the right to free expression is one of this Nation’s most cherished civil liberties.” (SHAD v. Smith Haven Mall, supra, 488 N.E.2d at p. 1212; see also Kasky v. Nike, Inc. (2002) 27 Cal.4th 939, 970-977 [119 Cal.Rptr.2d 296, 45 P.3d 243] (dis. opn. of Chin, J.).) But free speech rights and private property rights can and should coexist. The last 30 years have not seen a significant diminution of free speech opportunities in the many jurisdictions that have followed the high court’s lead regarding private property. The Union here is not without recourse if it wants to urge a lawful boycott of any business or engage in any other protected freedom of expression. It has plenty of outlets to exercise its free speech rights. If it wants to picket, it simply has to do so on public property or seek permission from private property owners. The Union can exercise its free speech rights, for example, just outside the shopping center, including near the entrances. Additionally, and especially today with the advent of the Internet and other forms of mass communication, “other public forums [are available] for the distribution and dissemination of . . . ideas.” (Diamond II, supra, 11 Cal.3d at p. 334.) But I would find no right to engage in speech activity on private property over the owner’s objection.
C. Pruneyard Distinguished
Even if we stubbornly maintain our position of “magnificent isolation”7 in the face of this tide of history, we should not carry Pruneyard to the extreme of forbidding private property owners from controlling expressive activity on their property—urging a boycott of its tenants—that is inimical to the purpose for which the property is being used. Pruneyard is readily distinguishable.
Assuming free speech rights exist in shopping centers, the fact remains that they are not Hyde Park in London, Central Park in New York, or the National Mall in Washington, D.C., areas that are quintessential public free speech *879zones. Shopping centers are private property dedicated to doing business. Their owners should not have to permit all expressive activity that the California and United States Constitutions protect in public places. A shopping center owner should be allowed to enforce reasonable restrictions to protect its business activities even if the government could not impose similar restrictions. Rule 5.6.2 is such a restriction.
In Pruneyard, the activity the majority compelled a shopping center owner to permit on its property was the soliciting of signatures for a petition to the government. (Pruneyard, supra, 23 Cal.3d at p. 902.) Likewise, in Diamond I, the activity was “securing signatures on two anti-pollution initiative petitions.” (Diamond I, supra, 3 Cal.3d at p. 655.) Soliciting petition signatures, and much other free speech activity, although perhaps not furthering the shopping center’s business, is fully compatible with that business. The same is not true here. The purpose of a shopping center is to provide a place where the tenants, i.e., the individual businesses, may do business. Urging a boycott of a tenant’s business is antithetical to that purpose. We should not compel shopping center owners to permit activity that interferes with the purpose for the center’s existence.
Pruneyard’s own analysis permits this conclusion. “By no means do we imply that those who wish to disseminate ideas have free rein. . . . [A]s Justice Mosk stated in Diamond II, . . A handful of additional orderly persons soliciting signatures and distributing handbills in connection [with the shopping center], under reasonable regulations adopted by defendant to assure that these activities do not interfere with normal business operations (see Diamond [/] at p. 665) would not markedly dilute defendant’s property rights’ (11 Cal.3d at p. 345 (dis. opn. of Mosk, J.).)” (Pruneyard, supra, 23 Cal.3d at pp. 910-911, italics added.)
Diamond I was also limited in its reach. We stressed that “[i]t bears repeating that no evidence was presented to the trial court that plaintiffs’ activities actually interfered with the normal business operations of the [shopping center]. Plaintiffs do not contend that they are entitled to use private property for the dissemination of ideas without limitations imposed by reasonable regulations designed to protect the business activities of the Center. . . . [j[] We impose no unrealistic burden on the operators of shopping centers in insisting that their control over First Amendment rights [obviously, now limited to free speech rights under the California Constitution] be exercised, if at all, through reasonable regulations calculated to protect their business interests rather than through absolute bans on all nonbusiness-related activities. Shopping centers ... are not incapable of regulating permissible activities.” (Diamond I, supra, 3 Cal.3d at p. 665, fn. omitted, italics added.)
*880A reasonable interpretation of these decisions, and one that would at least nudge this court toward the judicial mainstream, is that shopping center owners may impose reasonable regulations to protect their business interests, and that rule 5.6.2 is such a reasonable regulation. Compelling property owners to permit use of their property that would hinder business success would markedly dilute their property rights. Fashion Valley should at least be able to protect its business interests by enforcing rule 5.6.2.
It is true that two old cases that predate Hudgens, supra, 424 U.S. 507, Lloyd Corp., supra, 407 U.S. 551, and Diamond II, supra, 11 Cal.3d 331, involved boycotts. (Lane, supra, 71 Cal.2d 872; Schwartz-Torrance, supra, 61 Cal.2d 766.) It is also true that the majority opinion in Pruneyard cited those cases with approval. (Pruneyard, supra, 23 Cal.3d at pp. 908-909.) But the fact remains that they were based in large part on federal law that has since been discredited, and the belief that federal and state constitutional law coincided in this area. Pruneyard should at least be interpreted on its facts and its holding. It cannot somehow have revalidated old cases that had different facts and were decided under a legal landscape that is now obsolete.
Lane involved “an individual grocery store.” (Lane, supra, 71 Cal.2d at p. 873.) But recent Court of Appeal decisions have definitively held that Pruneyard does not extend to stand-alone stores like the one in Lane. (Albertson’s, Inc. v. Young (2003) 107 Cal.App.4th 106 [131 Cal.Rptr.2d 721] [grocery store]; Trader Joe’s Co. v. Progressive Campaigns, Inc. (1999) 73 Cal.App.4th 425 [86 Cal.Rptr.2d 442] [retail store]; see also Waremart Foods v. N.L.R.B. (D.C. Cir. 2004) 359 U.S. App.D.C. 312 [354 F.3d 870] [grocery store].) These cases found Pruneyard’s citation of Lane and Schwartz-Torrance not dispositive. As the Alberston’s, Inc. court noted in refusing to follow Lane, “we are not aware of any legal principle by which a court, years after rendering a decision, can retroactively alter its ratio decidendi.” (Albertson’s, Inc., supra, at p. 123; see also Trader Joe’s Co., supra, at p. 436 [Pruneyard’s reference “to Lane was brief and collateral”].)
Today’s majority opinion carefully says nothing casting doubt on the recent cases involving stand-alone stores, and they are surely correct. But if the older cases cited in Pruneyard are no longer authoritative in that respect, why should they be any more authoritative in this respect? In fact, they are no longer authoritative at all. If we are to preserve Pruneyard, we should at least interpret it on its own, and not be bound by ancient cases based on law that has long since disappeared.
The majority is also inconsistent in its treatment of First Amendment law. It rejects First Amendment law entirely as it relates to private property—law that is directly on point here—but then it relies heavily on First Amendment *881cases that involve restrictions the government has placed on speech. (Maj. opn., ante, at pp. 866-869.) It cites the federal strict scrutiny test that applies to governmental restrictions and that requires the government to show the restriction serves a compelling state interest. (Id. at p. 869.) It relies on, and quotes selectively from, Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. v. FCC (1994) 512 U.S. 622, 642 [129 L.Ed.2d 497, 114 S.Ct. 2445], which says, “ ‘The government may not regulate [speech] based on hostility—or favoritism— towards the underlying message expressed.’ ” (Italics added; see maj. opn., ante, at p. 869.) It then asserts, with no apparent awareness of the distinction—vital under the First Amendment—between governmental action and actions by private property owners, that the same rules apply here. (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 869.)
The strict scrutiny test that applies to the government has no application to action by private landowners involving their own property. Even if it did, it would have to be adapted to recognize the fact that no governmental action is involved. The compelling state interest test would have to yield to some kind of “compelling landowner interest” test. A property owner can assert its own interests only, not the state’s. If that test applied here, it would be met. Furthering business on its private property is not only a compelling interest, it is the property owner’s primary concern; doing business is the reason the shopping center exists. In implementing rule 5.6.2, Fashion Valley is merely preventing persons from using its property to urge potential patrons not to do business with its tenants. The Union may urge a boycott if it wishes, just not on private property without permission.
In finding no compelling interest, the majority merely asserts that the right of persons to use property they do not own is more compelling than the landowner’s right to use its own property for the very purpose it exists. (See maj. opn., ante, at p. 869.) I would instead give some priority to the property’s owner. The bankruptcy of the majority’s position is shown by its further assertion that “[t]he Mall cites no authority, and we are aware of none, that holds that a store has a compelling interest in prohibiting this traditional form of free speech.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 869.) Good reason exists for this lack of authority. Because most of the country, including the United States Supreme Court, rejects the very notion of free speech rights on private property, the issue never arises. Only in California is the issue relevant. The only tradition that is relevant to this case is the tradition, followed in most of the country, of finding no free speech rights on private property. The majority is trampling on tradition, not following it.
I would find rule 5.6.2 valid even under Pruneyard.
*882HI. Conclusion
I would answer the certified question the District of Columbia Circuit posed as follows: Under California law, Fashion Valley may maintain and enforce against the Union its rule 5.6.2. Additionally, I would overrule Pruneyard, supra, 23 Cal.3d 899. The time has come for this court to join the judicial mainstream.
Accordingly, I dissent.
Baxter, J., and Corrigan, J., concurred.
Petitioner’s petition for a rehearing was denied February 20, 2008. Baxter, J., Chin, J., and Corrigan, J., were of the opinion that the petition should be granted.

 Courts have not been consistent in giving this case a shorthand name. For example, the plurality, concurring, and dissenting opinions in Golden Gateway Center v. Golden Gateway Tenants Assn. (2001) 26 Cal.4th 1013 [111 Cal.Rptr.2d 336, 29 P.3d 797] (Golden Gateway) called it Robins for short. But because the majority here calls it Pruneyard, I will do so also.

 For example, the New York Court of Appeal, in an opinion that found no right to free speech in a privately owned shopping center under a state constitutional free speech provision that is essentially identical to California’s, described this court’s “4-3 decision” in Pruneyard as “hardly persuasive authority. That court, in overruling its own contrary precedent only five years old [citing Diamond II, supra, 11 Cal.3d 331], simply said that the California Constitution protected speech and petitioning at private shopping centers. There is not much analysis and only tangential discussion, if it can be called that, of the State action question. It is evident that the result in [Pruneyard] was dictated by ‘the accident of a change of personalities in the Judges of [the] court’____” (SHAD v. Smith Haven Mall (1985) 66 N.Y.2d 496 [498 N.Y.S.2d 99, 488 N.E.2d 1211, 1215, fn. 5].)

 Additionally, the Supreme Courts of Illinois, Nebraska, and Nevada have cited but declined to follow the Pruneyard approach in various free speech contexts. (People v. DiGuida (1992) 152 Ill.2d 104 [178 Ill.Dec. 80, 604 N.E.2d 336, 340, 342-347]; Dossett v. First State Bank (2001) 261 Neb. 959 [627 N.W.2d 131, 138-139]; S.O.C., Inc. v. The Mirage Casino-Hotel (2001) 117 Nev. 403 [23 P.3d 243, 250].)

 Article I, section 4, of the Connecticut Constitution provides: “Every citizen may freely speak, write and publish his sentiments on all subjects, being responsible for the abuse of that liberty.” Article I, section 5, of that constitution provides: “No law shall ever be passed to curtail or restrain the liberty of speech . . . .” (See United Food, supra, 852 A.2d at p. 660, fns. 3, 4.)

 Article I, section 8, of the Oregon Constitution provides: “No law shall be passed restraining the free expression of opinion, or restricting the right to speak, write, or print freely on any subject whatever, but every person shall be responsible for the abuse of this right.” (See Stranahan v. Fred Meyer, Inc., supra, 11 P.3d at p. 231, fn. 3.)

 Article I, section 3, of the Wisconsin Constitution provides: “Every person may freely speak, write and publish his sentiments on all subjects, being responsible for the abuse of that right, and no laws shall be passed to restrain or abridge the liberty of speech or of the press.” (See Jacobs v. Major, supra, 407 N.W.2d at p. 833, fn. 1.)

 The court in Andersen v. United States (9th Cir. 1956) 237 F.2d 118, 127, so described the position of the two jurisdictions that adopted or followed the infamous “product rule” for insanity stated in Durham v. United States (D.C.Cir. 1954) 94 U.S. App.D.C. 228 [214 F.2d 862],