Opinion

Police Department of Chicago v. Mosley

  • 408 U.S. 92
Court
Supreme Court of the United States
Filed
Jun 26, 1972
Status
Published
Author
Burger
On the bench
Blackmun, Brennan, Burger, Douglas, Marshall, Powell, Rehnquist, Stewart, White
Cited by
503 cases
Authority
More cited than 19.9%

holding that municipality could not exempt labor picketing from a general prohibition on picketing at a school

How later courts described this case

  • holding that municipality could not exempt labor picketing from a general prohibition on picketing at a school
  • holding that ordinance which impermissibly distinguished between labor picketing and all other peaceful picketing violates the Equal Protection Clause
  • invalidating a law that banned picketing within 150 feet of a school but exempted labor picketing
  • invalidating as content-based an ordinance criminalizing picketing in front of schools, but excepting labor-related picketing

Written by the judges who cited it.

The opinion

Mr. Chief Justice Burger,

concurring.

I join the Court’s opinion but with the reservation that some of the language used in the discussion of the First *103 Amendment could, if read out of context, be misleading. Numerous holdings of this Court attest to the fact that the First Amendment does not literally mean that we “are guaranteed the right to express any thought, free from government censorship.” This statement is subject to some qualifications, as for example those of Roth v. United States, 354 U. S. 476 (1957); Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, 315 U. S. 568 (1942). See also New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254 (1964).

This is a copy of a public record, reproduced as it was published. It is not legal advice, and it may not be the version a court would rely on. Check the official source before you cite it.

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