Post Office Sidewalks Case Gets Closer to Resolution

The oldest constitutional election law case still pending is Initiative & Referendum Institute v U.S. Postal Service, which was filed in 2000 in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C. It is still in that court.

On December 7, the court will review the recent survey results. The Court had earlier asked both sides to work together to survey postmasters, to see whether there is First Amendment activity on internal post office sidewalks. To the extent that postmasters report that people do petition in these sidewalks, or do pass out leaflets, or engage in other First Amendment activity, that bolsters the plaintiffs. If such sidewalks fit in the “traditional public fora” category, then such First Amendment activity is protected. Public sidewalks in general have had such protection since a famous 1939 U.S. Supreme Court opinion, C.I.O. v Hague.


Comments

Post Office Sidewalks Case Gets Closer to Resolution — 1 Comment

  1. Unfortunately, most Post Offices these days do not have external sidewalks. Therefore, as things stand right now, petitioning is effectively banned at most Post Offices in this country.

    Another problem today in regaurds to petitioning at Post Offices is that a lot of Post Offices are now inside stores and/or shopping centers where petitioning is officially banned.

    If the petitioners win this case it will be a big victory for ballot access as well as the 1st amendment in general.

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