concluding that “public disclosure of referendum petitions in general”—including the names and addresses of those who signed them— “is substantially related to the important interest of preserving the integrity of the electoral process,” and thus “disclosure under [Washington State’s Public Records Act] would not violate the First Amendment”
How later courts described this case
- concluding that “public disclosure of referendum petitions in general”—including the names and addresses of those who signed them— “is substantially related to the important interest of preserving the integrity of the electoral process,” and thus “disclosure under [Washington State’s Public Records Act] would not violate the First Amendment”
- holding that the plaintiffs had to satisfy the “standards for a facial challenge” because “the relief that would follow” was “an injunction barring the secretary of state from making [all] referendum petitions available to the public[,] ... reaching] beyond the particular circumstances of these plaintiffs” (internal quotation marks omitted)
- explaining that the particular label of the claim -- facial versus as applied -- "is not what matters" and - 21 - that "[t]he important point" is that the plaintiffs must "satisfy our standards for a facial challenge to the extent of [the] reach" of their claims
- explaining that in “rare case[s],” there may be a successful as-applied challenge where the “level of threat . . . would substantially limit a group’s ability to ‘garner the num- ber of signatures necessary to place [a] matter on the bal- lot’ ”
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
Justice Breyer,
concurring.
In circumstances where, as here, “a law significantly implicates competing constitutionally protected interests in complex ways,” the Court balances interests. Nixon v. Shrink Missouri Government PAC, 528 U.S. 377, 402 , 120 S. Ct. 897 , 145 L. Ed. 2d 886 (2000) (Breyer, J., concurring). “And in practice that has meant asking whether the statute burdens any one such interest in a manner out of proportion to the statute’s salutary effects upon the others.” Ibid. As I read their opinions, this is what both the Court and Justice Stevens do. See ante, at 196, 177 L. Ed. 2d, at 502-503 (opinion of the Court); post, at 217-218, 177 L. Ed. 2d, at 515-516 (Stevens, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment). And for the reasons stated in those opinions (as well as many of the reasons discussed by Justice Sotomayor), I would uphold the statute challenged in this case. With this understanding, I join the opinion of the Court and Justice Stevens’ opinion.