Facts
- New York City required a permit from the Police Commissioner to hold “public worship meetings” on public streets.
- Carl Jacob Kunz, an ordained Baptist minister associated with “Outdoor Gospel Work,” conducted street preaching in New York City.
- Kunz obtained a permit in 1946; it was valid only for that calendar year.
- After a hearing in November 1946, the Police Commissioner revoked Kunz’s permit based on evidence that he had ridiculed and denounced other religious beliefs during meetings.
- The ordinance penalized ridicule and denunciation of other religious beliefs but did not expressly authorize permit revocation or identify grounds and procedures for revocation.
- Kunz did not seek judicial review of the 1946 revocation.
- Kunz applied for permits in 1947 and 1948; his applications were disapproved without stated reasons.
- On September 11, 1948, Kunz preached at Columbus Circle without a permit and was arrested.
- He was convicted and fined for holding a religious meeting on the street without a permit; the conviction rested on his failure to possess a 1948 permit.
- State appellate courts affirmed the conviction; Kunz sought review, asserting First and Fourteenth Amendment violations.
Issues
- Whether a permitting ordinance for street religious meetings that supplies no standards to guide official action, and thus enables discretionary advance control of religious speech in public streets, violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments.
- Whether a conviction for preaching without a permit may stand when the permit denial rests on an official’s standardless discretion and prior conduct-based disapproval.
Decision
- The Supreme Court reversed Kunz’s conviction.
- The Court held the ordinance invalid as applied because it provided no appropriate standards for granting or denying permits and vested the Police Commissioner with discretionary power to control speech in advance.
- The Court distinguished permissible post hoc punishment for actual disorder from unconstitutional suppression through prior restraint.
- The Court rejected reliance on Kunz’s past conduct as a sufficient basis to sustain a future bar on speaking where the law lacked narrow, objective criteria for denial.
Legal Principles
- A licensing scheme for speech in public streets is unconstitutional when it grants an official broad, standardless discretion to permit or forbid expression in advance.
- Prior restraints are invalid when the ability to speak depends on the uncontrolled will of an administrator rather than narrow, objective, and definite standards.
- Government may regulate public forums through nondiscriminatory time, place, and manner rules and may punish actual misconduct under properly drawn laws, but it may not prevent speech through discretionary censorship.
- Denying future access to a public forum based on past speech is impermissible when the governing ordinance does not specify clear standards and limits on administrative decision-making.
Conclusion
The Court set aside Kunz’s conviction because New York City’s permit requirement for street worship meetings operated as a prior restraint: it lacked objective standards and allowed the Police Commissioner to decide in advance who could speak on religious matters in a traditional public forum, in violation of the First and Fourteenth Amendments.