Lewis v. City of New Orleans

1974-02-20

Headline: Court strikes down New Orleans ordinance banning cursing or reviling police as overbroad, reverses conviction, and limits cities’ ability to criminally punish offensive spoken words directed at officers.

Holding: The Court held that New Orleans Ordinance §49-7, as interpreted by the Louisiana Supreme Court, is facially overbroad under the First and Fourteenth Amendments and therefore invalid, reversing the conviction.

Real World Impact:

Invalidates broadly worded local laws that criminalize insulting or offensive speech toward police.
Reverses the woman’s conviction and prevents enforcement of §49-7 as written.
Requires cities to draft narrow, precise speech laws to avoid First Amendment problems.

Topics: freedom of speech, police insults, local laws on speech, fighting words

Summary

Background

A woman was arrested after an exchange with police while following a patrol car that was taking her son to the station. A New Orleans officer said she shouted profanity at him; she denied using such language. She was convicted under a city ordinance making it unlawful to “wantonly to curse or revile or to use obscene or opprobrious language” toward police. The Louisiana Supreme Court upheld the conviction on remand, construing the ordinance as limited to so-called "fighting words." The United States Supreme Court then reviewed that decision.

Reasoning

The Court asked whether the city law, as the Louisiana court had interpreted it, reached more speech than the narrow category of “fighting words” that may be punished. The majority concluded that terms like “opprobrious” sweep beyond words that by their very utterance inflict injury or incite immediate violence. Because the Louisiana court did not meaningfully narrow the ordinance to fit that limited category, the ordinance could be applied to protectable speech and is therefore facially overbroad under the First and Fourteenth Amendments. The Court reversed the Louisiana Supreme Court and the conviction.

Real world impact

The ruling prevents New Orleans from enforcing §49-7 as written and requires cities to draft much narrower rules if they want to punish only true “fighting words.” People cannot be criminally punished under this ordinance for offensive spoken words unless a law is carefully limited to unprotected speech. The decision removes a basis for similar broad local arrests.

Dissents or concurrances

Justice Powell agreed with reversing but stressed risk of police abuse and the need for narrow laws; Justice Blackmun (joined by two Justices) dissented, arguing the words were fighting words and the ordinance should stand.