Driving Political Opinion

Does the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights protect your freedom to put anything you want on a bumper sticker and slap it on your car? For the most part yes, it does, and there are plenty of negative, cruel and hateful bumper stickers of all kinds out there enjoying full freedom of speech protection, including many campaign bumper stickers.

In a flag burning case, United States v. Eichman , 496 U.S. 310 (1990) , the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that “the government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable and the fact that protected speech may be offensive to some does not justify its suppression.” That same protection of speech is extended to expressing one’s self on a lowly bumper sticker as well as the “speech” of symbolic gestures, such as burning the American flag.

In Baker v. Glover , 776 F.Supp. 1511, 19 Media L. Rep. 1984 (M.D. Ala. 1991), a successful challenge under First Amendment to Alabama’s “dirty words” bumper sticker law, Judge Myron H. Thompson ruled, “For those citizens without wealth or power, a bumper sticker may be one of the few means available to convey a message to a public audience.”

In Cunningham v. State, 260 Ga. 827 (1991), the Georgia Supreme Court ruled that a statute banning lewd bumper stickers unconstitutionally restricted a motorist's right to self-expression: “The peace of society is not endangered by the profane or lewd word which is not directed at a particular audience.” The court concluded its ruling by quoting Ben Franklin: “Everything one has a right to do is not best to be done.” Siding with Cunningham, the court relied on Cohen v. California, 403 U.S. 15 (1971), which upheld Cohen's right to wear a jacket that contained obscene words.

Despite these court rulings there are still a few states that have statutes which prohibit lewd, obscene and offensive bumper stickers. For example, Tennessee Code Annotated, § 55-8-187 reads: “To avoid distracting other drivers and thereby reduce the likelihood of accidents arising from lack of attention or concentration, the display of obscene or patently offensive bumper stickers, window signs, or other markings on a motor vehicle which are visible to other drivers is prohibited and display of such materials shall subject the owner of the vehicle on which they are displayed, upon conviction, to a fine of not less than two dollars ($2.00) nor more than fifty dollars ($50.00).” 

To some people, a bumper sticker for the “other” candidate might be considered offensive.

What about your employer restricting what is on your bumper? If your employer is the government, you may not have as much protection to express yourself as someone who works in the private sector. The courts have given the government a wide berth to maintain a work environment free of disruptions, which means the government can restrict employees’ freedom of speech on the job to some degree in the interest of efficiency.

In Fire Fighters Association v. Barr, 742 F.Supp. 1182 (DDC 1990), a federal district court in Washington, D.C. ruled in favor of a group of firefighters who had been disciplined for distributing bumper stickers that were derogatory to the fire department. The court found that the fire department’s bumper-sticker policy was unconstitutional. Similarly, a federal district court in Missouri ruled in Goodman v. City of Kansas City, 906 F.Supp. 537 (W.D. Mo. 1995), that a regulation prohibiting employees with cars displaying campaign bumper stickers from parking in lots controlled by the city was unconstitutional, writing, “The right to express oneself about issues and candidates at election time is an essential part of our constitutional democracy.”

Not all government employees have fought city hall and won when disciplined for displaying bumper stickers.

In Connealy v. Walsh, 412 F. Supp. 146 (W.D. Mo. 1976), a federal district court in Missouri denied the First Amendment claim of a social worker disciplined after she refused to remove a George McGovern bumper sticker from her car, writing that “the Juvenile Court could reasonably conclude that any partisan bumper sticker could result in a material and substantial interference with plaintiff’s duties and that a compelling state interest in promoting the effectiveness of Juvenile Service employees and of the Circuit Court justified the prohibition of all partisan political bumper stickers.”

In Ethredge v . Hail , 996 F.2d 1173, 1175 (11th Cir.1993), the federal appeals court affirmed a lower court’s “ruling that an administrative order that bars from Robins Air Force Base ‘bumper stickers or other similar paraphernalia’ that ‘embarrass or disparage’ the President of the United States does not violate the First Amendment.” The court’s ruling took into account that a bumper sticker did not have to be critical of the President to be embarrassing, “Indeed, we can well imagine signs or messages that, although intended to be supportive of the President, may (due to a profane nature, for example) embarrass or disparage the President.” For the very same reasons, bumper stickers displaying the image of the Confederate flag have also been prohibited by military officials.