Unemployed Workers Union v. Hackett

• Decision Date: 20 October 1971
• Docket Number: Civ. A. No. 4713.
• Citation: 332 F. Supp. 1372
• Parties: UNEMPLOYED WORKERS UNION et al. v. Mary C. HACKETT, Individually and as Director of the Rhode Island Department of Employment Security.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Rhode Island

332 F. Supp. 1372

UNEMPLOYED WORKERS UNION et al. v. Mary C. HACKETT, Individually and as Director of the Rhode Island Department of Employment Security.

Civ. A. No. 4713.

United States District Court, D. Rhode Island.

October 20, 1971.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Cary J. Coen, and John M. Roney, of R. I. Legal Services, Inc., Providence, R. I., for plaintiffs.

Charles H. McLaughlin, Providence, R. I., for defendant.

OPINION

PETTINE, Chief Judge.

Plaintiffs, members of the Unemployed Workers Union (hereinafter sometimes referred to as U.W.U.), quietly and individually approached persons waiting either in line or seated in a Rhode Island Department of Employment Security (hereinafter sometimes referred to as D.E.S.) office with conversation and fliers about the purpose of their organization and its next meeting date. They did not obstruct traffic or interfere with the conduct of the Department's business. Within three minutes of their entry into the building, the local manager of the D.E.S. office, accompanied by a policeman, told plaintiffs that fliers were not permitted to be distributed in the building and asked them to leave. Plaintiffs left the building and have now come to this Court for assistance in enforcement of their First Amendment rights.

The Unemployed Workers Union, an unincorporated association, and certain named plaintiffs, on behalf of themselves and as representatives of the class of members of the U.W.U. seek injunctive and declaratory relief as authorized by 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and 28 U.S.C. §§ 2201, 2202. Jurisdiction of this Court is based on 28 U.S.C. §§ 1343(3) and 1343(4).

The plaintiffs attack the policy of the named defendant, individually and as Director of the Rhode Island Department of Employment Security, of prohibiting them from speaking with and distributing literature or printed material to unemployed workers in the Rhode Island Department of Employment Security Office at Mason and West Exchange Streets, Providence.

The Unemployed Workers Union is an association of approximately 100 members that was organized on August 30, 1971. Among its goals is making the public and unemployed workers aware of rights and benefits under Rhode Island General Laws § 28-42-2 et seq. Information is given about food stamp and welfare benefits as well as about unemployment compensation. The organization seeks to secure "more adequate benefits." By this the Union means a campaign to have the unemployment benefit period in this State extended from 39 to 52 weeks and to have Rhode Island provide benefits for up to eight dependents rather than the current maximum of four dependents. Massachusetts and Connecticut, plaintiffs contend, provide both the 52-week period and an eight dependent maximum. The Union also states as its goal making the administration of Department of Employment Security programs more equitable. The Union attempts to program weekly meetings to inform people of their rights and has prepared pamphlets and an unemployed worker's handbook. They have also scheduled a conference for late October.

On September 2, 1971, plaintiffs met with defendant to discuss an unemployed workers "Bill of Rights." Point 5 of the "Bill of Rights" was the only point on which there was disagreement and involved the right of Union members to enter the building and engage in consensual conversation with and hand leaflets to those applicants or recipients not being attended to by a clerk. They explained that they would wear U.W.U. buttons so as not to be identified as D.E.S. employees and that they would clean up any dropped leaflets. On September 7, 1971 the Union received a letter from Miss Hackett, denying their Point 5 on the ground that it would interfere with the D.E.S. carrying out its mandate of providing services to unemployed workers.

The D.E.S. office has three entrances, two from Mason Street and one on West Exchange Street, and is basically a very large long room, of 20,000 square feet that is separated by a middle counter. The Mason Street side of the building is where application for benefits is made and the West Exchange Street side is where recipients pick up their compensation. Witness Hazard, who had been to the office to receive benefits twenty-four times in the past, testified that there were usually several lines to the counters with five-fifteen people per line. On an average Wednesday afternoon, he testified, he would find forty to fifty people waiting in lines. The average wait in line was fifteen minutes and people talked, or read, or just stood and waited during that time.

On September 8, 1971, eight or nine members of the Union entered the D.E.S. office. They were in two groups of approximately four each and entered from two different doors, one group staying on the applicants' side of the building and one on the recipients' side. Plaintiff Levesque testified that he entered the West Exchange Street door and went to the last line, to the last person in line. As he conversed with the man who was last in line and asked him if he would like a flier, the man in front in line turned around and asked for a flier. The talking was in conversational tones. At that point two officers approached plaintiff and told him that he would have to leave, that leafleting in the building was not allowed. Plaintiff left the building immediately.

Plaintiff Arcuri testified that on that day he entered the office with the group and went directly to the chairs in the rear of the room. He introduced himself to a seated man and handed him a flier. As the man read the flier and before Arcuri received a reply to it, a policeman came and, according to Arcuri's testimony, in a loud voice told Arcuri he would have to leave. Arcuri testified there had been no obstruction of passage and no blockage of doors. He left immediately.

The fliers being handed out by plaintiffs identified the Unemployed Workers Union and gave its next meeting date.

Defendant Hackett testified that there is an official administrative policy against distribution of printed materials and solicitation of any kind in D.E.S. offices that is embodied in a D.E.S. policy manual. She stated that she forbade distribution of leaflets because it would hinder her in the efficient and proper administration of her duty. Her decision not to allow plaintiffs to enter the building to leaflet was based on both the policy and her own approval of the policy.

The manager of the D.E.S. office, who had asked plaintiffs to leave the building, testified that there was no loud or boisterous talking by plaintiffs. He testified that there was some commotion when he asked plaintiffs to leave in that people got out of line, interested in seeing what was happening.

First Amendment Rights Generally

Defendant has attempted to prohibit plaintiffs from both peacefully speaking with and distributing printed material to waiting persons in the Employment Security Office. The First and Fourteenth Amendments protect both these forms of communication from suppression by officials who would, in the absence of a compelling State interest, sacrifice on the altar of bureaucratic efficiency the rights of the citizenry to speak, associate and petition their government for redress of grievances. It would be to sabotage the very purpose of the First Amendment to allow those in government to suppress peaceful speech that is intended to organize citizens who seek peaceful growth and change in governmental policies.

First, it is indisputable that the forms of communication employed here are within the ambit of First Amendment protection. In Organization for a Better Austin v. Keefe, 402 U.S. 415, 419, 91 S.Ct. 1575, 1577, 29 L.Ed.2d 1 (1971), it was reaffirmed that

"the activity of peaceful pamphleteering is a form of communication protected by the First Amendment. E. g. Martin v. City of Struthers, 319 U.S. 141 63 S.Ct. 862, 87 L.Ed. 1313 (1943); Schneider v. State, 308 U.S. 147 60 S.Ct. 146, 84 L.Ed. 155 (1939); Lovell v. City of Griffin, 303 U.S. 444 58 S.Ct. 666, 82 L.Ed. 949 (1938)."

Nor need this communication meet standards of acceptability in order to merit protection. The truth or validity of the publication, the intent of plaintiffs to influence respondent into action, the fact that plaintiffs' views may be offensive to some do not operate to deprive this communication of its constitutional protection. Organization for a Better Austin, supra, 402 U.S. at 415, 91 S.Ct. 1575, 29 L.Ed.2d 1. While it is true that this speech is designed to assist plaintiffs in organizing others to their cause, it is a thoughtless perversion to suggest that it therefore is "commercial speech" and under the doctrine of Valentine v. Chrestensen, 316 U.S. 52, 62 S.Ct. 920, 86 L.Ed. 1262 (1942) unprotected. See Hague v. Committee for Industrial Organization, 307 U.S. 496, 59 S.Ct. 954, 83 L.Ed. 1423 (1939).

Through the union of unemployed workers into an organizational structure, plaintiffs testified that they hope to make improvements in the unemployment compensation system by extending the term of benefits and increasing the limit on the number of dependents used to compute the amount of the benefits. Further, they hope to assist other recipients in understanding the system and assist applicants and recipients in obtaining benefits to which they are entitled. In order to achieve any of these goals, it is necessary for them to reach a wide audience of the unemployed.

The right of workers with common interests to associate to further those interests was affirmed in Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen v. Virginia ex rel. Virginia State Bar, 377 U.S. 1, 84 S.Ct. 1113, 12 L.Ed.2d 89 (1964):

"It cannot be seriously doubted that the First Amendment's guarantees of free speech, petition and assembly give * * * workers the right to gather together for the lawful purpose of helping and advising one another in asserting the rights Congress gave them * * * statutory rights would be vain and futile

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