Facts
- Tennessee prohibited the display or distribution of campaign materials and the solicitation of votes within 100 feet of polling-place entrances and inside the polling-place building.
- Violation was a misdemeanor punishable by up to 30 days’ imprisonment, a fine up to $50, or both.
- A campaign treasurer for a local election brought a facial challenge, alleging the statute restricted political speech in violation of the First and Fourteenth Amendments.
- The trial court upheld the statute, finding it served the State’s interest in preventing voter intimidation.
- The Tennessee Supreme Court struck down the 100-foot buffer as not narrowly tailored, while accepting the State’s authority to restrict campaigning inside the polling place.
- The U.S. Supreme Court granted review.
Issues
- Whether Tennessee’s prohibition on campaign speech within 100 feet of polling-place entrances is a content-based restriction in a public forum subject to strict (exacting) scrutiny.
- Whether preventing voter intimidation and election fraud are compelling interests that justify restrictions on election-day political speech near polling places.
- Whether a 100-foot campaign-free zone is narrowly drawn to serve those interests consistent with the First and Fourteenth Amendments.
Decision
- The Supreme Court reversed the Tennessee Supreme Court and remanded.
- A plurality concluded the statute is a facially content-based restriction on political speech in a public forum and therefore subject to exacting scrutiny.
- The plurality held the statute survives exacting scrutiny because it is narrowly drawn to serve compelling interests in preventing voter intimidation and election fraud.
- The plurality relied on longstanding historical practice and widespread state use of restricted zones around polling places as support for the necessity of some buffer zone.
- A concurrence agreed with the judgment on different doctrinal reasoning, emphasizing the special character of the area in and around polling places and the tradition of regulating conduct there.
- A dissent would have invalidated the statute as overbroad, arguing less speech-restrictive alternatives could address intimidation and fraud and criticizing the statute’s content discrimination.
Legal Principles
- Content-based restrictions on political speech in a public forum ordinarily require exacting scrutiny: the State must show the regulation is necessary to serve a compelling interest and is narrowly drawn to achieve that interest.
- Preventing voter intimidation and election fraud, and protecting the ability to vote freely and effectively, are compelling state interests in the election setting.
- A spatially limited buffer zone around polling places may be constitutional when drawn to prevent intimidation and fraud before they occur and when it does not eliminate political expression beyond the restricted area.
- The State need not prove perfect empirical tailoring for election regulations aimed at protecting ballot access and election integrity; reasonable prophylactic measures may be permissible.
Conclusion
The Court upheld Tennessee’s 100-foot campaign-free zone around polling-place entrances, concluding that even though the law targeted campaign speech based on content, it was narrowly drawn to serve compelling interests in preventing voter intimidation and election fraud and in protecting the right to cast a free ballot.