Business owner Jeremiah Johnson found himself on the outs when his landlord saw him protesting for black lives on social media and evicted him from his business space.
The first amendment restrictions apply only to governments, not private companies or individuals.
What the landlord did is wrong, racist, and almost certainly illegal, but because he is not a government entity, he cannot violate the tenants’ first amendment rights.
We got kicked out from our business office space by our landlord cuz he saw us on the news peacefully protesting.Violating our 1st amendment rights and the lease. Please share this video! When other people protest for haircuts, it’s great! But when I protest peaceful it’s bad!! pic.twitter.com/PuGkC3QMmA
— Jeremiah Johnson (@jeremiah_miah11) June 6, 2020
[Raw Story] The landlord seems to argue that employees of the business were wrong to be protesting in an area where looting was also occurring.
“I was protesting the right way,” Johnson says in the video.
“I will tell you flat out,” the landlord opines, “if there’s something illegal going on at a place that I’m at, I don’t want to be a part of it. I’m personally going to leave.”
“There was two different groups,” Johnson points out.
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“All I’m saying is I think it’s poor judgement to be at a place where something illegally is going on,” the landlord continues. “Whether you are a part of it or not.”
“We didn’t think that was going to happen,” the business owner says. “We were there for a peaceful protest.”
These were the pictures he saw on the news that made him think we were doing criminal acts. I’ll never support looting because I own small businesses in the U.S and back home in my country Liberia. I’ll always stand up for what’s right regardless of what a rich guy thinks pic.twitter.com/AqlaO4zYp7
— Jeremiah Johnson (@jeremiah_miah11) June 7, 2020
The First Amendment safeguards the freedoms of expression and association only from GOVERNMENTAL interference. Under the “state action” doctrine, the Constitution does not prevent landlords and other private parties from censoring and discriminating against others based on their political speech and affiliations.
In Lloyd Corporation v. Tanner, the Supreme Court refused to order a shopping mall to allow campaigners to distribute handbills on its premises, reasoning that the First Amendment does not supplant private property owners’ control over their land. Although the mall had opened its property to the public, it did not do so for political speech, and even if it had, its property would not have been transformed into a public forum.
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The Supreme Court has held that the federal-state action doctrine does not bound state constitutions. A few state constitutions, such as California’s and New Jersey’s, have gone beyond the First Amendment, extending their First Amendment analogs to protect the freedoms of expression and association against private interference.
But these state constitutions are the exception, not the rule, and even those state constitutions that do prevent some types of private interference with political rights are not guaranteed to avoid landlord interference.
Hopefully, Mr. Johnson can find a local attorney or the ACLU to help him review his lease and the applicable local laws to see if he has a reason for action against his landlord. Most likely, he does. That is the only route he has at this time.
This piece was written by Wayne Dupree on June 7, 2020. It originally appeared in WayneDupree.com and is used by permission.
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