Cite as: 533 U. S. 405 (2001)
Opinion of the Court
were bound together in the common venture, the imposition upon their First Amendment rights caused by using compelled contributions for germane advertising was, as in Abood and Keller, in furtherance of an otherwise legitimate program. Though four Justices who join this opinion disagreed, the majority of the Court in Glickman found the compelled contributions were nothing more than additional economic regulation, which did not raise First Amendment concerns. Glickman, 521 U. S., at 474; see id., at 477 (Souter, J., dissenting).
The statutory mechanism as it relates to handlers of mushrooms is concededly different from the scheme in Glickman; here the statute does not require group action, save to generate the very speech to which some handlers object. In contrast to the program upheld in Glickman, where the Government argued the compelled contributions for advertising were "part of a far broader regulatory system that does not principally concern speech," Reply Brief for Petitioner, O. T. 1996, No. 95-1184, p. 4, there is no broader regulatory system in place here. We have not upheld compelled subsidies for speech in the context of a program where the principal object is speech itself. Although greater regulation of the mushroom market might have been implemented under the Agricultural Marketing Agreement Act of 1937, 50 Stat. 246, 7 U. S. C. § 601 et seq., the compelled contributions for advertising are not part of some broader regulatory scheme. The only program the Government contends the compelled contributions serve is the very advertising scheme in question. Were it sufficient to say speech is germane to itself, the limits observed in Abood and Keller would be empty of meaning and significance. The cooperative marketing structure relied upon by a majority of the Court in Glickman to sustain an ancillary assessment finds no corollary here; the expression respondent is required to support is not germane to a purpose related to an association independent from the speech itself; and the rationale of Abood extends to the party
415
Page: Index Previous 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 NextLast modified: October 4, 2007