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Freedoms Of Collective Speech: A Theory Of Protected Communications By Organizations, Communities, And The State, Meir Dan-Cohen

Meir Dan-Cohen

Corporations' first amendment rights have received considerable judicial and scholarly attention in recent years. However, corporate speech cannot be studied adequately in isolation; rather, it is more fruitfully investigated within the broader context of collective speech. The author accordingly presents a theoretical framework for dealing with communications by different types of collectivities. The main distinction is between two paradigm collective entities: organizations and communities. Although it makes sense to ascribe speech to both, the grounds for extending constitutional protection are fundamentally different. Whereas communal speech has in and of itself expressive value that raises the first amendment's primary concerns, organizational …