Court Opinion

ID: 9548354
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 18:02:08.610704+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:18:50.740022
License: Public Domain

HOWE, Associate Chief Justice
(dissenting):
I dissent. The majority concludes that Willden has standing to mount a facial challenge to the ordinance, both as to his own rights and as to the rights of third parties. Despite its position that federal jurisdiction and standing requirements are not binding on the states, the majority nevertheless recognizes Utah cases which relied on the “useful principles” developed by the federal courts. Utah Restaurant Ass'n v. Davis County Bd. of Health, 709 P.2d 1159, 1162-63 (Utah 1985) (federal precedent on standing of associations). The majority cites the guideline that such broadened standing to third parties is limited to a statute’s deterrent effect on legitimate expression which is “both real and substantial” and not “readily subject to a narrowing construction by the state courts.” See Erznoznik v. City of Jacksonville, 422 U.S. 205, 216, 95 S.Ct. 2268, 2276, 45 L.Ed.2d 125, 135 (1975). If both these conditions do not occur, the litigant is not permitted to assert the rights of third parties. Young v. American Mini-Theatres, 427 U.S. 50, 61, 96 S.Ct. 2440, 2448, 49 L.Ed.2d 310, 320, reh’g denied, 429 U.S. 873, 97 S.Ct. 191, 50 L.Ed.2d 155 (1976); see Broadrick v. Oklahoma, 413 U.S. 601, 610, 93 S.Ct. 2908, 2915, 37 L.Ed.2d 830, 839 (1973).
Generally, assigning generalized or hypothetical complaints of third parties who are not before the court is an insufficient ground upon which standing can be predicated. See Baird v. State, 574 P.2d 713, 715-16 (Utah 1978); Society of Prof Journalists v. Bullock, 743 P.2d 1166, 1173 (Utah 1987). The general rule is that constitutional rights are personal and may not be asserted vicariously. Broadrick v. Oklahoma, 413 U.S. at 610, 93 S.Ct. at 2914. The overbreadth doctrine is an exception to that general rule. It permits parties in cases involving challenges to governmental restrictions on noncommercial speech to contend that the regulation is invalid because of its effect on the first amendment rights of others (third parties) who are not presently before the court. Village of Hoffman Estates v. Flipside, Hoffman Estates, Inc., 455 U.S. 489, 508, 102 S.Ct. 1186, 1198, 71 L.Ed.2d 362, 377 (White, J., concurring), reh’g denied, 456 U.S. 950, 102 S.Ct. 2023, 72 L.Ed.2d 476 (1982).
“Whether the [defendant] may make use of the overbreadth doctrine depends, in the first instance, on whether or not [he] has a colorable claim that the ordinance infringes on constitutionally protected, noncommercial speech of others.” Id. at 508, 102 S.Ct. at 1198. Thus, a defendant who claims standing by overbreadth is permitted to assert, where truly warranted, the facial unconstitutionality of laws or regulations which may create a “chilling effect” on the freedom of expression of persons not before the court, even though the laws or regulations could be constitutionally applied to the parties in the case. Bigelow v. Virginia, 421 U.S. 809, 817, 95 S.Ct. 2222, 2230, 44 L.Ed.2d 600, 609 (1975); Broadrick v. Oklahoma, supra at -; New York v. Ferber, 458 U.S. 747, 767, 102 S.Ct. 3348, 3360, 73 L.Ed.2d 1113, 1129 (1982); State v. Jordan, 665 P.2d 1280, 1284 (Utah), appeal dismissed sub nom. Fullmer v. Utah, 464 U.S. 910, 104 S.Ct. 266, 78 L.Ed.2d 249 (1983). Nevertheless, the overbreadth doctrine is “strong medicine,” and we have “employed it with hesitation, and then only as a last resort.” State v. *460Jordan, 665 P.2d 1280, 1283 (Utah 1983); Broadrick v. Oklahoma, 413 U.S. at 613, 93 S.Ct. at 2916, 37 L.Ed.2d at 841.
The instant case does not merit the invoking of the overbreadth exception. Defendant has not demonstrated how prohibiting defendant’s public solicitation of unlawful sexual conduct creates a “real” and “substantial” deterrent effect upon the first amendment freedoms of third parties who are not before this Court. Defendant’s claim that the ordinance could be stretched to include a husband’s patting his spouse on the buttocks in public does not create the required “real” and “substantial” deterrent. In fact, this adverse impact is both “abstract and academic” at best. Cf. Society of Prof. Journalists v. Bullock, 743 P.2d at 1174. There are, however, a substantial number of situations to which the ordinance might be validly applied. Parker v. Levy, 417 U.S. 733, 760, 94 S.Ct. 2547, 2563, 41 L.Ed.2d 439, 460 (1974).
Furthermore, we should recognize the legitimate interest that a municipality has to make rules and regulations which are “necessary and proper to improve the morals, preserve the health, peace and good order among its citizenry.” Redwood Gym v. Salt Lake County Commission, 624 P.2d 1138, 1143 (Utah 1981). The majority unfortunately adopts Willden’s argument that the ordinance “quite plainly” prohibits a husband or wife from discreetly suggesting to his or her spouse in public to later engage in sexual conduct in the privacy of their home. This scenario is used to illustrate that the prohibition against public solicitation does not apply merely to “unlawful” sexual conduct to be carried out in a public place, but to all solicitations in public of sexual conduct, whether lawful or unlawful. The majority argues that this is the clear intent of the ordinance.
Such a construction is farfetched. As the majority must realize, the ordinance is directed toward public solicitation of unlawful sexual conduct between persons not married to each other, which would exclude the husband-wife scenario. The ordinance obviously was not intended to prohibit lawful communication between spouses, nor does it sweep within its ambit protected expression. State v. Haig, 578 P.2d 837, 839 (Utah 1978). Further, the ordinance which defines “sexual conduct” is substantially similar to Utah Code Ann. § 76-10-1201(7) (1953), which was upheld by this Court as constitutional in State v. Haig.
The majority’s acceptance of Willden’s specious argument is particularly surprising in view of the established policy of this Court to construe statutory provisions whenever possible in a way to avoid invalidating them on constitutional grounds. Greaves v. State, 528 P.2d 805, 806-07 (Utah 1974). Recently, we have acted to fill constitutional voids in legislation which omitted certain provisions fundamental to the protection of a defendant’s rights in a capital proceeding. In State v. Lafferty, 749 P.2d 1239, 1260 (Utah 1988), this Court imposed the requirement that juries be instructed to find that previous crimes of the defendant which have not resulted in convictions, introduced at a penalty phase, be proven beyond a reasonable doubt. In State v. Wood, 648 P.2d 71, 83-84 (Utah), cert. denied, 459 U.S. 988,103 S.Ct. 341, 74 L.Ed.2d 383 (1982), we construed Utah Code Ann. § 76-3-207 (1953) to require proof beyond a reasonable doubt at the penalty phase of a capital case that the aggravating circumstances outweighed the mitigating circumstances, even though no specific burden of persuasion had been provided for by the legislature in the statute. We went to great lengths in In re Criminal Investigation, 7th District Court No. CS-1, 754 P.2d 633, 640-41 (Utah 1988), to save the constitutionality of the Subpoena Powers Act by reading into it a host of new provisions which simply were not put there by the legislature. These new provisions included the giving of a Miranda-type warning to the person subpoenaed, a target warning to him if appropriate, record-keeping requirements by the court issuing the subpoena, and restrictions upon secrecy orders. AH of this engrafting was done by a majority of this Court in order to uphold the constitutionality of the Subpoena Powers Act. In a strange turn-about, the majority of this Court now refuses to take a *461single step to import an obvious, commonsense requirement into an ordinance to save its constitutionality.
This Court’s role as constructionist and interpreter of the scope of an ordinance or statute is neither new nor novel. See Musser v. Utah, 333 U.S. 95, 98, 68 S.Ct. 397, 398, 92 L.Ed. 562, 565 (1948); Salt Lake City v. Savage, 541 P.2d 1035, 1037 (Utah 1975), cert. denied, 425 U.S. 915, 96 S.Ct. 1514, 47 L.Ed.2d 766 (1976); State v. Packard, 122 Utah 369, 375, 250 P.2d 561, 563 (1952). For example, in Savage, the defendant was convicted of violating a city ordinance prohibiting loitering. The defendant attacked the constitutionality of the ordinance by contending that its wording was overbroad and vague. 541 P.2d at 1036. We held that the party alleging the unconstitutionality of an ordinance or statute must overcome three hurdles, as follows:
(a) A legislative enactment is presumed to be valid and in conformity with the constitution;
(b) [The statute or ordinance] should not be held to be invalid unless it is shown beyond a reasonable doubt to be incompatible with some particular constitutional provision, and;
(c) The burden of showing invalidity of an ordinance or statute is upon the one who makes the challenge.
541 P.2d at 1037 (footnotes omitted).
In summary, defendant lacks standing to attack the constitutionality of the ordinance under the overbreadth doctrine because he has not shown a “real and substantial” abridgment of other innocent third persons’ first amendment rights. Also, the ordinance is subject to a commonsense limiting construction by this Court to prohibit only public solicitation of unlawful sexual conduct described in section (b). Additionally, we should recognize that municipalities may well have a significant governmental interest in imposing reasonable limitations on the time, place, and manner of presentation of some expressive or communicative conduct. Young v. American Mini-Theatres, 427 U.S. at 64, 96 S.Ct. at 2449, 49 L.Ed.2d at 322; see also California v. LaRue, 409 U.S. 109, 118, 93 S.Ct. 390, 397, 34 L.Ed.2d 342, 352 (1972), reh’g denied, 410 U.S. 948, 93 S.Ct. 1351, 35 L.Ed.2d 615 (1973). Lastly, defendant has not overcome the burden imposed by Savage.
The conviction should be affirmed.
HALL, C.J., concurs in the dissenting opinion of Associate Chief Justice HOWE.