Court Opinion

ID: 6974830
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-07-24 02:09:10.586498+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T16:08:54.896960
License: Public Domain

NOONAN, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
That commercial speech can be distinguished from non-commercial speech, that the government as proprietor can limit a non-public forum to commercial speech so that the government makes money, and that the sides of buses in Phoenix are meant to be such a forum, are propositions I accept. They do not remedy discriminatory application of the ordinance by the City of Phoenix.
The ordinance restricts advertising to “speech which proposes a commercial transaction.” At first blush, it looks as though the standard must be good because it incorporates a hint from a dictum of the Supreme Court: “[tjhere are eommonsense differences between speech that does ‘no more than propose a commercial transaction,’ ... and other varieties.” Virginia State Bd. of Pharmacy v. Virginia Citizens Consumer Council, Inc., *984425 U.S. 748, 771 n. 24, 96 S.Ct. 1817, 48 L.Ed.2d 346 (1976) (citation omitted). Advertisements for employment that do not express an opinion on social policy are “classic examples of commercial speech.” Pittsburgh Press Co. v. Pittsburgh Comm’n on Human Relations, 413 U.S. 376, 385, 93 S.Ct. 2553, 37 L.Ed.2d 669 (1973). An advertisement that expresses opinion and seeks financial support for a political movement is not commercial. New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254, 266, 84 S.Ct. 710, 11 L.Ed.2d 686 (1964). The distinction is tangible.
The distinction must be applied in the unique context of the medium of communication involved. Street car signs have been lumped with billboards as forming “a class by themselves.” Packer Corp. v. Utah, 285 U.S. 105, 110, 52 S.Ct. 273, 76 L.Ed. 643 (1932) (Brandeis, J.); see also Lehman v. City of Shaker Heights, 418 U.S. 298, 307-08, 94 S.Ct. 2714, 41 L.Ed.2d 770 (1974) (Douglas, J., concurring, relying on Justice Brandeis’s opinion in Packer). Experience, however, has shown each medium of communication to be unique. Metromedia, Inc. v. City of San Diego, 453 U.S. 490, 501, 101 S.Ct. 2882, 69 L.Ed.2d 800 (1981). The medium here is the exterior panels of city buses. Such panels are large — not as big as big billboards but large enough so that figures on them are more than lifesize and the print on them shouts its message. Moving and grunting as they move, buses call attention to themselves. Stuck in traffic beside or behind a bus, the driver and passengers of a car cannot avoid taking in what confronts them. It is in their face. Similarly, pedestrians waiting for a light to turn cannot avert their eyes from what a waiting bus offers to view. The exterior panels are better than billboards in their ability to command consideration by those momentarily before them, and, unlike billboards, they move down central streets.
Not only is each medium of expression unique; the cultural context changes with the times. The context of a quarter of a century ago is not today’s. We must apply precedents taking into account the context of contemporary culture. In this culture ideological conflicts exist in which the commercial side coincides with one of the two embattled positions. The commercial-non-commercial distinction should not be mechanically applied without attention to this distinct modern phenomenon.
As applied, the Phoenix ordinance bans a message that proposes a commercial transaction and, as an integral part of that proposal, identifies the product to be bought. What Children of the Rosary offers for sale is not something devised to evade the ordinance. As the record demonstrates, the bumper-sticker was a good it sold prior to the ordinance’s enactment. The American Civil Liberties Union offers a bumpersticker that, containing a message as to the ACLU’s goals, effectively advertises the value of the ACLU as a participant in the community. A nonprofit organization may surely sell products incidental to its mission and thereby both promote its goals and help to support itself. It is hai’d to see why Phoenix rejected the ACLU ad — surely the message was uncontroversial — unless the city was trapped into maintaining a consistent position on bumperstickers. It may be, as the majority suggests, that the ordinance would be porous if the sale of bumperstickers is not barred; but that suggestion only shows the deficiency of the ordinance as applied and the difficulty of governmental restraint of speech.
It is something of an anomaly in First Amendment jurisprudence for more protection to be accorded commercial speech than is accorded noncommercial speech. As Justice White has observed, such a result “inverts” the normal rule. Metromedia, Inc., 453 U.S. at 513, 101 S.Ct. 2882. If the inversion is permitted by precedent, it still must be done in a way that does not destroy the level playing field of politics or put the government’s seal of approval on one of two sides of a political issue. Moneymaking is not government’s primary business. It would be ironic if pursuit of profit permitted a unit of government to discriminate in the messages on government property.
Here, the message of a group acknowledging the sacredness of human life in the womb is rejected; Planned Parenthood could run an ad for an abortion clinic. The views clash; the city of Phoenix would give space to one and not the other. Analogously, if *985Arizona should come to permit physician-assisted suicide as does Oregon, Dr. Kevorkian could advertise his services on the sides of the buses of Phoenix, but the counter advice of advocates offering free counselling against this course would be forbidden. The examples from the great life issues in our present culture speak for themselves. The clash over the environment affords other examples. A power company could extol its product. The Sierra Club, objecting to more dams, would be denied the forum. The makers of a pesticide could celebrate their wares; champions of pesticide-free farms would be barred. A developer could tout the quality of his homes; defenders of green space in the suburbs would have to be silent on the buses. The pornographer could advertise his shop; the defenders of neighborhood decency would be denied a reply. In the America of 1998 to give the commercial advertiser space, without reference to the product being pushed, is for a city to take sides more than occasionally on issues of life and health and energy and the ecosystem.
The case is further complicated by the likelihood of commercial media using the buses to advertise their products. The record indicates that the city of Phoenix is ready to accept such advertisements. Commercial media advertising can be full of political or religious content. In this way a radio station in Phoenix, like a station in San Francisco, could advertise on the buses that it broadcasts Rush Limbaugh with a photo of the man accompanying the sales pitch. A Christian radio station could promote its product with a cross and a relevant message. A movie house could announce the return of The Last Temptation of Christ with an illustration of the Magdalen.
If the city of Phoenix is to be truly neutral on political and religious issues, it must go beyond the simplicity of “commercial” and be specific as to the content of commercial messages it will not accept. The city may, for instance, specify that the buses will not carry commercial messages on hot topics — e.g., abortion, cigars and cigarettes, environmental disputes, euthanasia, pornography, radio talk shows, and X-rated movies. The city will have to discriminate frankly as to content, as it permissibly may in this commercial context. Such content-based restrictions are permissible in such nonpublic fora. Perry Educ. Ass’n v. Perry Local Educators’ Ass’n, 460 U.S. 37, 49, 103 S.Ct. 948, 74 L.Ed.2d 794 (1983). What the city may not do is discriminate as to viewpoint, Arkansas Educ. Television Comm’n v. Forbes, — U.S. -,-, 118 S.Ct. 1633, 1643, 140 L.Ed.2d 875 (1998), as it did in this case where in the course of applying its ordinance it effectively rewrote it to permit only “primarily commercial” messages and thereby froze out even commercial advertising by nonprofit groups without significant business transactions to advertise.
Of the three rationales for the city’s policy, the avoidance of violence against the buses seems to border on the absurd; nothing in the record substantiates the fear. The other two rationales — neutrality on contentious political and religious matters and the maintenance of standards attractive to business advertisers — would both be served by the kind of precision suggested here as essential to constitutionality. Neither rationale is served by a policy that allows the ideology of one side but not the other to be smuggled in.
The Phoenix ordinance, as applied, discriminates against the appellants’ commercial speech and the Phoenix ordinance, as applied, fails to mark off a realm of ideology-free speech from a realm where ideologues with businesses to advertise can flourish. The preliminary injunction should have been granted.