Court Opinion

ID: 9567353
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 19:52:50.957478+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T10:00:33.638837
License: Public Domain

BARKETT, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
The members of Orlando Food Not Bombs (“Food Not Bombs”)1 began conducting weekly demonstrations in 2005 at a public park located in the heart of downtown Orlando in order to draw attention to society’s failure to provide food to all and express their opposition to war. They did so by displaying signs and wearing buttons and t-shirts with the Food Not Bombs’ logo and anti-war messages while simultaneously distributing free food to hungry and homeless persons. Under well-established Supreme Court 'precedent, Food Not Bombs has readily demonstrated that this conduct constitutes expressive conduct entitled to First Amendment protection and, therefore, I dissent.
The majority correctly notes that, to determine “whether particular conduct possesses sufficient communicative elements to bring the First Amendment into play, we [ask] whether an intent to convey a particularized message was present, and whether the likelihood was great that the message would be understood by those who viewed it.” Texas v. Johnson, 491 U.S. 397, 404, 109 S.Ct. 2533, 105 L.Ed.2d 342 (1989) (internal quotation marks and alterations omitted). The majority also correctly answers the first question in the affirmative, concluding that Food Not Bombs established the requisite intent to convey a particularized message. However, the majority then .answers the second question — whether the “likelihood was great that the message would be understood by those who viewed it” — in the negative. I believe this is an erroneous conclusion because it can only be reached by ignoring integral parts of Food Not Bombs’ conduct and all the relevant Supreme Court precedent.
The majority claims that Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights, Inc. (“FAIR”), 547 U.S. 47, 126 S.Ct. 1297, 164 L.Ed.2d 156 (2006), requires that we look only to the act of distributing food and must be “deaf and blind” to the plaintiffs’ buttons, t-shirts, and signs that would indicate to a reasonable observer that Food Not Bombs was expressing a message. But nowhere in FAIR does the Court hold, say, or even imply that the aspects of the conduct that includes words — the banners, signs, or t-shirts — cannot be considered in determining whether conduct is expressive under the First Amendment. Indeed, FAIR did not involve banners, signs, buttons, t-shirts, words, or any other external object at all that would convey the message. The conduct at issue in FAIR consisted of a military officer conducting interviews on the undergraduate campus, period.2 There was simply no way an observer could tell by seeing the recruiter on an undergraduate campus that the law school was attempting to send a message by excluding military recruiters from the law *1294school campus while permitting others to recruit there. As the Supreme Court noted, the expressive purpose of law schools requiring military recruiters to interview off-campus was not “overwhelmingly apparent” because “[a]n observer who sees military recruiters interviewing away from the law school has no way of knowing whether the law school is expressing its disapproval of the military, all the law school’s interview rooms are full, or the military recruiters decided for reasons of their own that they would rather interview someplace else.” FAIR, 547 U.S. at 66, 126 S.Ct. 1297 (emphasis added and internal quotation marks omitted).
FAIR did nothing to change the clearly established law that the First Amendment requires us to consider conduct as a whole and in “the factual context and environment in which it was undertaken.... ” Spence v. Washington, 418 U.S. 405, 410, 94 S.Ct. 2727, 41 L.Ed.2d 842 (1974).3 Rather, the FAIR Court’s discussion of explanatory speech clarifies that conduct cannot be turned into protected expressive conduct if its message must be explained at a separate time and distance from the conduct itself. The totality of the conduct in FAIR was considered and found wanting.
To reach its result, the majority deconstructs the expressive conduct and strips it of every component save the act of handing out food; but the Supreme Court has told us that we must analyze whether conduct is expressive by viewing what is observable as a whole — not by dividing and isolating it into parts. To use the Supreme Court’s example: the only way to differentiate a parade or a march — both clearly protected expressive conduct under the First Amendment — from a group of people heading to work or simply walking on the street is that a parade or march involves “[sjpectators line the streets; people march in costumes and uniforms, carrying flags and banners with all sorts of messages.... ” Hurley v. Irish-American Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Group of Boston, 515 U.S. 557, 569, 115 S.Ct. 2338, 132 L.Ed.2d 487 (1995). Under the majority’s view, the Court in Hurley would have ruled the parade unprotected because the only relevant conduct was walking, and walking is not protected expressive conduct. Obviously, that is not the law as Hurley expressly demonstrates.
Indeed, in every case posing the question of whether conduct is protected under the First Amendment, the Supreme Court has viewed observable conduct as a whole, rather than in isolated parts. In Edwards v. South Carolina, 372 U.S. 229, 235, 83 S.Ct. 680, 9 L.Ed.2d 697 (1963), the Court considered not only that a group of people were marching but also that they were singing the Star Spangled Banner when it recognized that their actions “reflect[edj an exercise of [ ] basic constitutional rights.” Similarly, theater is not analyzed as a person or group of people moving and talking or singing, but is understood as drama — and protected by the First Amendment — when the conduct is viewed as a whole. Southeastern Promotions, Ltd. v. Conrad, 420 U.S. 546, 557-58, 95 S.Ct. 1239, 43 L.Ed.2d 448 (1975). Likewise, in Schacht v. United States, 398 U.S. 58, 90 S.Ct. 1555, 26 L.Ed.2d 44 (1970), in which the Court struck down a conviction for unauthorized use of a military uniform, the Court looked at not just the fact that a person was wearing a military uniform but also that he was doing so in a theatrical production criticizing the war in Vietnam.
*1295Here, in “the factual context and environment in which [the conduct was] undertaken,” a reasonable person viewing Food Not Bombs’ demonstrations would observe that they (1) take place every week,4 (2) at a centrally located public park,5 (3) in an affluent neighborhood,6 (4) are visibly run by a group whose name itself, Food Not Bombs, conveys an unmistakable message, (5) include activists holding signs or banners and wearing t-shirts and buttons to reinforce the group’s central Food Not Bombs message, and (6) involve the distribution of food to the hungry and homeless in accordance with Food Not Bombs’ purpose. Given the totality of the activity taking place at the park, a reasonable observer would understand the intended message that society should use its resources to feed the poor rather than to fund wars. Thus, it is hardly likely that a reasonable observer might think that the conduct at issue could be viewed as a “family having a reunion, a church intending to engage in a purely charitable act, [or] a restaurant distributing surplus food,” as the majority suggests.7
The conduct at issue in this case is not ambiguous. The message conveyed by Food Not Bombs’ is “overwhelmingly apparent” to a reasonable observer and therefore Food Not Bombs’ conduct is protected by the First Amendment.8

. The law schools in FAIR wanted to “restrict military recruiting on their campuses because they objected] to the policy Congress ha[d] adopted with respect to homosexuals in the military” by having military recruiters interview on undergraduate campuses instead of on law school campuses. FAIR, 547 U.S. at 52-53, 126 S.Ct. 1297.

. This is because "the context in which a symbol is used for purposes of expression is important, for the context may give meaning to the symbol.” Spence, 418 U.S. at 410, 94 S.Ct. 2727.

. In 2005, to draw attention to "society’s failure to provide food and housing to each of its members and to reclaim public space,” Food Not Bombs began conducting public feedings every Wednesday at 5:00 p.m. in Lake Eola Park.

. Lake Eola Park, the chosen location by Food Not Bombs for its events, contributes significantly to the expression of its message. The district court, therefore, rightly recognized that Lake Eola Park “is a meaningful location which, from time immemorial, has been the traditional public forum for free speech.” The City does not dispute that Lake Eola Park, which is represented on the City’s seal, is its "signature park.”

. The park is located in a middle- and upper-middle class neighborhood of condominiums and businesses comprised of the very people Food Not Bombs wishes to reach with its message — the fortunate or privileged. As a Food Not Bombs member declared, "sharing food with those who have so little in the midst of those who have so much except concern and compassion for the least fortunate among them” is a way of sending a message to the fortunate about the social, economic and political inequalities that pervade society. Cf. Hurley, 515 U.S. at 568, 115 S.Ct. 2338 (noting that parades are "public dramas of social relations” whose "dependence on watchers is so extreme that ... if a parade or demonstration receives no media coverage, it may as well not have happened”) (citation and quotation omitted).

. Furthermore, without any explanation, the majority dismisses the act of sharing food as one that has no history of symbolic expression. However, sharing food has significant meaning both in this country’s history (e.g., Thanksgiving) and in major world religions (e.g., Passover in the Jewish tradition, Communion in the Christian tradition).

. Having determined that the conduct of Food Not Bombs is protected by the First Amendment, I also agree with the reasoning and conclusion of the district court, reached after conducting a trial, that the ordinance does not further a substantial government interest. See First Vagabonds Church of God v. City of Orlando, Fla., 578 F.Supp.2d 1353, 1360-61 (M.D.Fla.2008).