Lederman v. United States

131 F. Supp. 2d 46, 49 Fed. R. Serv. 3d 823, 2001 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3427, 2001 WL 267482
CourtDistrict Court, District of Columbia
DecidedMarch 5, 2001
DocketCIV.A. 99-3359(RWR)
StatusPublished
Cited by17 cases

This text of 131 F. Supp. 2d 46 (Lederman v. United States) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, District of Columbia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Lederman v. United States, 131 F. Supp. 2d 46, 49 Fed. R. Serv. 3d 823, 2001 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3427, 2001 WL 267482 (D.D.C. 2001).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM OPINION

ROBERTS, District Judge.

Plaintiff, an artist and president of an organization called Artists’ Response to Illegal State Tactics (“A.R.T.I.S.T.”), challenges the validity of an amended Capitol Grounds Regulation that created a no-demonstration zone within the 250-foot perimeter of the United States Capitol building. He also seeks to recover damages for his 1997 arrest pursuant to the original regulation. In an Opinion issued on March 14, 2000, I held the original regulation to be unconstitutional on its face and permanently enjoined its enforcement. See Lederman v. United States, 89 F.Supp.2d 29 (D.D.C.2000). The federal *48 defendants 1 have moved for reconsideration as to the public forum aspect of that ruling, or in the alternative, for clarification as to the specific United States Capitol Grounds areas which constitute a traditional public forum for First Amendment purposes. Because I remain unpersuaded by the federal defendants’ arguments that plaintiff was arrested in a non-public forum, I will deny their motion for reconsideration. I will, however, clarify that, to reach my decision, I need have concluded only that the sidewalk in front of the Capitol steps, on which plaintiff was arrested in 1997 and on which he intended to demonstrate in 1999, constitutes a traditional public forum.

Two days after I issued the March 14, 2000 ruling, the Capitol Police Board amended the Capitol Grounds Regulation. Plaintiff has amended his complaint to challenge the amended regulation. The federal defendants (hereinafter, “defendants”) have moved to dismiss, or in the alternative, for summary judgment on plaintiffs amended complaint. Plaintiff has cross-moved for summary judgment on his claim for declaratory and injunctive relief as to the amended regulation, and for partial summary judgment as to liability on his damages claims against the federal defendants. 2 Because I find that the amended regulation is reasonably related to the purpose of the enabling statute, but is not narrowly tailored to further a significant governmental interest, and that plaintiff has established viable damages claims as to certain constitutional torts, parties’ cross-motions for summary judgment will be granted in part and denied in part. As in my March 14, 2000 ruling, I also will issue a declaratory judgment invalidating the offending regulatory language on its face as contrary to the First Amendment and permanently enjoin its enforcement.

BACKGROUND

The factual circumstances that initially gave rise to this action are set forth in detail in the March 14, 2000 Memorandum Opinion, Lederman, 89 F.Supp.2d at 30-34. On March 11, 1997, plaintiff was arrested by two Capitol Police officers, Loughery and McQuay, while peacefully leafleting and holding a small sign on a sidewalk immediately in front of the House steps at the south end of the Capitol building. A District of Columbia Superior Court Hearing Commissioner dismissed the charges against plaintiff on November 30, 1998, holding that the Capitol Grounds Regulations under which plaintiff had been arrested, Article XIX, Capitol Grounds Regulation § 158(a), was unconstitutional both on its face and as applied to plaintiffs free speech activity. Plaintiff, who intended to leaflet in the same area in March 1999, brought his initial suit to preliminarily and permanently enjoin enforcement of the Capitol Grounds Regulation and to recover damages for his 1997 arrest. 3

The specific Capitol Grounds Regulation at issue in the first case created a no-demonstration zone within the 250 foot perimeter of the Capitol building. This regulation imposed an outright ban on the following types of activities within the zone:

[Pjarading, picketing, speechmaking, holding vigils, sit-ins, or other expressive conduct that conveys a message supporting or opposing a point of view or has the intent, effect, or propensity to attract a crowd or onlookers, but does *49 not include merely wearing Tee shirts, buttons, or other similar articles of apparel that convey a message.

Article XIX, Capitol Grounds Regulation § 158(a).

On cross-motions for partial summary judgment, I held that the creation of a no-demonstration zone around the Capitol was within the Police Board’s statutory authority to enact. See Lederman, 89 F.Supp.2d at 33-35. I went on to hold, however, that the Capitol Grounds Regulation could not “pass muster under the far more exacting standards of the First Amendment.” Id. at 35, 41-42. In reaching that conclusion, I first found that defendants had failed to rebut the presumption that the sidewalk on which plaintiff was arrested in 1997 was a traditional public forum for First Amendment purposes. Id. at 35-37. I then held that the Capitol Grounds Regulation was not a “reasonable time, place, and manner” restriction because, although the regulation left open ample alternative channels of expression, the portion of the regulation under which plaintiff was arrested in 1997 was not narrowly tailored to serve a significant government interest. Id. at 37-42.

In conducting my narrow tailoring inquiry, I first observed that the Capitol Grounds Regulation, via § 158(a)’s definition of “demonstration activity,” banned “three general categories of activity within 250 feet of the Capitol: (1) ‘parading, picketing, speechmaking, holding vigils, sit-ins’; (2) ‘other expressive conduct that conveys a message supporting or opposing a point of view’; and (3) other expressive conduct that ‘has the intent, effect, or propensity to attract a crowd or onlookers[.]’ ” Id. at 39 (quoting Article XIX, Capitol Grounds Regulations § 158(a)). I then held that plaintiffs leafleting fell into the second, and most expansive, category of banned speech (ie„ speech that constituted “other expressive conduct that conveys a message supporting or opposing a point of view”). Id. Accordingly, my analysis focused on that portion of the regulation. Although I agreed with the federal defendants that the Capitol Grounds Regulation left open adequate alternative channels of expression, I nevertheless concluded, after analyzing relevant Supreme Court and D.C. Circuit precedent, that such a broadly-worded prohibition on speech within a traditional public forum was “antithetical to the narrow tailoring demanded by the First Amendment.” Id. at 42. Accordingly, I struck down on its face the Capitol Grounds Regulation’s ban on “other expressive conduct that conveys a message supporting or opposing a point of view” within the 250-foot radius of the Capitol and permanently enjoined future enforcement of that provision of the regulation.

On March 16, 2000, two days after my ruling, the Capitol Police Board amended § 158(a)’s definition of demonstration activity (hereinafter, the “amended regulation”). The amended regulation became effective on March 30, 2000. The following changes were made, inserting the bolded language and dropping the stricken language:

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Bluebook (online)
131 F. Supp. 2d 46, 49 Fed. R. Serv. 3d 823, 2001 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3427, 2001 WL 267482, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/lederman-v-united-states-dcd-2001.