breach of peace

In the predawn hours of June 21, 1990, petitioner R.A.V., then a juvenile, and several other teenagers assembled a crudely made cross by taping together broken chair legs and burned the cross inside the fenced yard of a black family that lived across the street from the house where R.A.V. was staying. Although this conduct could have been punished under several Minnesota statutes carrying significant penalties, the City of St. Paul chose to charge R.A.V. under the St. Paul Bias-Motivated Crime Ordinance. The ordinance provides that whoever places on public or private property a symbol, object, appellation, characterization or graffiti, including but not limited to a burning cross or Nazi swastika, which one knows or has reasonable grounds to know arouses anger, alarm or resentment in others on the basis of race, color, creed, religion or gender commits disorderly conduct and shall be guilty of a misdemeanor. R.A.V. moved to dismiss the charge on the ground that the ordinance was substantially overbroad and impermissibly content-based and therefore facially invalid under the First Amendment, and the trial court granted the motion. The Minnesota Supreme Court reversed, construing the ordinance to reach only fighting words and concluding that it was not impermissibly content-based. This Court granted certiorari.

In July 1971 petitioners, a class of female employees of the Department of Social Services and of the Board of Education of the City of New York, commenced this action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. They sued the Department and its Commissioner, the Board and its Chancellor, and the city of New York and its Mayor, all in their official capacities. The complaint alleged that the city and its agencies had as a matter of official policy compelled pregnant employees to take unpaid leaves of absence before such leaves were required for medical reasons. The suit sought injunctive relief and backpay for periods of unlawful forced leave. On cross-motions for summary judgment, the District Court held petitioners' claims for injunctive and declaratory relief moot because the city and the Board had changed their maternity-leave policies after the complaint was filed. The court found that the acts complained of were unconstitutional under the Fourteenth Amendment. It denied backpay on the ground that any damages would come ultimately from the city of New York and that holding otherwise would circumvent the immunity conferred on municipalities by Monroe v. Pape. On appeal, petitioners renewed their arguments that the Board of Education was not a municipality within the meaning of Monroe v. Pape and that the District Court had erred in barring a damages award against the individual defendants. The Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit held that the Board was not a “person” under § 1983 because it performed a vital governmental function and had no final say over its appropriations. It also held that a damages action against officials sued in their official capacities could not proceed because any award would have to be paid by a city held not amenable to suit in Monroe v. Pape. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to consider whether local governmental officials and local independent school boards are “persons” within the meaning of 42 U.S.C. § 1983 when equitable relief in the nature of back pay is sought against them in their official capacities. After oral argument, the Court requested the parties to address whether Monroe v. Pape should be reconsidered in light of the legislative history of the Civil Rights Act of 1871.

The respondents, consisting of individual citizens of the United States, unincorporated labor organizations composed of such citizens, and a membership corporation, brought suit in the United States District Court against the petitioners. The petitioners were the Mayor, the Director of Public Safety, the Chief of Police of Jersey City, New Jersey, and the Board of Commissioners, the governing body of the city. The bill alleged that acting under a city ordinance forbidding the leasing of any hall without a permit from the Chief of Police for a public meeting at which a speaker shall advocate obstruction of the Government of the United States or a state or a change of government by other than lawful means, the petitioners had denied respondents the right to hold lawful meetings in Jersey City on the ground that they were Communists or Communist organizations. It further alleged that pursuant to an unlawful plan the petitioners had caused the eviction from the municipality of persons considered undesirable because of their labor organization activities. The bill further alleged that acting under an ordinance which forbids any person to distribute or cause to be distributed or strewn about any street or public place any newspapers, paper, periodical, book, magazine, circular, card or pamphlet, the petitioners had discriminated against the respondents by prohibiting and interfering with distribution of leaflets and pamphlets by the respondents while permitting others to distribute similar printed matter. The petitioners had caused respondents and those acting with them to be arrested for distributing printed matter in the streets. They had caused them to be carried beyond the limits of the city or to remote places therein and had compelled them to board ferry boats destined for New York. The petitioners had interfered with the distribution of pamphlets discussing the rights of citizens under the National Labor Relations Act, 29 U.S.C.A. § 151 et seq. The bill charged that the suit was to redress the deprivation, under color of state law, statute and ordinance, of rights, privileges and immunities secured by the Constitution of the United States and of rights secured by laws of the United States providing for equal rights of citizens of the United States. It charged that the petitioners' conduct had been in pursuance of an unlawful conspiracy to injure, oppress, threaten, and intimidate citizens of the United States in the free exercise and enjoyment of the rights and privileges secured to them by the Constitution and laws of the United States. The bill alleged that respondents had repeatedly applied for permits to hold public meetings in the city for the stated purpose as required by ordinance, although they did not admit the validity of the ordinance. In execution of a common plan and purpose the petitioners had consistently refused to issue any permits for meetings to be held by or sponsored by respondents. The respondents did not purpose to advocate the destruction or overthrow of the government of the United States or that of New Jersey. Their sole purpose was to explain to workingmen the purposes of the National Labor Relations Act, the benefits to be derived from it, and the aid which the Committee for Industrial Organization would furnish workingmen to that end, with all activities to be performed peacefully. The answer denied generally or qualified the allegations of the bill. It denied that the amount in controversy as to each plaintiff and against each defendant exceeds $3,000 exclusive of interest and costs. It alleged that the supposed grounds of federal jurisdiction are frivolous. After trial upon the merits the District Court entered findings of fact and conclusions of law and a decree in favor of respondents. The Circuit Court of Appeals concurred in the findings of fact, held the District Court had jurisdiction under Section 24(1) and (14) of the Judicial Code, modified the decree in respect of one of its provisions, and as modified affirmed it. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.

In 1968, Chicago police officer Richard Nuccio shot and killed a youth named Nelson. State authorities prosecuted Nuccio and obtained a conviction for second-degree murder. The Nelson family retained petitioner Elmer Gertz, a Chicago attorney, to represent them in civil litigation against Nuccio. Respondent Robert Welch, Inc., publishes American Opinion, a monthly magazine expressing the views of the John Birch Society. In March 1969, the magazine published an article titled "FRAME-UP: Richard Nuccio And The War On Police." The article accused Gertz of participating in a Communist conspiracy to discredit local law enforcement, described him as a "Leninist" and "Communist-fronter," and claimed he had been an officer of the National Lawyers Guild, which it portrayed as a Communist organization involved in planning attacks on Chicago police during the 1968 Democratic Convention. The article contained numerous inaccuracies, including the false implication that Gertz had a criminal record. Gertz had served as an officer of the National Lawyers Guild approximately fifteen years earlier but had no involvement in planning the 1968 demonstrations. He had never been a member of the Marxist League for Industrial Democracy or the Intercollegiate Socialist Society. The managing editor of American Opinion made no effort to verify the charges against Gertz before publication and appended an editorial introduction stating that the author had conducted extensive research. Gertz filed a diversity action for libel in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. The district court ruled that the statements constituted libel per se under Illinois law. After a trial, the jury awarded Gertz $50,000 in compensatory damages. The district court later entered judgment for the defendant notwithstanding the verdict, applying the New York Times standard. The Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit affirmed. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to review the application of constitutional standards to defamation of a private individual.

In the latter part of 1951, a dispute arose between steel companies including Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. and their employees represented by the United Steelworkers of America, C.I.O., over terms and conditions to be included in new collective bargaining agreements. Long-continued conferences failed to resolve the dispute. On December 18, 1951, the union gave notice of an intention to strike when the existing agreements expired on December 31. The Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service intervened without success. On December 22, 1951, President Truman referred the dispute to the Federal Wage Stabilization Board to investigate and make recommendations for fair and equitable terms of settlement. The Board's report resulted in no settlement. On April 4, 1952, the union gave notice of a nationwide strike to begin at 12:01 a.m. on April 9. The President believed that the proposed work stoppage would immediately jeopardize national defense because steel is an indispensable component of substantially all weapons and other war materials. A few hours before the strike was to begin, on April 8, 1952, the President issued Executive Order 10340 directing the Secretary of Commerce to take possession of most of the steel mills and keep them running. The Secretary immediately issued possessory orders calling upon the presidents of the seized companies to serve as operating managers for the United States. Obeying the Secretary's orders under protest, the companies brought proceedings against him in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. Their complaints charged that the seizure was not authorized by an act of Congress or by any constitutional provision and asked the court to declare the orders invalid and to issue preliminary and permanent injunctions. The Government opposed the motion for a preliminary injunction, asserting that the President had inherent power supported by the Constitution, historical precedent, and court decisions. On April 30, 1952, the District Court issued a preliminary injunction restraining the Secretary from continuing the seizure and possession of the plants. On the same day the Court of Appeals stayed the District Court's injunction. Deeming it best that the issues be promptly decided by the Supreme Court, the Court granted certiorari on May 3, 1952, and set the cause for argument on May 12.