Marijuana.com

Suetaz

Marijuana group sues music festival over First Amendment

Herald Tribune | April 17, 2004

COLUMBIA, S.C. -- A group that advocates the legalization of marijuana can leave its booth during a three-day music festival here, but if it flaunts its message and literature throughout the festival it might not get a booth next year, an attorney for the festival said Friday.

The National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws was seeking a temporary injunction to keep the 3 Rivers Music Festival from insisting the group stay behind its booth, 3 Rivers attorney Jay Elliott said. The group didn't get the injunction Friday, but won the right to roam after the festival said it would do nothing if the group violated the rule.

"If somebody just wants to flaunt it in front of us, we're not going to do anything," Elliott said. "But the next year we're going to look pretty carefully at the application."

NORML said the rule barring nonprofit groups from leaving their booths to pass out materials restricted its First Amendment rights. Officials with the ACLU, whose lawyers drafted the lawsuit, said the policy was unconstitutional because it limits only not-for-profit groups and because the festival is being held in a public place.

Judge Cameron Currie did not rule on whether the policy was infringed on the free speech rights of NORML, but warned festival organizers that the rule likely was unconstitutional.

"Unless you adopt a policy that applies to all organizations, not just not-for-profits, I do not think this is going to withstand constitutional scrutiny," Currie said. "If you do it, you have to do it for everybody, and it has to be content-neutral."

Elliott said the five-year-old festival, which draws roughly 25,000 people each day, could revamp its rules for advocacy groups.

Henry Koch, president of the Midlands chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, said after the hearing his group would protest any future policies that confine organizations to a booth.

Koch said his group would be out in force at the festival this year passing out materials. He said last year was NORML's first at 3 Rivers and that members handed out about 6,000 pieces of literature.

Originally the festival sought to keep NORML from even having a booth, but relented after the ACLU complained.