A Stitch in Haste

To review: The only legitimate constraint upon an individual right is ... another individual right. This is not a particularly difficult concept: Most people know and embrace, for example, the uncomplicated notion that "my right to swing my fist ends where your nose begins."

The interplay of respective rights only becomes problematic when "rights" are mis-defined. Your right to smoke ends where my bar begins, but so too does your right to breathe smoke-free air. The only way to concoct a "smokers rights versus non-smokers rights" conundrum is by forgetting about property rights of business owners, which ought to be the beginning -- and the end -- of the question.

So too with the absurd "guns in parking lots" debate. The "right to have a gun in your car"? The "right to park in a gun-free zone"? How about the right simply to own a parking lot and set whatever policy you think best?

Armed with that:

Complaints ... about free home-delivery newspapers in Maryland have inspired a proposed law that, if approved, would be the first of its kind in the nation. Delegate Tanya Shewell, R-Carroll, has proposed a "do-not-deliver" registry that would work similarly to a "do-not-call" registry for telemarketers.
...
In addition to publishers, Shewell's bill is likely to run into opposition from lawmakers in both parties who worry it could violate constitutional free-speech protections.
...
It's not clear whether the bill would violate the Constitution, but it could prove a legal morass, said T. Barton Carter, a media law expert at Boston University. ... If the law banned newspaper deliveries, it would also likely have to set up a do-not-deliver registry for pizza delivery ads and other fliers routinely delivered to homes, Carter said.

This is, of course, utter nonsense.

Another old saw about rights is that the "right of free press" does not mean the "right to a free press." If you think, as Charles Foster Kane did, that it might be fun to run a newspaper -- then go ahead and run one*, but with your own money and with a voluntary readership.

However, "freedom of the press" not does imply a "freedom to trespass."** Just as a property owner is not required to open up her home to Jehovah's Witnesses or Mormons (or smokers or gun owners), neither does she have to subject her private property to litterers -- irrespective of what the content of the litter may happen to be.

I am also unpersuaded by the "newspaper versus pizza delivery ad" argument. Since there is no legitimate First Amendment issue, there is by corollary also no "unfair discrimination" issue. I've never seen a pizza flier that is so bulky that it has to be wrapped in plastic. If the restriction is based on, e.g., the weight or volume of the item being distributed, then there is no unequal treatment and no issue.

There is no relevant difference -- even in the context of the First Amendment -- between tossing an unwanted newspaper on someone's lawn and tossing an unwanted bag of dog poop. And if this community can craft a rational do-not-deliver registry that protects the right to quiet enjoyment of one's property without any true infringements on anyone else's rights, then good for them.

---

The one question that could theoretically give me pause is notice. Such a registry would, in my opinion, have to allow for at least one warning before any penalties were actually imposed. This is not necessarily a law that a reasonable business owner would anticipate a priori.

---

*Unless you are a broadcast media company, in which case the First Amendment does not fully apply to you.

**Usually (third item).