The Assault on Free Speech, Public Assembly, and Dissent

A National Lawyers Guild Report 39
of activist groups. <strong>The</strong> NYPD and the Parks Department denied a
permit to the coalition United for Peace and Justice to rally in
Central Park. <strong>The</strong> resolution calls for prompt and flexible processing
of permit applications and rally locations within sight and sound of
the demonstration’s focus.
Paying for Permits and Liability Insurance
<strong>The</strong> requirement that liability insurance be taken out by
demonstrators before a permit is granted is another way that
authorities make it costly or difficult to secure permits for
constitutionally protected events—even though First Amendment
events are exempted from that requirement. Most of these liabilityinsurance
provisions are unconstitutional because they permit
unfettered government discretion to impose financial burdens based
on the content of the speech. Often there is no way the sponsoring
groups can afford the thousands of dollars such insurance costs.
<strong>The</strong> City of Los Angeles has been barred from charging liability
insurance or any department service charges for parades or other
demonstrations. This is a result of the litigation brought by the
National Lawyers Guild before the Democratic National Convention
in 2000. 107
In Forsyth County, Ga. v. Nationalist Movement, 108 the Supreme
Court invalidated a county ordinance because it tied the amount of
the parading and assembly fee to the content of the speech. <strong>The</strong>
ordinance allowed the permitting administrator to vary the fee based
on an estimated cost of maintaining public order, up to $1,000 daily.
<strong>The</strong>re were no narrowly drawn objective standards to guide the
administrator. In Minnesota and some other jurisdictions, the issue is
levying against defendants to repay the costs of a demonstration. 109
This also is content-based and probably unconstitutional for the same
reasons, but as yet it is undecided by the Supreme Court. In March
2003, governor Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota was quoted throughout
the media as saying that he wanted anyone arrested at antiwar
protests to either pay law-enforcement costs or be prosecuted.
Pawlenty wanted judges to order restitution for costs related to
arrests and was considering proposing legislation that would require
restitution. 110 Brian P. Lees of the Massachusetts State Senate came
out in favor of this in Boston. Representative Eugene O’Flaherty was