174
Syllabus
In addition, the interests asserted by the Government are "substantial": (1) reducing the social costs associated with casino and other forms of gambling and (2) assisting States that restrict or prohibit casino and other forms of gambling. However, that conclusion is by no means self-evident, since, in the judgment of both Congress and many state legislatures, the social costs that support the suppression of gambling are offset, and sometimes outweighed, by countervailing policy considerations. The Court cannot ignore Congress' unwillingness to adopt a single national policy that consistently endorses either interest asserted by the Government. See, e. g., Edenfield v. Fane, 507 U. S. 761, 768. Considering both the quality of the asserted interests and the information sought to be suppressed, the crosscurrents in the scope and application of § 1304 become more difficult to defend. Pp. 184-187.
(c) As applied to petitioners' case, § 1304 cannot satisfy the third and fourth parts of the Central Hudson test. With regard to the Govern-ment's first asserted interest—alleviating casino gambling's social costs by limiting demand—the operation of § 1304 and its regulatory regime is so pierced by exemptions and inconsistencies that the Government cannot hope to exonerate it. See Rubin v. Coors Brewing Co., 514 U. S. 476, 488. For example, federal law prohibits a broadcaster from carrying advertising about privately operated commercial casino gambling regardless of the station's or casino's location, but exempts advertising about state-run casinos, certain occasional commercial casino gambling, and tribal casino gambling even if the broadcaster is located in, or broadcasts to, a jurisdiction with the strictest of antigambling policies. Coupled with the FCC's interpretation and enforcement of the statute, it appears that the Government is committed to prohibiting certain accurate product information, not commercial enticements of all kinds, and then only for certain brands of casino gambling. The most significant difference identified by the Government between tribal and other classes of casino gambling is that the former are heavily regulated; but Congress' failure to institute such direct regulation of private casino gambling undermines the asserted justifications for the speech restriction before the Court. There may be valid reasons for imposing commercial regulations on non-Indian businesses that differ from those imposed on tribal enterprises, but it does not follow that those differences justify abridging non-Indians' freedom of speech more severely than the freedom of their tribal competitors. For the power to prohibit or to regulate particular conduct does not necessarily include the power to prohibit or regulate speech about that conduct. To the extent that federal law distinguishes among information about tribal, governmental, and private casinos based on the identity of their owners or operators, the Government presents no sound reason why such
Page: Index Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 NextLast modified: October 4, 2007