Citing Collins, the Court reasons that the First Amendment protects many kinds of messages, particularly advocacy. The Court held that the NAACP’s solicitation for clients was within the protection of the First Amendment. The state argued that the NAACP’s soliciting for clients did not count as protected First Amendment speech, but was actually professional business conduct which the state could regulate. The NAACP sued on the grounds that this violated the First Amendment. Virginia had amended its laws to effectively criminalize the way the NAACP solicited and retained clients within the state. National Ass’n for Advancement of Colored People v. The decisions in both Noerr and Collins were cited when the Court decided Combined, these two cases created the “Noerr-Pennington Doctrine”, a doctrine which protects the rights of groups to petition the government. The Court applied the same logic used in Noerr to hold that labor unions do not violate anti-trust laws when they conduct joint efforts to influence public officials. Pennington, a labor union case decided four years later. Noerr is considered a companion case to United Mine Workers v. Multiple groups or individuals working together to petition the government was likewise protected – interpreting the Sherman Act any other way would mean that Congress had passed it intending to infringe on the First Amendment, which it had definitely not intended. The campaigns were in effect petitioning the government, and petitioning the government for a desire change is how the democratic system is supposed to work. The majority reasoned that anti-trust laws were designed to stop unfair private agreements between monopolies and companies – whereas these publicity campaigns instead worked through influencing official government action. The Court held that publicity campaigns designed to influence the legislature into passing laws do violate anti-trust laws. The railroads filed a counterclaim, alleging the same violations of anti-trust laws, again for a publicity campaign, that the truckers had coordinated. Of particular issue was a publicity campaign conducted by the railroad companies to influence legislation that was pro-railroad and anti-trucker. The case involved a lawsuit by long distance trucking companies which alleged that multiple railroads had conspired, in violation of anti-trust laws, to influence the government to pass legislation that was harmful to truckers. The Court further clarified the protections afforded to the right to petition in 1961 when it decided Eastern Railroad Presidents Conference v. A solicitation for members to join a union may very well be business and economics related, but is still equally protected and would require a compelling government interest to be able to infringe it. The Court emphasized that protected free speech being expressed in an assembly or petition can take many forms, and that petitions did not necessarily have to be political in nature. The Supreme Court sided with the labor organizer, holding that the law violated the First Amendment. ![]() An organizer was convicted of speaking at a rally without a permit, and he challenged the constitutionality of the statute. The case involved a Texas law which required union members to get an organizers permit prior to being allowed to solicit new members. Collins, decided 1945, the right to petition and assemble was again considered to be inseparable from other First Amendment rights. The government could prohibit speech that instigated crime or violence, but could not criminalize peaceful meetings that were not advocating crime or violence. The Supreme Court held that since the right to assemble was so closely related to the rights of free speech and the free press, it should have the same level of protection under the 14th Amendment. De Jonge had been arrested under a state criminal syndicalism statute because he organized a peaceful public meeting where he spoke on behalf of the Communist Party. The right to peacefully assemble was declared to be a right “cognate” and “inseperable” from the freedom of speech and freedom of the press in the 1937 decision De Jonge v.
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