Schneider v. State, 308 U.S. 147 (1939)
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Schneider v. State
No. 11
Argued October 13, 16, 1939
Decided November 22, 1939 *
308 U.S. 147
CERTIORARI TO THE COURT OF ERRORS AND APPEALS OF NEW JERSEY
Syllabus
1. The freedom of speech and of the press secured by the First Amendment against abridgment by the United States is similarly secured to all persons by the Fourteenth Amendment against abridgment by a State. P. 160.
2. It is a duty of municipal authorities, as trustees for the public, to keep the streets open and available for movement of people and property -- the primary purpose to which the streets are dedicated, and, to this end, the conduct of those who use them may be regulated; but such regulation must not abridge the constitutional liberty of those who are rightfully upon the streets to impart information through speech or the distribution of literature. Id.
3. The guaranty of freedom of speech and of the press does not deprive a municipality of power to enact regulations against standing in the middle of a crowded street and obstructing traffic, or interfering with the passage of pedestrians in order to force their acceptance of tendered leaflets, or against throwing literature broadcast in the streets, since such conduct bears no necessary relationship to the freedom to speak, write, print or distribute information or opinion. P. 160.
4. The purpose to keep the streets clean and neat is insufficient to justify an ordinance which prohibits a person rightfully on a public street from handing literature to one willing to receive it. Any burden imposed upon the city authorities in cleaning and caring for the streets as an indirect consequence of such distribution results from the constitutional protection of the freedom of speech and press. P. 162.
There are obvious methods of preventing littering of the streets -- e.g., the punishment of those who actually throw papers on the streets.
5. The circumstance that, in the actual enforcement of an ordinance forbidding all distribution of literature in the streets, the distributor is arrested only if those who receive the literature throw it on the streets does not render the ordinance valid. P. 163.
6. Ordinances forbidding distribution of printed matter are not made valid by limiting their operation to streets and alleys, and leaving other public places free. P. 163.
7. A municipal ordinance prohibiting solicitation, and distribution of circulars, by canvassing from house to house, unless licensed by the police after an inquiry and decision amounting to censorship, held void as applied to one who delivered literature and solicited contributions from house to house in the name of religion. P. 163.
121 N.J.L. 542, 3 A.2d 609; 33 Cal.App.2d 747, 85 P.2d 231; 230 Wis. 131, 283 N.W. 301; 18 N.E.2d (Mass.) 166, reversed.
Two of these four cases came up by appeal, and two by certiorari, 306 U.S. 628, 629, to review decision of state courts which upheld convictions under municipal ordinances forbidding or regulating distribution of literature in the streets or other public places. In three of the cases, the acts charged took place in the streets. The other was a case of circulars distributed by house to house visitations.