Facts
- Minnesota elects judges by popular election.
- Minnesota’s Code of Judicial Conduct contained an “announce clause” barring judicial candidates from announcing views on disputed legal or political issues.
- Gregory Wersal twice ran for the Minnesota Supreme Court and campaigned by criticizing court decisions, prompting an ethics complaint that was dismissed.
- In a later campaign, Wersal alleged the announce clause chilled his ability to answer questions from the press and the public on disputed issues.
- Wersal, the Republican Party of Minnesota, and others sued state officials responsible for enforcing the code, alleging the clause violated the First Amendment.
- The district court granted summary judgment for the state, and the Eighth Circuit affirmed on the ground that the clause was narrowly tailored to protect judicial impartiality and its appearance.
Issues
- Whether a state may, consistent with the First Amendment, prohibit candidates for elected judicial office from announcing views on disputed legal or political issues.
- Whether the announce clause is a content-based restriction on core political speech subject to strict scrutiny.
- Whether protecting judicial impartiality (and its appearance) is a compelling interest advanced by a restriction narrowly tailored to that interest.
Decision
- The Supreme Court reversed, holding 5–4 that Minnesota’s announce clause violates the First Amendment.
- The Court treated the clause as a content-based restriction on speech about candidates’ qualifications, a category at the core of First Amendment protection.
- Applying strict scrutiny, the Court held the state’s asserted interests did not justify the breadth of the restriction.
- The Court concluded the clause was not narrowly tailored to preserve impartiality understood as lack of bias toward parties because it restricted issue-based speech rather than party-based bias.
- The Court rejected “impartiality” defined as absence of preconceptions about legal issues as a compelling interest, noting judges inevitably have views about the law.
- To the extent “impartiality” meant open-mindedness, the Court held the clause was still not narrowly tailored because it broadly suppressed discussion of issues rather than targeting closed-mindedness in adjudication.
- The Court noted the tension between choosing judicial elections and restricting campaign discussion of matters most relevant to voters, and found the clause both overinclusive and underinclusive.
Legal Principles
- Restrictions that prohibit candidates from speaking on specified disputed issues are content-based limits on core election speech and trigger strict scrutiny.
- A state must show a compelling interest and narrow tailoring; broad suppression of issue discussion is not narrowly tailored to preventing bias toward parties.
- “Impartiality” as lack of preconceptions about legal issues is not a compelling basis for censoring campaign speech in judicial elections.
- Even if protecting judicial open-mindedness is a legitimate interest, a blanket ban on announcing views on disputed issues is not a sufficiently tailored means of achieving it.
Conclusion
Minnesota’s announce clause unconstitutionally restricted judicial candidates’ speech on disputed legal and political issues; because the state chose judicial elections, it could not impose a broad, content-based ban that failed strict scrutiny under the First Amendment.