City of Dallas v. Stanglin/Opinion of the Court

Petitioner city of Dallas adopted an ordinance restricting admission to certain dance halls to persons between the ages of 14 and 18. Respondent, the owner of one of these "teenage" dance halls, sued to contest the constitutional validity of the ordinance. The Texas Court of Appeals held that the ordinance violated the First Amendment right of persons between the ages of 14 and 18 to associate with persons outside that age group. We now reverse, holding that the First Amendment secures no such right.

In 1985, in response to requests for dance halls open only to teenagers, the city of Dallas authorized the licensing of "Class E" dance halls. The purpose of the ordinance was to provide a place where teenagers could socialize with each other, but not be subject to the potentially detrimental influences of older teenagers and young adults. The provision of the ordinance at issue here, Dallas City Code § 14-8.1 (1985), restricts the ages of admission to Class E dance halls to persons between the ages of 14 and 18. This provision, as enacted, restricted admission to those between 14 and 17, but it was subsequently amended to include 18-year olds. Parents, guardians, law enforcement, and dance-hall personnel are excepted from the ordinance's age restriction. The ordinance also limits the hours of operation of Class E dance halls to between 1 p.m. and midnight daily when school is not in session. § 14-5(d)(2).

Respondent operates the Twilight Skating Rink in Dallas and obtained a license for a Class E dance hall. He divided the floor of his roller-skating rink into two sections with moveable plastic cones or pylons. On one side of the pylons, persons between the ages of 14 and 18 dance, while on the other side, persons of all ages skate to the same music-usually soul and "funk" music played by a disc jockey. No age or hour restrictions are applicable to the skating rink. Respondent does not serve alcohol on the premises, and security personnel are present. The Twilight does not have a selective admissions policy. It charges between $3.50 and $5 per person for admission to the dance hall and between $2.50 and $5 per person for admission to the skating rink. Most of the patrons are strangers to each other, and the establishment serves as many as 1,000 customers per night.

Respondent sued in the District Court of Dallas County to enjoin enforcement of the age and hour restrictions of the ordinance. He contended that the ordinance violated substantive due process and equal protection under the United States and Texas Constitutions, and that it unconstitutionally infringed the rights of persons between the ages of 14 and 17 (now 18) to associate with persons outside that age bracket. The trial court upheld the ordinance, finding that it was rationally related to the city's legitimate interest in ensuring the safety and welfare of children.

The Texas Court of Appeals upheld the ordinance's time restriction, but it struck down the age restriction. 744 S.W.2d 165 (1987). The Court of Appeals held that the age restriction violated the First Amendment associational rights of minors. To support a restriction on the fundamental right of "social association," the court said that "the legislative body must show a compelling interest," and the regulation "must be accomplished by the least restrictive means." Id., at 168. The court recognized the city's interest in "protect[ing] minors from detrimental, corrupting influences," ibid., but held that the "City's stated purposes . . . may be achieved in ways that are less intrusive on minors' freedom to associate," id., at 169. The Court of Appeals stated that "[a] child's right of association may not be abridged simply on the premise that he 'might' associate with those who would persuade him into bad habits," and that "neither the activity of dancing per se, nor association of children aged fourteen through eighteen with persons of other ages in the context of dancing renders such children peculiarly vulnerable to the evils that defendant City seeks to prevent." Ibid. We granted certiorari, 488 U.S. 815, 109 S.Ct. 51, 102 L.Ed.2d 30 (1988), and now reverse.

The dispositive question n this case is the level of judicial "scrutiny" to be applied to the city's ordinance. Unless laws "create suspect classifications or impinge upon constitutionally protected rights," San Antonio Independent School Dist. v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 1, 40, 93 S.Ct. 1278, 1300, 36 L.Ed.2d 16 (1973), it need only be shown that they bear "some rational relationship to a legitimate state purpose" id., at 44, 93 S.Ct., at 1302. Respondent does not contend that dance-hall patrons are a "suspect classification," but he does urge that the ordinance in question interferes with associational rights of such patrons guaranteed by the First Amendment.

While the First Amendment does not in terms protect a "right of association," our cases have recognized that it embraces such a right in certain circumstances. In Roberts v. United States Jaycees, 468 U.S. 609, 104 S.Ct. 3244, 82 L.Ed.2d 462 (1984), we noted two different sorts of "freedom of association" that are protected by the United States Constitution:

"Our decisions have referred to constitutionally     protected 'freedom of association' in two distinct senses.      In one line of decisions, the Court has concluded that      choices to enter into and maintain certain intimate human      relationships must be secured against undue intrusion by the      State because of the role of such relationships in      safeguarding the individual freedom that is central to our      constitutional scheme.  In this respect, freedom of      association receives protection as a fundamental element of      personal liberty.  In another set of decisions, the Court has      recognized a right to associate for the purpose of engaging      in those activities protected by the First Amendment-speech,      assembly, petition for the redress of grievances, and the      exercise of religion." Id., at 617-618, 104 S.Ct., at 3249.

It is clear beyond cavil that dance-hall patrons, who may number 1,000 on any given night, are not engaged in the sort of "intimate human relationships" referred to in Roberts. The Texas Court of Appeals, however, thought that such patrons were engaged in a form of expressive activity that was protected by the First Amendment. We disagree.

The Dallas ordinance restricts attendance at Class E dance halls to minors between the ages of 14 and 18 and certain excepted adults. It thus limits the minors' ability to dance with adults who may not attend, and it limits the opportunity of such adults to dance with minors. These opportunities might be described as "associational" in common parlance, but they simply do not involve the sort of expressive association that the First Amendment has been held to protect. The hundreds of teenagers who congregate each night at this particular dance hall are not members of any organized association; they are patrons of the same business establishment. Most are strangers to one another, and the dance hall admits all who are willing to pay the admission fee. There is no suggestion that these patrons "take positions on public questions" or perform any of the other similar activities described in Board of Directors of Rotary International v. Rotary Club of Duarte, 481 U.S. 537, 548, 107 S.Ct. 1940, 1947, 95 L.Ed.2d 474 (1987).

The cases cited in Roberts recognize that "freedom of speech" means more than simply the right to talk and to write. It is possible to find some kernel of expression in almost every activity a person undertakes-for example, walking down the street or meeting one's friends at a shopping mall-but such a kernel is not sufficient to bring the activity within the protection of the First Amendment. We think the activity of these dance-hall patrons-coming together to engage in recreational dancing-is not protected by the First Amendment. Thus this activity qualifies neither as a form of "intimate association" nor as a form of "expressive association" as those terms were described in Roberts.

Unlike the Court of Appeals, we do not think the Constitution recognizes a generalized right of "social association" that includes chance encounters in dance halls. The Court of Appeals relied, mistakenly we think, on a statement from our opinion in Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479, 483, 85 S.Ct. 1678, 1681, 14 L.Ed.2d 510 (1965), that "[t]he right to freely associate is not limited to 'political' assemblies, but includes those that 'pertain to the social, legal, and economic benefit' of our citizens." 744 S.W.2d, at 168, quoting Griswold v. Connecticut, supra, 381 U.S., at 483, 85 S.Ct., at 1681. But the quoted language from Griswold recognizes nothing more than that the right of expressive association extends to groups organized to engage in speech that does not pertain directly to politics.

The Dallas ordinance, therefore, implicates no suspect class and impinges on no constitutionally protected right. The question remaining is whether the classification engaged in by the city survives "rational-basis" scrutiny under the Equal Protection Clause. The city has chosen to impose a rule that separates 14- to 18-year-olds from what may be the corrupting influences of older teenagers and young adults. Ray Couch, an urban planner for the city's Department of Planning and Development, testified:

" '[O]lder kids [whom the ordinance prohibits from entering     Class E dance halls] can access drugs and alcohol, and they      have more mature sexual attitudes, more liberal sexual      attitudes in general. . . .  And we're concerned about mixing      up these [older] individuals with youngsters that [sic] have      not fully matured.' "  744 S.W.2d, at 168, n. 3.

A Dallas police officer, Wesley Michael, testified that the age restriction was intended to discourage juvenile crime.

Respondent claims that this restriction "has no real connection with the City's stated interests and objectives." Brief for Respondent 13. Except for saloons and teenage dance halls, respondent argues, teenagers and adults in Dallas may associate with each other, including at the skating area of the Twilight Skating Rink. Id., at 14. Respondent also states, as did the court below, that the city can achieve its objectives through increased supervision, education, and prosecution of those who corrupt minors. Id., at 15.

We think respondent's arguments misapprehend the nature of rational-basis scrutiny, which is the most relaxed and tolerant form of judicial scrutiny under the Equal Protection Clause. In Dandridge v. Williams, 397 U.S. 471, 90 S.Ct. 1153, 25 L.Ed.2d 491 (1970), in rejecting the claim that Maryland welfare legislation violated the Equal Protection Clause, the Court said:

"[A] State does not violate the Equal Protection Clause     merely because the classifications made by its laws are      imperfect.  If the classification has some 'reasonable      basis,' it does not offend the Constitution simply because      the classification 'is not made with mathematical nicety or      because in practice it results in some inequality.'  Lindsley      v. Natural Carbonic Gas Co., 220 U.S. 61, 78 [31 S.Ct. 337,      340, 55 L.Ed. 369 (1911) ].

'The problems of government are practical ones and may     justify, if they do not require, rough accommodations      illogical, it may be, and unscientific.'  Metropolis Theatre      Co. v. City of Chicago, 228 U.S. 61, 69-70 [33 S.Ct. 441,     443, 57 L.Ed. 730 (1913) ]. . ..

". . . . [The rational-basis standard] is true to the      principle that the Fourteenth Amendment gives the federal      courts no power to impose upon the States their views of what      constitutes wise economic or social policy." Id., 397 U.S.,     at 485-486, 90 S.Ct., at 1162 (footnote omitted).

We think that similar considerations support the age restriction at issue here. As we said in New Orleans v. Dukes, 427 U.S. 297, 303-304, 96 S.Ct. 2513, 2517, 49 L.Ed.2d 511 (1976): "[I]n the local economic sphere, it is only the invidious discrimination, the wholly arbitrary act, which cannot stand consistently with the Fourteenth Amendment." See als United States Railroad Retirement Board v. Fritz, 449 U.S. 166, 177, 101 S.Ct. 453, 461, 66 L.Ed.2d 368 (1980). The city could reasonably conclude, as Couch stated, that teenagers might be susceptible to corrupting influences if permitted, unaccompanied by their parents, to frequent a dance hall with older persons. See 7 E. McQuillin, Law of Municipal Corporations § 24.210 (3d ed. 1981) ("Public dance halls have been regarded as being in that category of businesses and vocations having potential evil consequences"). The city could properly conclude that limiting dance-hall contacts between juveniles and adults would make less likely illicit or undesirable juvenile involvement with alcohol, illegal drugs, and promiscuous sex. It is true that the city allows teenagers and adults to roller-skate together, but skating involves less physical contact than dancing. The differences between the two activities may not be striking, but differentiation need not be striking in order to survive rational-basis scrutiny.

We hold that the Dallas ordinance does not infringe on any constitutionally protected right of association, and that a rational relationship exists between the age restriction for Class E dance halls and the city's interest in promoting the welfare of teenagers. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is therefore reversed, and the cause is remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.

It is so ordered.