Court Opinion

ID: 9425427
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:14:39.618617+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:55.456058
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Douglas,
with whom Mr. Justice Brennan and Mr. Justice Marshall concur, dissenting.
The Hatch Act by § 9 (a) prohibits federal employees from taking “an active part in political management or in political campaigns.” Some of the employees, whose union is speaking for them, want
“to run in state and local elections for the school board, for city council, for mayor”;
“to write letters on political subjects to newspapers” ;
“to be a delegate in a political convention” ;
“to run for an office and hold office in a political party or political club”;
“to campaign for candidates for political office”;
“to work at polling places in behalf of a political party.”
There is no definition of what “an active part ... in political campaigns” means. The Act incorporates over 3,000 rulings of the Civil Service Commission between *5961886 and 1940 and many hundreds of rulings since 1940. But even with that gloss on the Act, the critical phrases lack precision. In 1971 the Commission published a three-volume work entitled Political Activities Reporter which contains over 800 of its decisions since the enactment of the Hatch Act. One can learn from studying those volumes that it is not “political activity” to march in a band during a political parade or to wear political badges or to “participate fully in public affairs, except as prohibited by law, in a manner which does not materially compromise his efficiency or integrity as an employee or the neutrality, efficiency, or integrity of his agency.” 5 CFR § 733.111 (a) (13).
That is to say, some things, like marching in a band, are clear. Others are pregnant with ambiguity as “participate fully in public affairs, except as prohibited by law, in a manner which does not materially compromise,” etc. Permission to “ [t] ake an active part ... in a nonpartisan election,” 5 CFR §733.111 (a) (10), also raises large questions of uncertainty because one may be partisan for a person, an issue, a candidate without feeling an identification with one political party or the other.
The District Court felt that the prohibitions in the Act are “worded in generalities that lack precision,” 346 F. Supp. 578, 582, with the result that it is hazardous for an employee “if he ventures to speak on a political matter since he will not know when his words or acts relating to political subjects will offend.” Id., at 582-583.
The chilling effect of these vague and generalized prohibitions is so obvious as not to need elaboration. That effect would not be material to the issue of constitutionality if only the normal contours of the police power were involved. On the run of social and economic matters the “rational basis” standard which United Public *597Workers v. Mitchell, 330 U. S. 75, applied would suffice.1 But what may have been unclear to some in Mitchell should by now be abundantly clear to all. We deal here with a First Amendment right to speak, to propose, to publish, to petition Government, to assemble. Time and place are obvious limitations. Thus no one could object if employees were barred from using office time to engage in outside activities whether political or otherwise. But it is of no concern of Government what an employee does in his spare time, whether religion, recreation, social work, or politics is his hobby — unless what he does impairs efficiency or other facets of the merits of his job. Some things, some activities do affect or may be thought to affect the employee’s job performance. But his political creed, like his religion, is irrelevant. In the areas of speech, like religion, it is of no concern what the employee says in private to his wife or to the public in Constitution Hall. If Government employment were only a “privilege,” then all sorts of conditions might be attached. But it is now settled that Government employment may not be denied or penalized “on a basis that infringes [the employee’s] constitutionally protected interests — especially, his interest in freedom of speech.” See Perry v. Sindermann, 408 U. S. 693, 597. If Government, as the majority stated in Mitchell, may not condition public employment on the basis that the employee will not “take any active part in missionary work,” 330 U. S., at 100, it is difficult to see why it may condition employment on the basis that the employee not take “an active part ... in political campaigns.” *598For speech, assembly, and petition are as deeply embedded in the First Amendment as proselytizing a religious cause.
Free discussion of governmental affairs is basic in our constitutional system. Sweezy v. New Hampshire, 354 U. S. 234, 250; Mills v. Alabama, 384 U. S. 214, 218; Monitor Patriot Co. v. Roy, 401 U. S. 265, 272. Laws that trench on that area must be narrowly and precisely drawn to deal with precise ends. Overbreadth in the area of the First Amendment has a peculiar evil, the evil of creating chilling effects which deter the exercise of those freedoms. Dombrowski v. Pfister, 380 U. S. 479, 486. As we stated in NAACP v. Button, 371 U. S. 415, 433, in speaking of First Amendment freedoms and the unconstitutionality of overbroad statutes: “These freedoms are delicate and vulnerable, as well as supremely precious in our society. The threat of sanctions may deter their exercise almost as potently as the actual application of sanctions.”
Mitchell is of a different vintage from the present case. Since its date, a host of decisions have illustrated the need for narrowly drawn statutes that touch First Amendment rights. A teacher was held to be unconstitutionally discharged for sending a letter to a newspaper that criticized the school authorities. Pickering v. Board of Education, 391 U. S. 563, 573. “In these circumstances we conclude that the interest of the school administration in limiting teachers' opportunities to contribute to public debate is not significantly greater than its interest in limiting a similar contribution by any member of the general public.” We followed the same course in Wood v. Georgia, 370 U. S. 375, when we relieved a sheriff from a contempt conviction for making a public statement in connection with a current political controversy. As in the present case, the sheriff spoke as a *599private citizen and what he said did not interfere with his duties as sheriff. Id., at 393-394.
The present Act cannot be appropriately narrowed to meet the need for narrowly drawn language not embracing First Amendment speech or writing without substantial revision. That rewriting cannot be done by the Commission because Congress refused to delegate to it authority to regulate First Amendment rights. The proposal to do so aroused a great debate in Congress2 and Senator Hatch finally submitted a substitute, saying “[i]t does away with the question of the delegation of power.” 3
The Commission, on a case-by-case approach, has listed 13 categories of prohibited activities, 5 CFR § 733.122 (b), starting with the catch-all “include but are not limited to.” So the Commission ends up with open-end discretion to penalize X or not to penalize him. For example, a “permissible” activity is the employee’s right to “[express his opinion as an individual privately and publicly on political subjects and candidates.” 5 CFR § 733.111 (a)(2). Yet “soliciting votes” is prohibited. 5 CFR § 733.122 (b) (7). Is an employee safe from punishment if he expresses his opinion that candidate X is the best *600and candidate Y the worst? Is that crossing the forbidden line of soliciting votes?
A nursing assistant at a veterans’ hospital put an ad in a newspaper reading:
“To All My Many Friends of Poplar Bluff and Butler County I want to take this opportunity to ask your vote and support in the election, TUESDAY, AUGUST 7th. A very special person is seeking the Democratic nomination for Sheriff. I do not have to tell you of his qualifications, his past records stand.
“This person is my dad, Lester (Less) Massingham. “THANK YOU
“WALLACE (WALLY) MASSINGHAM”
He was held to have violated the Act. Massingham, 1 Political Activity Reporter 792, 793 (1959).
Is a letter a permissible “expression” of views or a prohibited “solicitation?” The Solicitor General says it is a “permissible” expression; but the Commission ruled otherwise. For an employee who does not have the Solicitor General as counsel great consequences flow from an innocent decision. He may lose his job. Therefore the most prudent thing is to do nothing. Thus is self-imposed censorship imposed on many nervous people who live on narrow economic margins.
I would strike this provision of the law down as unconstitutional so that a new start may be made on this old problem that confuses and restricts nearly five million federal, state, and local public employees today that live under the present Act.

 "For regulation of employees it is not necessary that the act regulated be anything more than an act reasonably deemed by Congress to interfere wth the efficiency of the public service.” United Public Workers v. Mitchell, 330 U. S. 75, 101.

 S. 3046, as reported by the Senate Committee on Privileges and Elections, authorized “the Civil Service Commission to define the term ‘active part in political management or in political campaigns’ as that term is used in the prohibitions applicable to Federal employees and in the prohibitions applicable to State and local officers and employees.” S. Rep. No. 1236, 76th Cong., 3d Sess., 2. The Senate was reluctant to leave the task of defining these terms “to some bureaucratic board which has absolutely no knowledge of political conditions and circumstances in any section of the country.” 86 Cong. Rec. 2427 (remarks of Sen. Lucas). The section also was challenged as an unconstitutional delegation of legislative authority. Id., at 2579 (remarks of Sen. Brown and Sen. McKellar). Others were concerned with problems of fairness. Id., at 2720 (Sen. Bankhead).

 Id., at 2928.