Regulation of charitable subscriptions, barring fees in excess of a prescribed level, effectively imposes prior restraints on fundraising, and is incompatible with the 1st amendment. However, any and all reliance on the percentage of charitable donations fundraisers retain for themselves is not prohibited. While bare failure to disclose that information to potential donors does not establish fraud, when nondisclosure is accompanied by intentionally misleading statements designed to deceive the listener, a fraud claim is permissible. Illinois ex rel. Madigan v. Telemarketing Associates, Inc., 538 U.S. 600, 123 S. Ct. 1829, 155 L. Ed. 2d 793 (2003). The 1st amendment requires that an adult business licensing scheme assure prompt judicial review of an administrative decision denying a license. An ordinance providing that the city’s final decision may be appealed to state court pursuant to state rules of civil procedure did not violate the 1st amendment. City of Littleton v. Z.J. Gifts D-4, L.L.C., 541 U.S. 774, 124 S. Ct. 2219, 159 L. Ed. 2d 84 (2004). While a governmental employer may impose certain restraints on the speech of its employees that would be unconstitutional if applied to the general public, the courts have recognized the right of employees to speak on matters unrelated to their employment and to speak on matters of public concern. Because a police officer’s off-duty activities were not related to a matter of public concern and were designed to exploit his employer’s image, they were not protected under the 1st amendment. City of San Diego v. Roe, 543 U.S. 77, 125 S. Ct. 521, 160 L. Ed. 2d 410 (2004). When public employees make statements pursuant to their official duties, the employees are not speaking as citizens for 1st amendment purposes, and the constitution does not insulate their communications from employer discipline. Restricting speech that owes its existence to a public employee’s professional responsibilities does not infringe any liberties the employee might have enjoyed as a private citizen. It simply reflects the exercise of employer control over what the employer itself has commissioned or created. Garcetti v. Ceballos, 547 U.S. 410, 126 S. Ct. 1951, 164 L. Ed. 2d 689 (2006). Enforcement of a rule adopted by a statewide membership corporation organized to regulate interscholastic sports among its members that prohibited high school coaches from recruiting middle school athletes did not violate the 1st amendment. There is a difference of constitutional dimension between rules prohibiting appeals to the public at large and rules prohibiting direct, personalized communication in a coercive setting. Bans on direct solicitations are more akin to a conduct regulation than a speech restriction, but restrictions are limited to conduct that is inherently conducive to overreaching and other forms of misconduct. Tennessee Secondary School Athletic Ass’n v. Brentwood Academy, 551 U.S. 291, 127 S. Ct. 2489, 168 L. Ed. 2d 166 (2007). Schools may take steps to safeguard those entrusted to their care from speech that can reasonably be regarded as encouraging illegal drug use. School officials did not violate the 1st amendment by confiscating a pro-drug banner and suspending the student responsible for it. Morse v. Frederick, 551 U.S. 393, 127 S. Ct. 2618, 168 L. Ed. 2d 290 (2007). Offers to provide or requests to obtain child pornography are categorically excluded from the 1st amendment. Offers to deal in illegal products or otherwise engage in illegal activity do not acquire 1st amendment protection when the offeror is mistaken about the factual predicate of his or her offer. Impossibility of completing the crime because the facts were not as the defendant believed is not a defense. United States v. Williams, 553 U.S. 285, 128 S. Ct. 1830, 170 L. Ed. 2d 650 (2008). The free speech clause of the 1st amendment restricts government regulation of private speech; it does not regulate government speech. Although a park is a traditional public forum for speeches and other transitory expressive acts, the display of a permanent monument in a public park is not a form of expression to which forum analysis applies. Instead, the placement of a permanent monument in a public park is best viewed as a form of government speech and is therefore not subject to scrutiny under the free speech clause of the 1st amendment. Pleasant Grove City v. Summum, 555 U.S. 460, 129 S. Ct. 1125, 172 L. Ed. 2d 853 (2009). The government may regulate corporate political speech through disclaimer and disclosure requirements, but it may not suppress that speech altogether. Federal law prohibiting corporations and unions from using their general treasury funds to make independent expenditures for speech defined as an “electioneering communication” or for speech expressly advocating the election or defeat of a candidate is unconstitutional. Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, 558 U.S. 310, 130 S. Ct. 876, 175 L. Ed. 2d 753 (2010). While the prohibition of animal cruelty itself has a long history in American law, depictions of animal cruelty are not outside the reach of the 1st amendment altogether. The guarantee of free speech does not extend only to categories of speech that survive an ad hoc balancing of relative social costs and benefits. A federal statute that criminalized the commercial creation, sale, or possession of certain depictions of animal cruelty, which encompassed common depictions of ordinary and lawful activities and required merely that the conduct be “illegal” where the alleged violation took place, was substantially overbroad and therefore facially invalid under the 1st amendment. United States v. Stevens, 559 U.S. 460, 130 S. Ct. 1577, 176 L. Ed. 2d 435 (2010). A public university may condition its official recognition of a student group, and the attendant use of school funds and facilities, on the organization’s agreement to open eligibility for membership and leadership to all students. In requiring a student religious group, in common with all other student organizations, to choose between welcoming all students and forgoing the benefits of official recognition, a school did not transgress constitutional limitations. The 1st amendment shields groups against state prohibition of the organization’s expressive activity, however exclusionary that activity may be, but a group enjoys no constitutional right to state subvention of its selectivity. Christian Legal Society Chapter v. Martinez, 561 U.S. 661, 130 S. Ct. 2971, 177 L. Ed. 2d 838 (2010). The 1st amendment shielded church members from tort liability for their speech when they picketed near a soldier’s funeral service and their picket signs reflected the church’s view that the United States is overly tolerant of sin and that God kills American soldiers as punishment. Whether the amendment prohibits liability for speech in this type of case turns largely on whether that speech is of public or private concern, as determined by all the circumstances of the case. Snyder v. Phelps, 562 U.S. 443, 131 S. Ct. 1207, 179 L. Ed. 2d 172 (2011). A state cannot create new categories of unprotected speech by applying a simple balancing test that weighs the value of a particular category of speech against its social costs and then punishes that category of speech if it fails the test. Without persuasive evidence that a novel restriction on content, such as restrictions on selling or lending “violent” video games to children, is part of a long, if heretofore unrecognized, tradition of proscription, a legislature may not revise the judgment of the American people, embodied in the 1st amendment, that the benefits of its restrictions on the government outweigh the costs. Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Ass’n, 564 U.S. 786, 131 S. Ct. 2729, 180 L. Ed. 2d 708 (2011). Like the protected books, plays, and movies that preceded them, video games communicate ideas—and even social messages—through many familiar literary devices and through features distinctive to the medium. That suffices to confer 1st amendment protection. Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Ass’n, 564 U.S. 786, 131 S. Ct. 2729, 180 L. Ed. 2d 708 (2011). The 1st amendment does not permit a public-sector union to adopt procedures that have the effect of requiring objecting nonmembers to lend the union money to be used for political, ideological, and other purposes not germane to collective bargaining. The 1st amendment does not allow a public-sector union to require objecting nonmembers to pay a special fee or dues increase that is levied to meet expenses for the purpose of financing the union’s political and ideological activities that were not disclosed when the amount of the regular assessment was set. Knox v. Service Employees International Union, Local 1000, 567 U.S. 298, 132 S. Ct. 2277, 183 L. Ed. 2d 281 (2012). The federal statute at issue in this case imposed two types of limits on campaign contributions: 1) base limits that restrict how much money a donor may contribute to a particular candidate or committee; and 2) aggregate limits that restrict how much money a donor may contribute in total to all candidates or committees. Base limits were previously upheld as serving the permissible objective of combatting corruption. The aggregate limits do little, if anything, to address that concern, while seriously restricting participation in the democratic process. The aggregate limits are therefore invalid under the 1st amendment. McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission, 572 U.S. 185, 134 S. Ct. 1434, 188 L. Ed. 2d 468 (2014). A Massachusetts act that made it a crime to knowingly stand on a public way or sidewalk within 35 feet of an entrance or driveway to any reproductive health care facility violated the 1st amendment. Although the act was content neutral, it was not narrowly tailored because it burdened substantially more speech than was necessary to further the government’s legitimate interests. McCullen v. Coakley, 573 U.S. 464, 134 S. Ct. 2518, 189 L. Ed. 2d 502 (2014). Judicial candidates have a 1st amendment right to speak in support of their campaigns. States have a compelling interest in preserving public confidence in their judiciaries. When a state adopts a narrowly tailored restriction, like the one at issue in this case, providing that judicial candidates “shall not personally solicit campaign funds . . . but may establish committees of responsible persons” to raise money for election campaigns, those principles do not conflict. A state’s decision to elect judges does not compel it to compromise public confidence in their integrity. The 1st amendment permits such restrictions on speech. Williams-Yulee v. Florida Bar, 575 U.S. 433, 135 S. Ct. 1656, 191 L. Ed. 2d 570 (2015). A law that is content based on its face is subject to strict scrutiny regardless of the government’s benign motive, content-neutral justification, or lack of animus toward the ideas contained in the regulated speech. An innocuous justification cannot transform a facially content-based law into one that is content neutral. Because strict scrutiny applies either when a law is content based on its face or when the purpose and justification for the law are content based, a court must evaluate each question before it concludes that the law is content neutral and thus subject to a lower level of scrutiny. Reed v. Town of Gilbert, 576 U.S. 155, 135 S. Ct. 2218, 192 L. Ed. 2d 236 (2015). A speech regulation targeted at specific subject matter is content based even if it does not discriminate among viewpoints within that subject matter. In this case, the town sign code singled out specific subject matter for differential treatment, even if it did not target viewpoints within that subject matter. Ideological messages were given more favorable treatment than messages concerning a political candidate, which were themselves given more favorable treatment than messages announcing an assembly of like-minded individuals. That is a paradigmatic example of content-based discrimination. Reed v. Town of Gilbert, 576 U.S. 155, 135 S. Ct. 2218, 192 L. Ed. 2d 236 (2015). But see City of Austin v. Reagan National Advertising of Austin, LLC, 596 U.S. ___, 142 S. Ct. 1464, 212 L. Ed. 2d 418 (2022). A speech regulation is content based if the law applies to particular speech because of the topic discussed or the idea or message expressed. A regulation that targets a sign because it conveys an idea about a specific event is no less content based than a regulation that targets a sign because it conveys some other idea. Reed v. Town of Gilbert, 576 U.S. 155, 135 S. Ct. 2218, 192 L. Ed. 2d 236 (2015). When government speaks, it is not barred by the free speech clause from determining the content of what it says. That freedom in part reflects the fact that it is the democratic electoral process that first and foremost provides a check on government speech. Thus, government statements and government actions and programs that take the form of speech do not normally trigger the 1st amendment rules designed to protect the marketplace of ideas. As a general matter, when the government speaks it is entitled to promote a program, to espouse a policy, or to take a position. Walker v. Texas Division, Sons of Confederate Veterans, Inc., 576 U.S. 200, 135 S. Ct. 2239, 192 L. Ed. 2d 274 (2015). Based on the historical context, observers’ reasonable interpretation of the messages conveyed by Texas specialty plates, and the effective control that the state exerts over the design selection process, Texas’ specialty license plates constituted government speech. Drivers who display a state’s selected license plate designs convey the messages communicated through those designs. The 1st amendment stringently limits a state’s authority to compel a private party to express a view with which the private party disagrees. But here, just as Texas could not require a group to convey the state’s ideological message, the group could not force Texas to include a Confederate battle flag on its specialty license plates. Walker v. Texas Division, Sons of Confederate Veterans, Inc., 576 U.S. 200, 135 S. Ct. 2239, 192 L. Ed. 2d 274 (2015). With a few exceptions, the U.S. Constitution prohibits a government employer from discharging or demoting an employee because the employee supports a particular political candidate. When an employer demotes an employee out of a desire to prevent the employee from engaging in political activity, the employee is entitled to challenge that unlawful action under the 1st amendment and 42 USC 1983—even if the employer makes a factual mistake about the employee’s behavior. A discharge or demotion based upon an employer’s belief that the employee has engaged in protected activity can cause the same kind, and degree, of constitutional harm whether that belief does or does not rest upon a factual mistake. Heffernan v. City of Paterson, 578 U.S. 266, 136 S. Ct. 1412, 194 L. Ed. 2d 508 (2016). A North Carolina statute making it a felony for a registered sex offender to gain access to a number of websites, including commonplace social media websites, violated the 1st amendment. A fundamental principle of the 1st amendment is that all persons have access to places where they can speak and listen, and then, after reflection, speak and listen once more. To foreclose access to social media altogether is to prevent the user from engaging in the legitimate exercise of 1st amendment rights. Packingham v. North Carolina, 582 U.S. 98, 137 S. Ct. 1730, 198 L. Ed. 2d 273 (2017). Minnesota’s political apparel ban lacked objective, workable standards required for a reasonable content-based restriction on speech in a nonpublic forum and therefore violated the 1st amendment. Minnesota Voters Alliance v. Mansky, 585 U.S. ___, 138 S. Ct. 1876, 201 L. Ed. 2d 201 (2018). Under Illinois law, if a public-sector collective-bargaining agreement includes an agency-fee provision and the union certifies to the employer the amount of the fee, that amount is automatically deducted from a nonmember’s wages. No form of employee consent is required. This procedure violates the 1st amendment and cannot continue. Neither an agency fee nor any other payment to the union may be deducted from a nonmember’s wages, nor may any other attempt be made to collect such a payment, unless the employee affirmatively consents to pay. By agreeing to pay, nonmembers are waiving their 1st amendment rights, and such a waiver cannot be presumed. Janus v. AFSCME, 585 U.S. ___, 138 S. Ct. 2448, 201 L. Ed. 2d 924 (2018). The free speech clause of the 1st amendment constrains governmental actors and protects private actors. To draw the line between governmental and private, the court applies the state-action doctrine. Under that doctrine, a private entity may be considered a state actor when it exercises a function “traditionally exclusively reserved to the state.” Operation of public access channels on a cable system is not a traditional, exclusive public function. In operating the public access channels, the plaintiff in this case was a private actor, not a state actor, and therefore was not subject to 1st amendment constraints on its editorial discretion. Manhattan Community Access Corp. v. Halleck, 587 U.S. ___, 139 S. Ct. 1921, 204 L. Ed. 2d 405 (2019).