Supreme Court takes case on free speech rights of antiabortion counseling centers

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Source: Washington Post

Supreme Court takes case on free speech rights of antiabortion counseling centers

By Robert Barnes November 13 at 10:33 AM

The Supreme Court on Monday said it would decide whether it violates free speech guarantees for California to require crisis pregnancy centers, which counsel against abortion, to tell patients that the state offers contraception services and abortion assistance.

It is one of three cases raising First Amendment concerns that the court announced it will hear after the first of the year. The others involve the arrest of a man who spoke out against corruption at a Florida city council meeting, and a Minnesota law that bars wearing political messages at polling places.

The California case promises to be a high-profile conflict that raises important free speech issues about when a states intent to regulate the medical profession violates constitutional protections.

Crisis pregnancy centers provide services for pregnant women and try to convince them not to end their pregnancies. But some state legislatures, including Californias, have charged that they use deceptive advertising and confuse and even intimidate women who believe they are going to receive more neutral abortion counseling.
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Robert Barnes has been a Washington Post reporter and editor since 1987. He has covered the Supreme Court since November 2006. Follow @scotusreporter

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/courts_law/supreme-court-takes-case-on-free-speech-rights-of-antiabortion-counseling-centers/2017/11/13/cd2003f8-c882-11e7-aa96-54417592cf72_story.html

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Ha tip, Popehat:

SCOTUS accepted cert in a compelled speech case in the Ninth Circuit. This was my lawsplainer on the Ninth Circuit's opinion. https://www.popehat.com/2016/10/17/lawsplainer-the-ninth-circuit-and-compelled-speech-about-abortion/ Issue is whether state can compel "pregnancy crisis centers" to post information about abortion services.

Link to tweet

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Court grants review in three new cases

http://www.scotusblog.com/2017/11/court-grants-review-three-new-cases/#more-264106

This morning the justices issued orders from last weeks conference. They added three new cases to their merits docket for the term, including two high-profile First Amendment cases, and they denied review in an Alabama death-penalty case, over a lengthy dissent by Justice Sonia Sotomayor that was joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Elena Kagan.

In the first of todays grants, National Institute of Family and Life Advocates v. Becerra, the justices agreed to weigh in on a challenge by crisis pregnancy centers nonprofits that try to steer pregnant women away from having abortions to a California law that requires the centers to convey specific messages. The law mandates that nonprofits that are licensed to provide medical services post notices to inform their patients that free or low-cost abortions are available and to provide the telephone number of the state agency that can put the patients in touch with providers of those abortions. The groups that are not licensed to provide medical services but try to support pregnant women by supplying them with diapers and formula, for example must include disclaimers in their advertisements to make clear in up to 13 languages that their services do not include medical help.

The nonprofits went to court, arguing that Californias law violates the First Amendment, both by requiring them to convey the messages and, because the requirements do not apply to clinics that perform abortions, by targeting them because they discourage women from seeking abortions. A federal district court rejected their arguments, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit affirmed. The nonprofits went to the Supreme Court last spring, hoping that it would agree to rule on their case. After asking the lower court to send the record in the case a sure sign that at least one justice is looking at the case closely today the court granted review to decide whether the disclosures required by the California law violate the First Amendments free speech clause; it declined to decide whether the disclosures run afoul of another part of the First Amendment that bars the government from prohibiting the free exercise of religion.
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Recommended Citation: Amy Howe, Court grants review in three new cases, SCOTUSblog (Nov. 13, 2017, 11:21 AM), http://www.scotusblog.com/2017/11/court-grants-review-three-new-cases/

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Oh, by the way, happy 65th birthday, Merrick Garland.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merrick_Garland

[Fred Sanders]

1. The real question for SCOTUS is "Can religious institutions disguise themselves as ' information

centers if the true intent is a religious based motive?"

Fuck NO!

[Shoonra]

2. This is a two-edged sword ...

A Supreme Court decision that the Anti-abortion people do NOT have to tell potential patients that the birth control and abortions are available, also means that Read Doctors do not have to tell their patients that abortion leads to mental illness or other lies.

[Geechie]

3. Meanwhile ...

Until February of this year, we had a law on the books for six years in Florida preventing doctors from talking to their patients about guns in the home. What a world. What we CAN say, what we CAN'T say...