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Constitutional Law Keyed to Stone
Kovacs v. Cooper
Citation:
336 U.S. 77 (1949)Facts
Kovacs was operating a sound truck on a public street near the municipal building in Trenton, New Jersey. A city patrolman heard music being broadcast from the truck and approached it. As he neared, the music stopped, and the patrolman heard a man’s voice broadcasting from the truck. Kovacs admitted to operating the mechanism for the music and speaking into the amplifier. Although the police court record did not specify the purpose of the broadcasting, the New Jersey Supreme Court suggested that Kovacs was using the sound apparatus to comment on a labor dispute in progress in Trenton. The city ordinance in question prohibited the use of sound trucks, loudspeakers, or sound amplifiers on public streets that emitted “loud and raucous noises.” Kovacs was charged with and convicted of violating this ordinance. The case reached the Supreme Court on the grounds that the ordinance violated Kovacs’ First Amendment rights to freedom of speech and assembly as applied to the states through the Fourteenth Amendment.
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