The First Amendment to the United States Constitution provides that “Congress shall make no law. . . abridging the freedom of speech . . ..” The 14th Amendment extends that prohibition to the states of the Union in general. See U.S. Const., Amendment XIV, § 1. In National Rifle Association v. Vullo, decided on May 30, 2024, the Court followed one of its Constitutional Law precedents and ruled that the states were forbidden from threatening adverse governmental action against third-party associates of a speaker “in order to punish or suppress” the speaker’s “speech.” The vote on the Court was unanimous.
COMMENT: As a literal matter, the Constitution does not really prohibit a state government from indirectly violating a controversial speaker’s freedom of speech by threatening third-party intermediaries who provide needed services to that speaker, as the National Rifle Association alleged in this case. However, the Constitution does authorize the Congress to enact legislation to offer that kind of indirect protection for Constitutional rights. See U.S. Const., Amendment XIV, § 5. Here the Congress has done so with the enactment of 42 U.S.C. § 1983, even though the Court failed to cite that statute in its Opinion.
RECENT RULINGS 