noting the “brief treatment” of the First Amendment issue in Casey did not provide much insight into how to analyze regulations of professional speech or why the statute at issue survived scrutiny under the First Amendment
How later courts described this case
- noting the “brief treatment” of the First Amendment issue in Casey did not provide much insight into how to analyze regulations of professional speech or why the statute at issue survived scrutiny under the First Amendment
- “A natural reading of the [anti-harassment] provision would seem to indicate that it is primarily concerned with verbal harassment. ... [W]e think that on balance the provision substantially regulates speeeh[.]”
Written by the judges who cited it.
Later courts went against this
Disagreed with by Dr. Bernd Wollschlaeger v. Governor of the State of Florida, 848 F.3d 1293 (2017)
We also reject the argument asserted by the panel, see Wollschlaeger IV, 814 F.3d at 1197-98, and championed by the state officials, see Appellants’ En Banc Br. at 49, that FOPA’s speaker-focused and content-based restrictions on speech are justified because there is a significant power imbalance between doctors and their patients, who are in a vulnerable position.
The opinion
WILSON, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
Numerous voices have weighed in on this appeal, which requires us to assess the constitutionality of Florida’s Firearm Owners Privacy Act. Thirty amici curiae filed briefs, and the Majority has now filed its third iteration of an opinion seeking to uphold the Act. See Wollschlaeger v. Governor of Fla. (Wollschlaeger I), 760 F.3d 1195 (11th Cir.2014), opinion vacated and superseded on reh’g, Wollschlaeger v. Governor of Fla. (Wollschlaeger II), 797 F.3d 859 (11th Cir.2015). Having considered all these arguments for and against the constitutionality of this state law, I continue to believe that it does not survive First Amendment scrutiny. However, I have already written two dissents to this effect, and the plaintiffs have sought en banc review. Accordingly, I decline to pen another dissent responding to the Majority’s evolving rationale. I rest on my previous dissents.