(Mis)attribution

Denver University Law Review

Volumn 87, Issue 4, 2010, Pages 833-854

  Greene, Abner S ^b   Manning, Leonard F ^a  

^a FORDHAM LAW SCHOOL   (United States)

^b NONE

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EID: 79951873669     PISSN: 08839409     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Article

References (205)

1. Misattribution issues arise in various legal settings, including libel, plagiarism, right of publicity, and trademark. For a helpful discussion of the latter, see generally Helen Norton, The Measure of Government Speech: Identifying Expression's Source, 88 B. U. L. REV. 587, 611-14 (2008).
2. See also Visual Artists Rights Act, 17 U. S. C. § 106A (2006)
3. construed in Mass. Museum of Contemporary Art Found., Inc. v. Büchel, 593 F.3d 38, 47-48 (1st Cir. 2010) (noting that the Act includes a right of attribution "protects the author's right to be identified as the author of his work and also protects against the use of his name in connection with works created by others").
4. 424 U. S. 693 (1976).
5. Id. at 711-12.
6. See id. at 696.
7. 400 U. S. 433 (1971).
8. Davis, 424 U. S. at 707-09.
9. 544 U. S. 550 (2005).
10. See id. at 561 n. 5.
11. Id. at 555.
12. For the factual and legal background, see id. at 553-55.
13. See, e.g., United States v. United Foods, Inc., 533 U. S. 405, 416-17 (2001) (not addressing the government speech issue) ;
14. Glickman v. Wileman Bros. & Elliott, Inc., 521 U. S. 457, 483 n. 2 (1997) (Souter, J., dissenting) ("The Secretary of Agriculture does not argue that the advertisements at issue represent so-called 'government speech,' with respect to which the Government may have greater latitude in selecting content than otherwise permissible under the First Amendment.").
15. See Johanns, 544 U. S. at 560-64.
16. Id. at 559;
17. see also id. at 564 n. 7.
18. Id. at 564-65, 565 n. 8.
19. Wooley v. Maynard, 430 U. S. 705 (1977) ;
20. W. Va. State Bd. of Educ. v. Barnette, 319 U. S. 624 (1943) ;
21. see also infra notes 52-83 and accompanying text.
22. Keller v. State Bar of Cal., 496 U. S. 1 (1990) ;
23. Abood v. Detroit Bd. of Educ., 431 U. S. 209 (1977) ;
24. see also Johanns, 544 U. S. at 557-59;
25. infra notes 46-51 and accompanying text.
26. Johanns, 544 U. S. at 571-72, 577-79 (Souter, J., dissenting).
27. Id. at 572, 577-80.
28. Whether the average/reasonable viewer would attribute the ads to any specific beef producer or producers was a tricky question.
29. See infra notes 44-45 and accompanying text.
30. See Johanns, 544 U. S. at 564 n. 7 ("[Plaintiffs] enjoy no right not to fund government speech-whether by broad-based taxes or targeted assessments, and whether or not the reasonable viewer would identify the speech as the government's.").
31. See id. at 564 n. 7, 564-65. Souter responded, "But the challenge here is to the application of the statute through actual, misleading ads, as shown by a record replete with examples."
32. Id. at 577 n. 5 (Souter, J., dissenting).
33. Id. at 565 (majority opinion).
34. Id. (emphasis added).
35. Id. at 564-65.
36. See id. at 571-72 (Souter, J., dissenting).
37. Id. at 568 (Thomas, J., concurring).
38. Cf. Robert Post, Compelled Subsidization of Speech: Johanns v Livestock Marketing Association, 2005 SUP. CT. REV. 195, 207 n. 64 ("[C]onstitutional issues raised by government stealth do not depend upon whether government speech is funded by a general tax or by targeted assessments.").
39. See Johanns, 544 U. S. at 570-71 (Souter, J., dissenting) (discussing how plaintiffs advanced just such a concern).
40. 552 U. S. 442 (2008).
41. Id. at 444.
42. Id. at 444, 453.
43. See id. at 454.
44. See id. at 454-58;
45. see also id. at 457 n. 9 ("We are aware of no case in which the mere impression of association was held to place a severe burden on a group's First Amendment rights, but we need not decide that question here.").
46. See id. at 459-60 (Roberts, C. J., concurring).
47. See id.
48. (referring to Boy Scouts v. Dale, 530 U. S. 640 (2000)
49. Hurley v. Irish-American Gay, Lesbian and Bi-Sexual Group, 515 U. S. 557 (1995)
50. and Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights, Inc., 547 U. S. 47 (2006), all discussed at infra notes 70-82 and accompanying text).
51. See Grange, 552 U. S. at 460-62 (Roberts, C. J., concurring).
52. See id. at 462 (Scalia, J., dissenting).
53. See id. at 462-64.
54. See id. at 467-68.
55. Cf. Randall P. Bezanson & William G. Buss, The Many Faces of Government Speech, 86 IOWA L. REV. 1377, 1433 (2001) (anticipating this development).
56. 515 U. S. 753 (1995).
57. See id. at 772-783 (1995) (O'Connor, J., concurring in part and in the judgment, joined by Souter and Breyer, JJ.) ;
58. id. at 797-816 (Stevens, J., dissenting) ;
59. id. at 817-18 (Ginsburg, J., dissenting).
60. See id. at 766 (plurality opinion).
61. See id. at 778-82 (O'Connor, J., concurring in part and in the judgment) ;
62. id. at 800 n. 5 (Stevens, J., dissenting).
63. See Johanns v. Livestock Marketing Ass'n, 544 U. S. 550, 566 (2005) ;
64. see also Glickman v. Wileman Bros. & Elliott, Inc., 521 U. S. 457, 471 (1997).
65. See Johanns, 544 U. S. at 565-66.
66. See id. at 557-58.
67. See Norman L. Cantor, Forced Payments to Service Institutions and Constitutional Interests in Ideological Non-Association, 36 RUTGERS L. REV. 3, 15, 19, 28 (1983).
68. See id. at 21-22.
69. See Keller v. State Bar of Cal., 496 U. S. 1, 13-14, 17 (1990) (discussing the concern with compelled association) ;
70. Abood v. Detroit Bd. of Educ., 431 U. S. 209, 232-37 (1977) (discussing freedom of speech and freedom of association) ;
71. see also Johanns, 544 U. S. at 557-58 (explaining Abood and Keller without analysis) ;
72. id. at 565 n. 8 ("being forced to fund someone else's private speech unconnected to any legitimate government purpose violates personal autonomy") ;
73. Howard M. Wasserman, Compelled Expression and the Public Forum Doctrine, 77 TUL. L. REV. 163, 167, 207 (2002).
74. See generally Post, supra note 26.
75. For a critique, see Abner S. Greene, Government of the Good, 53 VAND. L. REV. 1, 12-18 (2000).
76. See Johanns, 544 U. S. at 579 n. 9 (Souter, J., dissenting) (noting there is still harm in the Barnette/Wooley line even if proper disclosure cured any misattributional harm).
77. But cf. Bezanson & Buss, supra note 39, at 1433 (suggesting that in Barnette and Wooley "a reasonable observer will see the ideas as that person's own") (emphasis added). For a discussion of "unwanted association" in the compelled speech cases
78. see Leslie Gielow Jacobs, Pledges, Parades, and Mandatory Payments, 52 RUTGERS L. REV. 123, 158-62 (1999).
79. For more general skepticism about the harm from compelled speech, see Larry Alexander, Compelled Speech, 23 CONST. COMMENT. 147 (2006) ;
80. Abner S. Greene, The Pledge of Allegiance Problem, 64 FORDHAM L. REV. 451, 473-89 (1995).
81. But see Seana Valentine Shiffrin, What is Really Wrong with Compelled Association?, 99 NW. U. L. REV. 839, 852-64 (2005) (discussing harms from compelled speech and association, specifically (1) concern regarding the distortion of one's thinking process (cognitive dissonance), and (2) the effects from lack of sincerity).
82. Pacific Gas & Electric Co. v. Pub. Utilities Comm'n of Cal., 475 U. S. 1 (1986).
83. Red Lion Broad. Co. v. FCC, 395 U. S. 367 (1969).
84. Miami Herald Publ'g Co. v. Tornillo, 418 U. S. 241 (1974).
85. See Wooley v. Maynard, 430 U. S. 705, 720-21 (1977) (Rehnquist, J., dissenting).
86. Id. at 715 (majority opinion).
87. Id. at 717 n. 15.
88. PruneYard Shopping Ctr. v. Robins, 447 U. S. 74 (1980).
89. Id. at 87.
90. Id.
91. Id. at 99 (Powell, J., concurring).
92. See Pacific Gas & Elec. Co. v. Pub. Utilities Comm'n of Cal., 475 U. S. 1, 5, 7 (1986).
93. See id. at 15-16, 16 n. 11.
94. Id. at 15.
95. Id.
96. see also id. at 15 n. 11, 16.
97. Turner Broad. Sys., Inc. v. FCC, 512 U. S. 622 (1994).
98. Id. at 655.
99. See Greene, supra note 51, at 14.
100. For discussion of some of the complexities of a misattribution analysis here, see Randall P. Bezanson, Speaking Through Others' Voices: Authorship, Originality, and Free Speech, 38 WAKE FOREST L. REV. 983, 1013-14 (2003).
101. Hurley v. Irish-Am. Gay, Lesbian & Bisexual Group, 515 U. S. 557, 559, 581 (1995).
102. Id. at 575.
103. Id. at 576-77 (citation omitted).
104. Id. at 577.
105. Bd. of Regents of the Univ. of Wis. Sys. v. Southworth, 529 U. S. 217 (2000).
106. See generally Laura A. Rosenbury, Between Home and School, 155 U. PA. L. REV. 833 (2007) ;
107. Shiffrin, supra note 52.
108. Boy Scouts of Am. v. Dale, 530 U. S. 640, 653 (2000).
109. Id.
110. See id. at 694, 697-98 (Stevens, J., dissenting).
111. Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic & Institutional Rights, Inc. (FAIR), 547 U. S. 47, 65 (2006).
112. Id. (citations omitted).
113. Id.
114. See Greene, supra note 52, at 480-82, 483-84, 486-87 (critiquing Wooley and PG&E in part because of the absence of misattribution and the possibility of simultaneous dissent/disavowal, while supporting Barnette because of the autonomy interest in not using one's body to communicate another's message).
115. See Greene, supra note 51, at 49-52.
116. Many scholars have stressed this in writing about government speech.
117. See Bezanson & Buss, supra note 39, at 1384, 1431-32, 1436, 1484-85, 1510;
118. Caroline Mala Corbin, Mixed Speech: When Speech is Both Private and Governmental, 83 N. Y. U. L. REV. 605, 666-67 (2008) ;
119. Leslie Gielow Jacobs, Who's Talking? Disentangling Government and Private Speech, 36 U. MICH. J. L. REFORM 35, 57, 61, 63, 66 (2002) [hereinafter Jacobs, Who's Talking?];
120. Leslie Gielow Jacobs, Free Speech and the Limits of Legislative Discretion: The Example of Specialty License Plates, 53 FLA. L. REV. 419, 452, 458 (2001) ;
121. Leslie Gielow Jacobs, The Public Sensibilities Forum, 95 NW. U. L. REV. 1357, 1391 (2001) [hereinafter, Jacobs, Public Sensibilities];
122. Gia B. Lee, Persuasion, Transparency, and Government Speech, 56 HASTINGS L. J. 983 (2005) ;
123. Norton, supra note 1, at 591-92, 599-600;
124. Helen Norton, Not for Attribution: Government's Interest in Protecting the Integrity of Its Own Expression, 37 U. C. DAVIS L. REV. 1317, 1333 (2004) ;
125. Leslie Gielow Jacobs, Who's Talking? Disentangling Government and Private Speech, 36 U. MICH. J. L. REFORM 35, 57, 61, 63, 66 (2002) [hereinafter Jacobs, Who's (Pubitemid 126406390)
126. see Mark Fenster, The Opacity of Transparency, 91 IOWA L. REV. 885 (2006).
127. See Abner S. Greene, Discounting Accountability, 65 FORDHAM L. REV. 1489, 1504-05 (1997) ;
128. Abner S. Greene, Checks and Balances in an Era of Presidential Lawmaking, 61 U. CHI. L. REV. 123, 177-79 (1994).
129. Cf. Lee, supra note 85, at 1040 (arguing transparency in government communications is generally a constitutional ideal rather than an enforceable right).
130. On the under-enforced Constitution, see LAWRENCE G. SAGER, JUSTICE IN PLAINCLOTHES: A THEORY OF AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONAL PRACTICE 84-128 (2004) ;
131. Lawrence Gene Sager, Fair Measure: The Legal Status of Underenforced Constitutional Norms, 91 HARV. L. REV. 1212 (1978). Here I do not parse the difference between government transparency as a norm of political theory or as part of our under-enforced Constitution. For my argument suggesting we have an aspirational Constitution and should not be drawing lines between ideal political theory and the Constitution
132. see Abner S. Greene, Can We Be Legal Positivists Without Being Constitutional Positivists?, 73 FORDHAM L. REV. 1401 (2005).
133. See Schlesinger v. Reservists Comm. to Stop the War, 418 U. S. 208, 215-16 (1974) ;
134. United States v. Richardson, 418 U. S. 166, 171 (1974).
135. Luther v. Borden, 48 U. S. 1 (1849), is sometimes cited for the proposition that Guarantee Clause questions-pertaining to Article IV, Section 4, "[T]he United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a republican form of government"-are nonjusticiable. Luther dealt with an unusual and narrow set of facts, though, and can't by itself be understood as precluding all judicial recourse under the Guarantee Clause.
136. See Baker v. Carr, 369 U. S. 186, 218-26 (1962).
137. See United States v. Carolene Products Co., 6304 U. S. 144, 152 n. 4 (1938). Arguably, though, lack of government transparency blocks the channels of political change and thus should not be cordoned off as a political question.
138. 500 U. S. 173 (1991) ;
139. see also, e.g., Lee, supra note 85, at 1042-52;
140. Norton, supra note 1, at 628-31.
141. Rust, 500 U. S. at 178-81.
142. Id. at 193.
143. See id. at 199-200.
144. Id. at 200.
145. Id.
146. see, e.g., Lawrence Lessig, The Regulation of Social Meaning, 62 U. CHI. L. REV. 943, 1017 (1995).
147. Rust, 500 U. S. at 180.
148. For discussions of this difficult question, see Bezanson & Buss, supra note 39, at 1396-1401;
149. Greene, supra note 51, at 28-29;
150. Robert C. Post, Subsidized Speech, 106 YALE L. J. 151, 168-76. (1996).
151. Greene, supra note 51, at 50;
152. see also Carole I. Chervin, The Title X Family Planning Gag Rule: Can the Government Buy Up Constitutional Rights?, 41 STAN. L. REV. 401, 428 (1989).
153. See Greene, supra note 52, at 473-75.
154. See Texas v. Johnson, 491 U. S. 397, 399 (1989).
155. I put aside the complex question of a governmental entity that closes all of its public parks and turns all of its public thoroughfares over to private control.
156. Cf. Griffin v. County Sch. Bd., 377 U. S. 218 (1964) ;
157. Marsh v. Alabama, 326 U. S. 501 (1946).
158. But cf. Palmer v. Thompson, 403 U. S. 217 (1971). For recent discussion of some problems arising on this public-private margin
159. see Nelson Tebbe, Privatizing and Publicizing Speech, 104 NW. U. L. REV. COLLOQUY 70 (2009), http://www.law.northwestern.edu/lawreview/colloquy/2009/30/ LRColl2009n30Tebbe.pdf.
160. 84 U. S. 260 (1988) (deferring to school principal's content-based editorial decisions for the school newspaper, produced through the journalism class).
161. In addition to commemorative stamps, the U. S. Postal Service allows privately produced and printed stamps for regular mail, subject to the following: The material must be consistent with the Postal Service's intent to maintain neutrality on religious, social, political, legal, moral, or other public issues.... The material must not harm the public image, reputation, or goodwill of the Postal Service and must not be otherwise derogatory or detrimental to the Postal Service's interest.
162. USPS DOMESTIC MAIL MANUAL § 604. 4.3.3 (d) (1), (4) (Feb. 1, 2010). This is an example of the kind of opening of a platform for private speech subject to significant content-based restrictions that I discuss below.
163. Many scholars point to the state's concern in these cases with attribution, association, endorsement, imprimatur, and legitimation.
164. See Bezanson & Buss, supra note 39, at 1477 (discussing adopt-a-highway signs; agreeing the KKK's message wouldn't be attributed to the state, but still saying "the State could be understood to legitimate the Klan through its endorsement, not necessarily sharing the Klan's policies or prior history but attesting to its rehabilitation in a new form") ;
165. Corbin, supra note 85, at 647-62 (arguing one problem with viewing these hard cases as private speech is the government may still be seen as approving/endorsing/tolerating that speech and is therefore concerned with the resulting association/attribution/imprimatur) ;
166. Id. at 686-87 (arguing even if we view these hard cases as mixed public/private speech, the state might still be concerned with endorsement and association) ;
167. Norton, supra note 1, at 597, 614 (providing examples of private parties seeking government imprimatur in several of the settings discussed here) ;
168. Norton, supra note 85, at 1320, 1341-48 (defending government's concern with misattribution, endorsement, imprimatur, and the like in several of the settings discussed here).
169. I don't want to get caught up in semantics here. I am using "limited public forum" to mean new speech opportunities the government opens up, limited either affirmatively (e.g., "we're funding dog paintings only" or "this is a theater for musicals only") or negatively, such as the concerns I discuss in the text.
170. See ROBERT C. POST, CONSTITUTIONAL DOMAINS: DEMOCRACY, COMMUNITY, MANAGEMENT 199-267 (1995) ;
171. Post, supra note 98, at 164-76.
172. See, e.g., David Cole, Beyond Unconstitutional Conditions: Charting Spheres of Neutrality in Government-Funded Speech, 67 N. Y. U. L. REV. 675, 718 (1992). For helpful discussion of the relationship between public forum doctrine and government speech
173. see Steven Shiffrin, Government Speech, 27 UCLA L. REV. 565, 572-88 (1980).
174. 129 S. Ct. 1125 (2009). For insightful commentary on free speech issues raised by Summum
175. see Joseph Blocher, Property and Speech in Summum, 104 NW. U. L. REV. COLLOQUY 83 passim (2009), http://www.law.northwestern.edu/lawreview/colloquy/ 2009/31/LRColl2009n31Blocher.pdf;
176. Tebbe, supra note 102, at 70-74.
177. Summum, 129 S. Ct. at 1129, 1138.
178. These concerns with specific types of content-based harm might not have sufficed to uphold Pleasant Grove's decision to reject Summum's monument, and thus only by deeming the decision government speech could we approve of the Court's holding. For a discussion of the malleability of public forum doctrine
179. see Greene, supra note 51, at 61-67.
180. The discussion that follows shares a great deal of common ground with Corbin, supra note 85
181. and Jacobs, Public Sensibilities, supra note 85.
182. For arguments that would seemingly reject the discussion that follows, see Jacobs, Who's Talking?, supra note 85, at 88-105
183. (setting up an either/or world: either speech is the government's in one way or another and therefore it is okay to make viewpoint distinctions, or it is private speech and subject to standard public forum rules) ;
184. Norton, supra note 1, at 602-03 (traditional free speech analysis applies when government declines to claim speech as its own as a formal matter, even in these hard case settings) ;
185. id. at 622-24 (specific adopt-a-highway program doesn't satisfy functional government speech test; thus, apparently relegated to private speech status and traditional free speech principles) ;
186. id. at 627-28 (stating that selling commemorative bricks to be fixed at public school is not government speech and thus is subject to traditional public forum analysis; while I agree the per se exclusion of religious references was probably invalid, the school should have the kind of content-based flexibility I discuss in the text) ;
187. Norton, supra note 85, at 1333, 1341, 1349-50 (arguing government may defend some of these hard cases by adopting the speech as its own, but if government is not speaking then traditional free speech principles including public forum principles apply) ;
188. Redish & Kessler, supra note 85, at 546-47 (would disapprove my position here, deeming it a viewpoint-based subsidy and not a matter of judgmental necessity).
189. See also Randall P. Bezanson, The Government Speech Forum: Forbes and Finley and Government Speech Selection Judgments, 83 IOWA L. REV. 953, 992-94 (1998) (permitting leeway when government itself is speaking, but applying standard free speech rules otherwise; it is not clear how the argument would apply to cases such as vanity plates, adopt-a-highway signs, and transit ads, if we agree with my proposition that the government isn't advancing its own message in these settings).
190. See FREDERICK SCHAUER, FREE SPEECH: A PHILOSOPHICAL ENQUIRY 80-85 (1982).
191. See Greene, supra note 51, 2-6.
192. See Good News Club v. Milford Cent. Sch., 533 U. S. 98 (2001) ;
193. Rosenberger v. Rector & Visitors of the Univ. of Va., 515 U. S. 819 (1995) ;
194. Lamb's Chapel v. Ctr. Moriches Union Free Sch. Dist., 508 U. S. 384 (1993) ;
195. Bd. of Educ. v. Mergens, 496 U. S. 226 (1990) (the one case in which the predicate wasn't a free speech holding but rather a federal access statute) ;
196. Widmar v. Vincent, 454 U. S. 263 (1981).
197. Good News Club, 533 U. S. at 102;
198. Rosenberger, 515 U. S. at 845-46;
199. Lamb's Chapel, 508 U. S. at 393, 395;
200. Mergens, 496 U. S. at 253;
201. Widmar, 454 U. S. at 277.
202. See Greene, supra note 51, at 31-40, for my related discussion of viewpoint discrimination in government speech.
203. See Abner S. Greene, Government Speech on Unsettled Issues, 69 FORDHAM L. REV. 1667, 1669-70 (2001) ;
204. Greene, supra note 51, at 2-6.
205. Lehman v. City of Shaker Heights, 418 U. S. 298, 304 (1974).