Court Opinion

ID: 9745248
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 22:43:08.91509+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:58.122153
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE GOLDENHERSH, dissenting: I dissent and would affirm the decision of the appellate court. I do not quarrel with the majority’s analysis of the holding in Broadrick v. Oklahoma (1973), 413 U.S. 601, 37 L. Ed. 2d 830, 93 S. Ct. 2908, and Landry v. Daley (N.D. Ill. 1968), 280 F. Supp. 938, but I am of the opinion that the rules were incorrectly applied to the facts in this case. Section 12—6(a)(3) of the Criminal Code of 1961 provides in pertinent part: “A person commits intimidation when, with intent to cause another to perform or to omit the performance of any act, he communicates to another a threat to perform without lawful authority any of the following acts: 3. Commit any criminal offense; ***.” (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1979, ch. 38, par. 12—6(a)(3).) The offense of intimidation consists of speech, the communication of a threat. It involves only speech because the conduct purportedly threatened, “any criminal offense,” must of necessity be proscribed under another section of the Code. In contrast, the statute upheld in Broadrick clearly involved action. It is clear that the limitation of overbreadth scrutiny applied in Broadrick is applicable only when conduct, and not merely speech, is involved. Thus, in Broadrick the Supreme Court upheld the validity of an Oklahoma statute involving restrictions on political campaign activity and in New York v. Ferber (1982), 458 U.S. 747, 73 L. Ed. 2d 1113, 102 S. Ct. 3348, held valid a New York statute prohibiting the knowing promotion of a sexual performance by a child under the age of 16 by distributing material which depicted the performance. Section 12—6(a)(3) strikes at the heart of the political process by silencing those who in the furtherance of their political goals may advocate use of unlawful means. As pointed out by the appellate court, the statute here involved makes it “an offense to threaten to commit any crime, no matter how minor or insubstantial.” (103 Ill. App. 3d 353, 357.) As the majority points out, it prohibits people from threatening to picket in front of a city hall without a permit (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1979, ch. 38, par. 85—3) and from threatening to distribute literature that is deemed “offensive” within the right-of-way limits of a State toll highway (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1979, ch. 121, par. 314a471/2). The statute would also prohibit people from threatening to commit misdemeanors and other “evils [which] are not so substantial that the state’s interest in prohibiting the threat of them outweighs the public interest in giving legitimate political discussion a wide berth.” Landry v. Daley (N.D. Ill. 1968), 280 F. Supp. 938, 964, rev’d on other grounds sub. nom. Boyle v. Landry (1971), 401 U.S. 77, 27 L. Ed. 2d 696, 91 S. Ct. 758. The Supreme Court has long recognized that a fair and robust debate on issues of public importance can be guaranteed only if those who merely advocate criminal acts receive some protection against recrimination by the sovereign. The State may punish a citizen for advocating criminal acts only “where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action.” Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969), 395 U.S. 444, 447, 23 L. Ed. 2d 430, 434, 89 S. Ct. 1827, 1829. Section 12—6(a)(3) is overbroad because it makes unlawful significant speech which is protected under the first amendment. The statute prohibits a threat of criminal action even though the threatened criminal act is neither imminent nor substantial. Moreover, the statute prohibits the threat even though there is no substantial likelihood that the criminal act will ever occur. In many situations the threatened criminal activity will not be imminent, substantial, and likely. As a result the statute, if continued to be regarded as valid, will silence much speech which is protected by the first amendment, for “persons whose expression is constitutionally protected may well refrain from exercising their rights for fear of criminal sanctions provided by a statute susceptible of application to protected expression.” (Gooding v. Wilson (1972), 405 U.S. 518, 521, 31 L. Ed. 2d 408, 413, 92 S. Ct. 1103, 1105.) For this reason I would affirm the judgment of the appellate court, and declare the statute void under the overbreadth doctrine. JUSTICE SIMON joins in this dissent.