HIGH COURT UPHOLDS CHICAGO PARK-USE PERMIT REGULATIONS

Justices Also Side With Law Enforcement on Criteria for Search

A unanimous Supreme Court yesterday upheld Chicago's rules for
deciding whether to grant permits to demonstrators seeking access to
public parks, a decision that shores up the authority of local
governments to regulate political demonstrations in public places.

The court ruled that the city's 13-point guidelines, which include a
requirement that groups of more than 50 people prove they have
insurance to cover potential damage caused by an event, did not
unconstitutionally impede free speech, because they applied equally
to all groups, regardless of viewpoint, and were necessary to ensure
proper usage of a limited municipal asset.

"The licensing scheme at issue here is not subject-matter censorship
but content-neutral time, place and manner regulation of the use of a
public forum," Justice Antonin Scalia wrote for the court. "The
picnicker and soccer player, no less than the political activist or
parade marshal, must apply for a permit if the 50-person limit is to
be exceeded."

"This firms up where we say we've always been," said Lani Williams,
associate counsel of the International Municipal Lawyers Association,
which submitted a friend-of-the court brief in support of Chicago.

The case, Thomas v. Chicago Park District, No. 00-1249, arose out of
a clash between the Chicago Park District authorities and members of
the Windy City Hemp Development Board, who have repeatedly applied
for permits to demonstrate in Chicago parks in favor of legalized
marijuana, sometimes receiving approval, sometimes not.

The demonstrators launched a broad challenge to the rules, arguing
that they amounted to a prior restraint on free expression. The
demonstrators also said the rules do not offer applicants seeking to
overturn a permit denial sufficiently rapid access to the courts.

Chicago's rules, the demonstrators said, were like state
movie-censorship rules, which the court had limited in a 1965 case.
In that case, the court held that a theater seeking to show a
particular film was entitled to prompt judicial review of any
proposed state ban.

Under the Chicago rules, it may take as long as 28 days for the
authorities to act on a permit request, after which there is an
opportunity to appeal directly to the general superintendent of the
Park District. Only after that proceeding, which can take up to 14
days, may permit-seekers go to court.

This was potentially the most far-reaching issue in the case, since
lower courts have reached different conclusions as to how swift
access to the courts must be to satisfy the Supreme Court's 1965
ruling.

But the justices sidestepped it, deciding the fact that Chicago's
rules applied to all groups, regardless of ideology, meant that this
case, unlike the movie censorship matter, was not an instance in
which officials were attempting to control the content of public
discourse, either directly or by giving authorities so much latitude
that they may favor certain groups over others when granting permits.

Separately, the court ruled unanimously that a Border Patrol agent
acted within the Constitution when he stopped and searched a minivan
driver near the Arizona-Mexico border, partly because the driver's
behavior and that of children riding in the back seat aroused the
agent's suspicion that drugs were being smuggled in the minivan.

The agent, Clinton Stoddard, acted reasonably, the court held,
because even conduct that might be considered innocent in other
circumstances understandably struck him as suspicious given his
training and experience along the dusty smuggling trails of the
Southwest.

"Stoddard was entitled to make an assessment of the situation in
light of his specialized training and familiarity with the customs of
the area's inhabitants," Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist wrote for
the court.

The court thus sided strongly with law enforcement in a case that
yesterday's opinion described as "importan[t] to the enforcement of
the nation's drug and immigration laws."

On an afternoon in January 1998, Stoddard observed the minivan
driving along a little-used road in a manner that suggested it might
be trying to avoid Border Patrol checkpoints. Also, he noticed that
children sitting in back had their legs propped up on what appeared
to be large overstuffed bags. He said they waved at him in what
looked to him like a staged effort to seem friendly.

Upon inspection of the car, Stoddard found almost 129 pounds of
marijuana, and the car's driver, Ralph Arvizu, was charged with drug
trafficking. Arvizu argued that the marijuana should not be admitted
as evidence, because the officer did not have an objectively
reasonable basis to stop him.

The San Francisco-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit
sided with Arvizu, holding that otherwise innocent behavior, such as
the children's waving, may not sustain an officer's inference that
wrongdoing is afoot.

But the justices sharply rebuked the 9th Circuit yesterday, saying
its ruling wrongly tried to separate the behavior Stoddard observed
from the context in which he observed it.

The case is U.S. v. Arvizu, No. 00-1519.