Legal Services Corp. v. Velazquez
Legal Services Corp. v. Velazquez | |
---|---|
Holding | |
A restriction on advocacy by the Legal Services Corporation (LSC) seeking to change welfare law is an unconstitutional viewpoint restriction even though the LSC is a quasi-government entity. | |
Court membership | |
| |
Case opinions | |
Majority | Kennedy, joined by Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg, Breyer |
Dissent | Scalia, joined by Rehnquist, O'Connor, Thomas |
Laws applied | |
U.S. Const. Amend. I; 42 U.S.C. § 2996e(d)(4) |
Legal Services Corp. v. Velazquez, 531 U.S. 533 (2001), is a decision of the Supreme Court of the United States concerning the constitutionality of funding restrictions imposed by the United States Congress. At issue were restrictions on the Legal Services Corporation (LSC), a private, nonprofit corporation established by Congress. The restrictions prohibited LSC attorneys from representing clients attempting to amend (or challenge) existing welfare law. The case was brought by Carmen Velazquez, whose LSC-funded attorneys sought to challenge existing welfare provisions since they believed that it was the only way to get Velazquez financial relief.
The Court ruled that the restrictions violated the free speech guarantees of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. Because LSC facilitated "private" speech, that of its grantees, the restrictions did not simply regulate government speech.
Because the restrictions blocked attempts to change only a specific area of law, the Court held, they could not be considered viewpoint-neutral, and the government is prohibited from making such viewpoint-based restrictions of private speech.
Reactions to the decision were mixed within Congress, with Republicans and Democrats disagreeing on the propriety of the decision. Several law review articles argued that the use of a "distortion principle" to decide violations of free speech was an unreasonable and unconstitutional rule whose conditions on funding might "distort" speech advocacy. Others contended that the Court mishandled the interpretation of the statute at issue.
Background
History of funding restriction jurisprudence
The first major test of the federal government's power over funding restrictions based on speech was the 1991 case
Six years later, the Court reviewed another restriction, this time about funding restrictions imposed by a public university. In the 1997 case Rosenberger v. University of Virginia, a government supported university sought to withhold funds from religious student publications although it funded similar secular publications. The Court said that the government could seek to shape funding to support a government message, such restrictive steps could not be imposed to the exclusion of a particular viewpoint.[3]
Legal Services Corporation
In 1974 the United States Congress passed the Legal Services Corporation Act, which established the
... initiating legal representation or participating in any other way, in litigation, lobbying, or rulemaking, involving an effort to reform a Federal or State welfare system, except that this paragraph shall not be construed to preclude a recipient from representing an individual eligible client who is seeking specific relief from a welfare agency if such relief does not involve an effort to amend or otherwise challenge existing welfare law in effect on the date of the initiation of the representation.[6]
Lower-court proceedings
In 1997, Carmen Velazquez lost welfare benefits from the government under the provisions of the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families Act (TANF). An attorney from an LSC grantee, Bronx Legal Services, litigated her claim.[7] Bronx Legal Services, on behalf of Velazquez, filed suit in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York to seek a declaration that the provision of the Act prohibiting challenges to existing welfare law was unconstitutional under the First Amendment.[4] It argued that there was no way to help Velazquez without challenging the welfare system itself,[7] and it sought to challenge the provisions under which Velazquez lost her benefits, a challenge that they could not make because of the 1996 restrictions.[8] The district court denied an injunction.[9]
The court's decision was affirmed in part and reversed in part by the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, which unanimously held that the welfare-advocacy restriction was unconstitutional,[10] but upheld other restrictions that Bronx Legal Services had challenged (such as the lobbying restriction) by a 2–1 vote.[7] The Second Circuit also rejected the claim that any funding conditions would be illegitimate by instead preferring a case-by-case analysis.[11] LSC asked the Supreme Court for a review and argued that the Second Circuit had been wrong in striking only down the welfare-advocacy restriction.[12]
Supreme Court decision
The Supreme Court heard
The Court affirmed the decision of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals by holding 5-4 that the restriction on pursuing welfare advocacy was unconstitutional because of the First Amendment.[14]
Justice
The Court also criticized the fact that the restriction functionally barred attorneys from participating in the courts.
Dissent
Justice
He argued that the majority's holding was "unprecedented" because it was the first time the government would be limited in advocating its own message.[4][17]
Reactions
The immediate reaction was mixed among members of Congress.[19] Democratic supporters of the decision were optimistic of future victories against funding restrictions and stated that they were glad the restriction had fallen but that the decision "opens the LSC up to even more attacks."[19] Republicans in Congress condemned the decision and agreeing to work against it. US Representative
Parties involved in the case also had mixed reactions. LSC, which had sought to protect the restrictions, said that it would "immediately review [their] regulations and then modify them to adhere to the Court's ruling," which it did quickly after the decision.[11] Burt Neuborne, the lawyer who argued against the restriction before the Supreme Court, said that the ruling "really reads like a First Amendment textbook."[11]
Subsequent developments
In the weeks following the Velazquez decision, the Supreme Court rejected appeals related to other LSC restrictions.[20] LSC has engaged in welfare-reform litigation since the original injunction was lifted.
The case provided the basis for other challenges to restrictions imposed on LSC, such as bans against lobbying or class actions.
The implications of those subsequent rulings mandated two new rules, one narrow and one broad. Firstly, restrictions may be imposed on LSC as long as they do not discriminate on the basis of "viewpoint" or "opinion."
Analysis and commentary
A
Further criticism from the article was that the Court unduly rested its decision on a separation of powers determination.[32] The Court held in Velazquez that the restriction on welfare advocacy cases disrupted the "vital relationship between the bar and the judiciary."[33] That finding, the article argued, was baseless because there is no connection between preventing some government lawyers from arguing a single point and the deprivation of due process rights.[34] It concluded that the fundamental problems of statutory interpretation and a lack of a credible distinction with Rust in Justice Kennedy's analysis renders the opinion "unconvincing."[35]
An article in the Maryland Law Review by Christopher Gozdor, a lawyer in the
The article then turned to the Rust distinction. Gozdor explained: "The Court distinguished Velazquez from Rust because Rust involved a subsidy to facilitate private expression of the government's message, while Velazquez involved LSC funding that was designed [for] private speech."[37][38] The critical question for the court was the characterization of the speech that the law promoted. Because advocacy by LSC grantees to change welfare laws was not in advance of the government's own message, the restriction placed on it essentially prohibited a form of private speech. The relationship that the Court set forth, Gozdor asserted, was that the restriction "distorted" private speech. That "distortion principle" was the main criticism of the article, as was Scalia's dissenting opinion.[17][39]
Gozdor, agreeing with Scalia's dissent, wrote that the restriction did not create such a distortion of private speech because Congress had still permitted LSC to form affiliate organizations, which would be considered "legally separate."[40] Notwithstanding the difficulty of an organization to classify itself as an "affiliate entity" of LSC, Gozdor argued that there was no real prevention of speech when there were ample alternative means of relaying the message.[41]
Further, in attacking the distortion principle's application, Gozdor also argued against the principle as a
An article by Jessica Sharpe in the North Carolina Law Review argued that Kennedy's majority opinion wrongly set forth the understanding of the role of an attorney.[46] Sharpe criticized the Court's thesis that the role of the attorney is that of an advocate such that a restriction on the attorney served as a direct restriction of advocacy. That rationale, Sharpe argued, could undermine the balance of abortion restrictions because state regulations on abortion access also could be seen as an intrusion into doctor–patient speech. Because Velazquez "blurred" this distinction, the privileged nature of doctor–patient conversations could be subjected to future regulations and limitations.[47]
See also
Notes
- ^ 531 U.S. at 541–543.
- ^ 531 U.S. at 541–542.
- ^ a b 531 U.S. at 542.
- ^ a b c d "Legal Services Corp. v. Velazquez, Carmen, et al.", "Oyez: Supreme Court Media", May 7, 2012, accessed May 8, 2012.
- ^ Houseman, Alan W. "What Can and Cannot Be Done: Representation of Clients by LSC-Funded Programs", "Center for Law and Social Policy," August 9, 2001.
- ^ a b U.S.C §2996(1)
- ^ a b c "Supreme Court: Welfare Challenges Curb Rejected", World News Digest, February 28, 2001.
- ^ 164 F.3d at 764 (2d Cir. 1999).
- ^ 164 F.3d at 762 (2d Cir. 1999).
- ^ 531 U.S. 535 at 537
- ^ a b c d e Greenhouse, Linda, "Justices Reject Congress's Curbs on Welfare Suits", New York Times, March 1, 2001.
- ^ 531 U.S. 535 at 537, 540.
- ^ 531 U.S. at 535.
- ^ 531 U.S. at 549.
- ^ 531 U.S. at 546.
- ^ 531 U.S. at 548.
- ^ a b c 532 U.S. at 557. Scalia, J., dissenting.
- ^ 531 U.S. at 563.
- ^ a b c "Supreme Court Strikes Down Limits on Legal Services Corporations's Suits, Re-Energizing Program's Detractors", Congressional Quarterly Weekly, March 2, 2001.
- ^ "Legal Services Corporations restrictions to stay put; High court denies certiorari over remaining questions", The Indiana Lawyer, April 25, 2001.
- ^ Schwinn, Steven D. "Ninth Circuit Declines Further Review of Legal Services Funding Restrictions", Constitutional Law Prof Blog, June 4, 2010, accessed January 1, 2011
- ^ Oregon v. Legal Services Corp., 552 F. 3d 965 (9th Cir., 2009; dismissing challenge against restrictions)
- ^ Brooklyn Legal Services Corp. v. Legal Services Corp., 462 F. 3d 219 (2nd Cir., 2006; dismissing challenge to attorney fee restriction)
- ^ Volokh 2008, pp. 410–412
- ^ Volokh 2008, p. 434
- ^ Volokh 2008, p. 410
- ^ Johnson 2001, p. 355
- ^ Johnson 2001, p. 357
- ^ Johnson 2001, p. 358
- ^ Johnson 2001, p. 360
- ^ Johnson 2001, p. 362
- ^ Johnson 2001, p. 365
- ^ 531 U.S. 535 at 545-546
- ^ Johnson 2001, p. 367-368
- ^ Johnson 2001, p. 372
- ^ Gozdor 2002, p. 459–467
- ^ Gozdor 2002, p. 467
- ^ 531 U.S. 535 at 541–542.
- ^ Gozdor 2002, p. 471–472
- ^ Gozdor 2002, p. 472
- ^ Gozdor 2002, p. 472–473
- ^ Gozdor 2002, p. 474
- ^ Gozdor 2002, p. 475
- ^ Gozdor 2002, p. 476
- ^ Gozdor 2002, p. 477–481
- ^ Sharpe 2002, p. 1324
- ^ Sharpe 2002, p. 1331–1332
References
- Gozdor, Christopher (2002). "Legal Services Corp. v. Velazquez: A Problematic Commingling of Unconstitutional Conditions and Public Fora Analyses Yields A New Grey Area For Free Speech". Maryland Law Review. 61 (1): 454–481.
- Johnson, Jay (2001). "Note: The Interaction Between Statutory and Constitutional Arguments in Legal Services Corp. v. Velazquez". Journal of Law and Politics. 17 (1): 353–372.
- Sharpe, Jessica (2002). "Legal Services Corp. v. Velazquez: Tightening the Noose on Patients' Rights". North Carolina Law Review. 81 (1): 1312–1332.
- Volokh, Eugene (2008). First Amendment and Related Statutes: Problems, Cases and Policy Arguments (3rd ed.). Foundation Press (published May 12, 2008). ISBN 978-1-59941-338-9.
External links
- Text of Legal Services Corporation v. Velazquez, 531 U.S. 533 (2001) is available from: Google Scholar Justia Library of Congress Oyez (oral argument audio)