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Comcast Sues Vermont To Avoid Building 550 Miles of New Cable Lines (arstechnica.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Comcast has sued the state of Vermont to try to avoid a requirement to build 550 miles of new cable lines. Comcast's lawsuit against the Vermont Public Utility Commission (VPUC) was filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Vermont and challenges several provisions in the cable company's new 11-year permit to offer services in the state. One of the conditions in the permit says that "Comcast shall construct no less than 550 miles of line extensions into un-cabled areas during the [11-year] term." Comcast would rather not do that. The company's court complaint says that Vermont is exceeding its authority under the federal Cable Act while also violating state law and Comcast's constitutional rights: "The VPUC claimed that it could impose the blanket 550-mile line extension mandate on Comcast because it is the 'largest' cable operator in Vermont and can afford it. These discriminatory conditions contravene federal and state law, amount to undue speaker-based burdens on Comcast's protected speech under the First Amendment of the United States Constitution... and deprive Comcast and its subscribers of the benefits of Vermont law enjoyed by other cable operators and their subscribers without a just and rational basis, in violation of the Common Benefits Clause of the Vermont Constitution."
Our CEO can't buy a bigger yacht if we put customers first.
If something's a constitutional or other legal right then you don't have to get a PERMIT to be authorized to do it.
Unless Grayned v. Rockford has been overturned while I wasn't looking, that is just not true. The government has a well-established right to regulate the time, place, and manner in which you exercise that speech.
To make laws that man cannot, and will not obey, serves to bring all law into contempt.
--E.C. Stanton
Fine, don't want to play nice? Then the state should open up any area where Comcast operates to the free market (and state it that way, to confuse and bother the corrupt republicans who will undoubtedly try and block it)
This whole 1st Amendment shit is a red herring. Even if laying cable is "speech", Comcast signed a contract to do it, which isnt any different than Susan Bennet signing a contract to be the voice of Siri.
Here is the applicable text of the contract:
33. Comcast shall construct no less than 550 miles of line extensions into uncabled areas during the term of this CPG. Comcast may satisfy this obligation either by fully funding the line extensions or by collecting contributions-in-aid-of-construction from customers pursuant to its line extension tariff. Any line extensions that are funded by a grant from any federal or state governmental agency shall not be used to satisfy this requirement. Comcast shall annually file with the Board and the Department a report that details all line extensions completed during the prior calendar year. This report shall, at minimum, describe the length and location of all completed line extensions and the funding source for such extensions.
There are a few more sections about line extensions, but only in the manner in which they are handled.
"His name was James Damore."
First, IANAL, however after reading Grayned v. Rockford, it doesn't support what you say.
Grayned v. Rockford was about the constitutionality of two city ordinances in which demonstrators were arrested while protesting outside a school while school was in session.
The first ordinance, the "anti-picketing" ordinance was ruled as unconstitutional by the Supreme count of Illinois.
The second ordinance, the "anti-noise" ordinance was ruled constitutional, but was only violated because of where, when AND manner that speech was exercised. They could have done any two of those things, but only when all three were done (adjacent to a school, during/30-minutes prior or after school session, AND loud enough to disrupt regular school operation) was in violation of the law.
According to Grayned v. Rockford, they didn't need a PERMIT, nor was there a way to get a PERMIT to do what they did (make enough noise close enough to a school to disrupt it's normal operation). While an interesting case, it simply doesn't support what you say it does. The government isn't regulating free speech in this case. It is however interpreting what happens when one's right to free speech violates another's rights, and deciding which takes priority and codifies it in law.