Hill v. Colorado, 530 U.S. 703, 28 (2000)

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730

HILL v. COLORADO

Opinion of the Court

might easily stand on the sidewalk at entrances (without blocking the entrance) and, without physically approaching those who are entering the clinic, peacefully hand them leaflets as they pass by.

Finally, the 8-foot restriction occurs only within 100 feet of a health care facility—the place where the restriction is most needed. The restriction interferes far less with a speaker's ability to communicate than did the total ban on picketing on the sidewalk outside a residence (upheld in Frisby v. Schultz, 487 U. S. 474 (1988)), the restriction of leafletting at a fairground to a booth (upheld in Heffron v. International Soc. for Krishna Consciousness, Inc., 452 U. S. 640 (1981)), or the "silence" often required outside a hospital. Special problems that may arise where clinics have particularly wide entrances or are situated within multipurpose office buildings may be worked out as the statute is applied.

This restriction is thus reasonable and narrowly tailored.

V

Petitioners argue that § 18-9-122(3) is invalid because it is "overbroad." There are two parts to petitioners' "over-breadth" argument. On the one hand, they argue that the statute is too broad because it protects too many people in too many places, rather than just the patients at the facilities where confrontational speech had occurred. Similarly, it burdens all speakers, rather than just persons with a history of bad conduct.38 On the other hand, petitioners also contend that the statute is overbroad because it "bans virtually the universe of protected expression, including displays of signs, distribution of literature, and mere verbal statements." 39

The first part of the argument does not identify a constitutional defect. The fact that the coverage of a statute is

38 Brief for Petitioners 22-23.

39 Id., at 25.

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