494
Stevens, J., concurring in judgment
The case before us aptly demonstrates the artificiality of a rigid commercial/noncommercial distinction. The speech at issue here is an unadorned, accurate statement, on the label of a bottle of beer, of the alcohol content of the beverage contained therein. This, the majority finds, ante, at 481- 482, is "commercial speech." The majority does not explain why the words "4.73% alcohol by volume" 2 are commercial. Presumably, if a nonprofit consumer protection group were to publish the identical statement, "Coors beer has 4.73% alcohol by volume," on the cover of a magazine, the Court would not label the speech "commercial." It thus appears, from the facts of this case, that whether or not speech is "commercial" has no necessary relationship to its content. If the Coors label is commercial speech, then, I suppose it must be because (as in Central Hudson) the motivation of the speaker is to sell a product, or because the speech tends to induce consumers to buy a product.3 Yet, economic motivation or impact alone cannot make speech less deserving of constitutional protection, or else all authors and artists who sell their works would be correspondingly disadvantaged. Neither can the value of speech be diminished solely because of its placement on the label of a product. Surely a piece of newsworthy information on the cover of a magazine, or a book review on the back of a book's dust jacket, is entitled to full constitutional protection.
As a matter of common sense, any description of commercial speech that is intended to identify the category of speech entitled to less First Amendment protection should relate to the reasons for permitting broader regulation: namely, commercial speech's potential to mislead. See Virginia Bd. of
2 The 4.73 percent figure comes from an "[i]ndependent [l]aboratory [a]nalysis" of Coors beer cited in a Coors advertisement. App. 65.
3 The inducement rationale might also apply to a consumer protection publication, if it is sold on a newsrack, as some consumers will buy the publication because they wish to learn the varying alcohol contents of competing products.
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