The California Court of Appeal has held that commercial private property owners have a constitutional right to exclude union picketers or other protesters from their property. As a result, the court invalidated two California laws as violative of the First and Fourteenth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution. The case, Ralphs Grocery Co. v. United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local 8,[1] is important because it will expand commercial entities’ right to seek injunctions to remove protesters from their property.
At issue in the case were the Moscone Act[2] and California Labor Code Section 1138.1. The Moscone Act prohibits courts from issuing restraining orders or injunctions to prevent peaceful assemblies on private property where the assembly is arising out of a labor dispute, so long as access to entrances and exits are not blocked. This results in private property owners being unable to obtain a court order that requires labor-related protesters to vacate the premises. Labor Code § 1138.1 has a similar effect to the Moscone Act, except that it allows a court to issue an injunction in a labor dispute only after the court has found all of the following:
This, in effect, prevented courts from issuing injunctions in labor disputes that were organized on private property in all but the most extreme circumstances. Importantly, the Moscone Act and Labor Code § 1138.1 had no impact on speech that did not arise out of a labor dispute.
As a result of the Moscone Act and Labor Code § 1138.1, Ralphs Grocery Co. (“Ralphs”), who owned Food Co., was unable to procure an injunction against labor organizers who picketed outside of the only entrance of its grocery store. In 2007, Ralphs opened a Food Co. in Sacramento. Ralphs and the United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local 8 (“Union”) had been unable to come to an agreement as to whether this store would be a “Union store.” When the store opened, Union members began engaging daily in picketing demonstrations. Ralphs distributed to the Union members a copy of its rules regarding speech on the premises, but the Union failed to follow them. Ralphs also called the police, who refused to remove the Union members so long as their demonstrations were peaceful. As a result, Ralphs filed this lawsuit seeking a restraining order on the protesters. The trial court, basing its decision on Labor Code § 1138.1 denied the restraining order.
The Court of Appeal examined two prior U.S. Supreme Court cases[3] that both invalidated statutes or ordinances which exempted labor-related speech from other speech restrictions in public forums. The Court noted that although this case dealt with the regulation of speech in a private forum, the same standard applied. The U.S. Supreme Court has established that the First and Fourteenth Amendments prohibit state or local governments from regulating speech based on content. The Ralphs Court held that the Moscone Act and Labor Code § 1138.1 regulate speech based on content because they draw a distinction between labor picketing and other types of peaceful picketing. For example, a commercial entity would find it more difficult to procure an injunction where the content of the speech was based on a labor dispute than if it were based on another issue. Therefore, both the Moscone Act and Labor Code § 1138.1 regulate speech based on content. Accordingly, the Court invalidated them in their entirety as unconstitutional and granted Ralphs an injunction against Union picketers.
This decision will have an important impact on many employers in California. Employers are no longer restricted in pursuing injunctive relief against unions, individuals, or other demonstrators on their property. This will give businesses more power to control what groups are entitled to assembly on their property. It is important to note, however, that this decision does not allow a commercial entity to exclude protesters from the public sidewalks surrounding the entity’s property.
Alvarez-Glasman & Colvin serves as legal counsel to businesses and property owners throughout California and is at the forefront of a wide variety of legal issues facing businesses and individuals. Please contact Associate Anthony Marinaccio at anthony@agclawfirm.com or (562) 699-5500 for more information regarding this case or other constitutional or commercial law issues.
[1] No. C060413 (Cal. Ct. App. 2010).
[2] Cal. Civ. Proc. Code § 527.3 (2010).
[3] Police Dep’t v. Mosley, 408 U.S. 92 (1972); Carey v. Brown, 447 U.S. 455 (1980).