U.S. Supreme Court

No. 95-1065

on writ of certiorari to the united states court of appeals for the second circuit

[February 19, 1997]

Chief Justice Rehnquist delivered the opinion of the Court. The question presented is whether an injunction that places restrictions on demonstrations outside abortion clinics violates the First Amendment. We uphold the provisions imposing "fixed bubble" or "fixed buffer zone" limitations, as hereinafter described, but hold that the provisions imposing "floating bubble" or "floating buffer zone" limitations violate the First Amendment.

Respondents include three doctors and four medical clinics (two of which are part of larger hospital complexes) in and around Rochester and Buffalo in upstate New York. These health care providers perform abortions and other medical services at their facilities. The eighth respondent is Pro Choice Network of Western New York, a not for profit corporation dedicated to maintaining access to family planning and abortion services.

On September 24, 1990, respondents filed a complaint in the District Court for the Western District of New York against fifty individuals and three organizations-- Operation Rescue, Project Rescue Western New York,

and Project Life of Rochester. The complaint alleged that defendants had consistently engaged in illegal blockades and other illegal conduct at facilities in the Western District of New York where abortions were performed. (For convenience, we refer to these facilities as "clinics" throughout.) The complaint alleged one federal and six state causes of action: conspiracy to deprive women seeking abortions or other family planning services of the equal protection of the laws, in violation of Rev. Stat. §1980, 42 U.S.C. § 1985(3); discrimination against and harassment of women seeking abortions and other family planning services, in violation of N. Y. Civ. Rights Law §40-c (McKinney 1992) and N. Y. Exec. Law §296 (McKinney 1993); trespass; tortious interference with business; tortious harassment; false imprisonment; and intentional infliction of emo tional harm. The complaint alleged that a large blockade was planned for September 28, and requested that the court issue a temporary restraining order (TRO) to stop it. The complaint also sought a permanent injunction and damages.

Before the complaint was filed, the clinics were subjected to numerous large scale blockades in which protesters would march, stand, kneel, sit, or lie in parking lot driveways and in doorways. This conduct blocked or hindered cars from entering clinic parking lots, and patients, doctors, nurses, and other clinic employees from entering the clinics.

In addition to these large scale blockades, smaller groups of protesters consistently attempted to stop or disrupt clinic operations. Protesters trespassed onto clinic parking lots and even entered the clinics themselves. Those trespassers who remained outside the clinics crowded around cars or milled around doorways and driveway entrances in an effort to block or hinder access to the clinics. Protesters sometimes threw themselves on top of the hoods of cars or crowdedaround cars as they attempted to turn into parking lot driveways. Other protesters on clinic property handed literature and talked to people entering the clinics-- especially those women they believed were arriving to have abortions--in an effort to persuade them that abortion was immoral. Sometimes protesters used more aggressive techniques, with varying levels of belligerence: getting very close to women entering the clinics and shouting in their faces; surrounding, crowding, and yelling at women entering the clinics; or jostling, grabbing, pushing, and shoving women as they attempted to enter the clinics. Male and female clinic volunteers who attempted to escort patients past protesters into the clinics were sometimes elbowed, grabbed, or spit on. Sometimes the escorts pushed back. Some protesters remained in the doorways after the patients had entered the clinics, blocking others from entering and exiting.

On the sidewalks outside the clinics, protesters called "sidewalk counselors" used similar methods. Counselors would walk alongside targeted women headed toward the clinics, handing them literature and talking to them in an attempt to persuade them not to get an abortion. Unfortunately, if the women continued toward the clinics and did not respond positively to the counselors, such peaceful efforts at persuasion often devolved into "in your face" yelling, and sometimes into pushing, shoving, and grabbing. Men who accompanied women attempting to enter the clinics often became upset by the aggressive sidewalk counseling and sometimes had to be restrained (not always successfully) from fighting with the counselors. The District Court found that the local police had been "unable to respond effectively" to the protests, for a number of reasons: the protests were constant, overwhelming police resources; when the police arrived, the protesters simply dispersed and returned later; prosecution of arrested protesters was difficult because patients were often reluctant to cooperate for fear of makingtheir identity public; and those who were convicted were not deterred from returning to engage in unlawful conduct. In addition, the court found that defendants harassed the police officers verbally and by mail, including the deputy police chief. Also harassed were people who testified against the protesters and "those who invoke[d] legal process against" the protesters. This, testified the deputy police chief, "made it more difficult for him to do his job." Pro Choice Network of Western N. Y. v. Project Rescue Western N. Y., 799 F. Supp. 1417, 1426-1427 (WDNY 1992). See also id., at 1431 ("[T]here has been substantial uncontradicted evidence that defendants' activities are intended, and do in fact, prevent and hinder local police from protecting the right of women to choose to have an abortion").

On September 27, 1990, three days after respondents filed their complaint and one day before the scheduled large scale blockade, the District Court issued a TRO. The parties stipulated that the TRO might remain in force until decision on respondents' motion for a preliminary injunction. In pertinent part, the TRO enjoined defendants from physically blockading the clinics, physically abusing or tortiously harassing anyone entering or leaving the clinics, and "demonstrating within 15 feet of any person" entering or leaving the clinics. As an exception to this 15 foot "buffer zone" around people, the TRO allowed two sidewalk counselors to have "a conversation of a nonthreatening nature" with individuals entering or leaving the clinic. If the individuals indicated that they did not want the counseling, however, the counselors had to "cease and desist" from counseling. 1  

At first, defendants complied with the TRO, holding a peaceful demonstration rather than the scheduled blockade. Subsequently, they stipulated that "physical blockades" could be enjoined, and they conducted no such blockades between the issuance of the TRO and the issuance of the preliminary injunction 17 months later. Defendants, however, continued to engage in protests that the District Court labeled "constructive blockades," as well as sidewalk counseling. Constructive blockades consisted of "demonstrating and picketing around the entrances of the clinics, and . . . harassing patients and staff entering and leaving the clinics." Id., at 1424. This included many of the protest elements described above, including attempts to intimidate or impede cars from entering the parking lots, congregating in driveway entrances, and crowding around, yelling at, grabbing, pushing, and shoving people entering and leaving the clinics. The purpose of constructive blockades was the same as physical blockades: "to prevent or dissuade patients from entering the clinic." Ibid. Clinic volunteer escorts testified that the protests were much quieter, calmer, and smaller during the first month after the TRO issued, but that the protests returned to their prior intensity thereafter, including aggressive sidewalk counseling with occasional shoving and elbowing, trespassing into clinic buildings to continue counseling of patients, and blocking of doorways and driveways.

Alleging that Project Rescue and five individual defendants (including petitioner Schenck) breached the TRO on five separate occasions from late October 1990 through December 1990, respondents sought four contempt citations. A fifth contempt citation for a 1991 incident was sought against petitioner Schenck and another individualdefendant. Throughout 1991 and into 1992, the District Court held 27 days of hearings in these contempt proceedings, and issued opinions concluding that five of the six incidents justified a finding of civil contempt. 2  

In February 1992, after hearing 12 additional days of testimony, the District Court issued the injunction, parts of which are challenged here. The relevant provisions are set forth in the margin. 3 Although the injunctionlargely tracked the TRO, there were significant changes. First, while the TRO banned "demonstrating . . . within fifteen feet of any person" entering or leaving the clinics, the injunction more broadly banned "demonstrating within fifteen feet from either side or edge of, or in front of, doorways or doorway entrances, parking lot entrances, driveways and driveway entrances of such facilities" ("fixed buffer zones"), or "within fifteen feet of any person or vehicle seeking access to or leaving such facilities" ("floating buffer zones"). In addition, the injunction clarified the "cease and desist" provision, specifying that once sidewalk counselors who had entered the buffer zones were required to "cease and desist" their counseling, they had to retreat 15 feet from the people they had been counseling and had to remain outside the boundaries of the buffer zones.

In its opinion accompanying the preliminary injunction, the District Court stated the relevant inquiry as whether respondents had established (i) that they would be irreparably harmed if the injunction was not granted and (ii) that they were likely to succeed on the merits. The court held that the irreparable harm requirement was met, because "those women denied unimpeded access to [the clinics] cannot be compensated merely by money damages. Injunctive relief alone can assure women unimpeded access to [the] clinics." Id., at 1428. The court also held that respondents were likely to succeed on at least three of their claims. First, relying on New York State National Organization for Women v. Terry, 886 F. 2d 1339 (CA2 1989), cert. denied, 495 U.S. 947 (1990), the court held that women seeking abortions constituted a protected class under 42 U.S.C. § 1985(3), and that their constitutional right to travel between States and to choose to have an abortion was likely infringed by defendants, in violation of §1985(3). Second, the court held that the same conduct that infringed this class of women's constitutional rights under §1985(3) "clearly violates N. Y. Civ. Rights Law §40-c." 4 799 F. Supp., at 1431. Finally, the court heldthat in light of the "overwhelming evidence that defendants have repeatedly trespassed upon [the clinics'] property in the past and may continue to trespass in the future," respondents had shown a likelihood of success on their trespass claim. Id., at 1432. Having already found likelihood of success on these claims, the court chose not to address respondents' other four state law claims. Id., at 1432, n. 11.

In analyzing defendants' assertion that the injunction violated their First Amendment right to free speech, the court applied our standard "time, place, and manner analysis," asking whether the speech restrictions in the injunction (i) were content neutral, (ii) were narrowly tailored to serve a significant government interest, and (iii) left open ample alternative channels for communication of the information. Id., at 1432 (citing Frisby v. Schultz, 487 U.S. 474, 481 (1988)). The court held that the injunction was content neutral because "it merely restricts the volume, location, timing and harassing and intimidating nature of defendants' expressive speech." 799 F. Supp., at 1433. The court held that the injunction served three significant governmental interests-- public safety, ensuring that abortions are performed safely, and ensuring that a woman's constitutional rights to travel interstate and to choose to have an abortion were not sacrificed in the interest of defendants' First Amendment rights. 5  

As to narrow tailoring, the court explained that the 15 foot buffer zones "around entrances and . . . around people and vehicles seeking access . . . are necessary to ensure that people and vehicles seeking access to the clinics will not be impeded, and will be able to determine readily where the entrances are located." Id., at 1434. The court added that the buffer zones would also provide the benefit of "prevent[ing] defendants from crowding patients and invading their personal space." Ibid. The court explained the "cease and desist" provision--allowing two sidewalk counselors inside the buffer zones but requiring them to "cease and desist" their counseling if the counselee asked to be left alone--as "an exception" to the buffer zones and as "an attempt to accommodate fully defendants' First Amendment rights." Ibid. The court held that this provision was "necessary in order to protect the right of people approaching and entering the facilities to be left alone." Id., at 1435. Finally, the court held that the injunction left open ample alternative channels for communication, because defendants could still "picket, carry signs, pray, sing or chant in full view of people going into the clinics." Id., at 1437.

After the District Court issued its opinion, we held in Bray v. Alexandria Women's Health Clinic, 506 U.S. 263, 269 (1993), that "women seeking an abortion" were not a protected class under 42 U.S.C. § 1985(3). In light of Bray, the District Court dismissed respondents' §1985(3) claim, with leave to file an amended §1985(3) cause of action. Pro Choice Network of Western N. Y. v. Project Rescue Western N. Y., 828 F. Supp. 1018, 1025 (WDNY 1993). The court then decided to exercise pendent jurisdiction over respondents' remaining causesof action (the six state claims), regardless of the ultimate disposition of the §1985(3) claim. In so deciding, the court noted that "the preliminary injunction is grounded not only on the §1985(3) claim, but two state law claims [the N. Y. Civ. Rights Law §40-c claim and the trespass claim] as well." Id., at 1026, n. 4. The court explained that judicial economy, convenience, and fairness all suggested that it keep the case, since it had expanded substantial resources on the case and its involvement in the case was ongoing. Id., at 1028-1029 (citing the contempt motions filed by respondents in 1990 and 1991, criminal contempt charges brought against six individuals for protests in 1992, and civil and criminal contempt motions filed in 1993).

Petitioners, two individual defendants, appealed to the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. While the case was on appeal, we decided Madsen v. Women's Health Center, Inc., 512 U.S. 753 (1994), a case which also involved the effect of an injunction on the expressive activities of antiabortion protesters. (We discuss Madsen in greater depth in Part II-A, infra.) We held that "our standard time, place, and manner analysis is not sufficiently rigorous" when it comes to evaluating content neutral injunctions that restrict speech. The test instead, we held, is "whether the challenged provisions of the injunction burden no more speech than necessary to serve a significant government interest." Id., at 765.

Applying Madsen, a panel of the Court of Appeals reversed the District Court in a split decision. 67 F. 3d 359 (1994). The Court of Appeals then heard the case en banc, and affirmed the District Court by a divided vote. 67 F. 3d 377 (1995). Each of two opinions garnered a majority of the court. Judge Oakes' lead opinion, joined by eight other judges, affirmed for reasons that closely track the reasoning of the District Court. Id., at 388-392. A concurring opinion by Judge Winter, joined by nine other judges, affirmed primarilyon the ground that the protesters' expressive activities were not protected by the First Amendment at all, and because the District Court's injunction was a "reasonable response" to the protesters' conduct. Id., at 396, 398. We granted certiorari. 516 U. S. ___ (1996).

Petitioners challenge three aspects of the injunction: (i) the floating 15 foot buffer zones around people and vehicles seeking access to the clinics; (ii) the fixed 15 foot buffer zones around the clinic doorways, driveways, and parking lot entrances; and (iii) the "cease and desist" provision that forces sidewalk counselors who are inside the buffer zones to retreat 15 feet from the person being counseled once the person indicates a desire not to be counseled. Because Madsen bears many similarities to this case and because many of the parties' arguments depend on the application of Madsen here, we review our determination in that case.

A Florida state court had issued a permanent injunction enjoining specified organizations and individuals from blocking or interfering with clinic access and from physically abusing people entering or leaving the clinic. Six months after the injunction issued, the court found that protesters still impeded access by demonstrating on the street and in the driveways, and that sidewalk counselors approached entering vehicles in an effort to hand literature to the occupants. In the face of this evidence, the court issued a broader injunction that enjoined the defendant protesters from " `physically abusing, grabbing, intimidating, harassing, touching, pushing, shoving, crowding or assaulting' " anyone entering or leaving the clinic; from " `congregating, picketing, patrolling, demonstrating or entering that portion of public right of way or private property within [36] feet of the property line of the Clinic' "; from approaching anyone " `seeking the services of the Clinic' " who is within 300 feet of the clinic, unless the person " `indicates a desire to communicate' "; and from making any noise or displaying any image which could be heard or seen inside the clinic. 512 U.S., at 759 -760.

After determining that the injunction was not a prior restraint and was content neutral, id., at 762-764, we held that the proper test for evaluating content neutral injunctions under the First Amendment was "whether the challenged provisions of the injunction burden no more speech than necessary to serve a significant government interest," id., at 765. The Florida Supreme Court had concluded that the injunction was based on a number of governmental interests: protecting a woman's freedom to seek pregnancy related services, ensuring public safety and order, promoting the free flow of traffic on streets and sidewalks, protecting property rights, and protecting the medical privacy of patients whose psychological and physical well being were threatened as they were held "captive" by medical circumstance. Id., at 767-768. We held that the combination of these interests was "quite sufficient to justify an appropriately tailored injunction" to protect unimpeded access to the clinic by way of public streets and sidewalks. Id., at 768.

We held that some of the injunction's provisions burdened more speech than necessary to serve these interests, and that others did not. We upheld the 36 foot buffer zone as applied to the street, sidewalks, and driveways "as a way of ensuring access to the clinic." We explained that the trial court had few other options to protect access to the clinic: allowing protesters to remain on the sidewalks and in the clinic driveway was not a valid option because of their past conduct, and allowing them to stand in the street was obviously impractical. In addition, we stated that "some deference must be given to the state court's familiarity with thefacts and the background of the dispute between the parties even under our heightened review." Id., at 769-770 (citing Milk Wagon Drivers v. Meadowmoor Dairies, Inc., 312 U.S. 287, 294 (1941))

We struck down the 300 foot no approach zone around the clinic, however, stating that it was difficult

"to justify a prohibition on all uninvited approaches . . . regardless of how peaceful the contact may be . . . . Absent evidence that the protesters' speech is independently proscribable (i.e., `fighting words' or threats), or is so infused with violence as to be indistinguishable from a threat of physical harm, see Milk Wagon Drivers, 312 U.S., at 292 -293, this provision cannot stand. `As a general matter, we have indicated that in public debate our own citizens must tolerate insulting, and even outrageous, speech in order to provide adequate breathing space to the freedoms protected by the First Amendment.' Boos v. Barry, 485 U. S. [312, 322 (1988)] (internal quotation marks omitted). The `consent' requirement alone invalidates this provision; it burdens more speech than is necessary to prevent intimidation and to ensure access to the clinic." 512 U.S., at 774 .

We now apply Madsen to the challenged provisions of the injunction and ask whether they burden more speech than necessary to serve a significant governmental interest. 6  

Petitioners first argue that there are no significant governmental interests that support the injunction. The argument goes as follows: of the seven causes of action in respondents' complaint, the only one left standing after the District Court's most recent opinion is respondents' trespass claim; a trespass cause of action can support an injunction banning trespass, but nothing else; thus, the injunction's provisions banning "demonstrating" within 15 feet of people, cars, and entrances are overbroad.

First, this argument is factually incorrect. The trespass claim is not the only one left standing at this point. In its opinion issuing the preliminary injunction, the District Court held that the conduct that satisfied the elements of a §1985(3) claim under federal law also satisfied the elements of a §40-c claim under state law. After our decision in Bray, the District Court dismissed respondents' §1985(3) claim. Petitioners argue that in doing so, the District Court necessarily and implicitly dismissed the §40-c claim as well, since the two claims were based on the same conduct. But our opinion in Bray did not attempt to construe any statute other than 42 U.S.C. § 1985(3). And the fact that certain conduct does not state a claim under §1985(3) does not necessarily mean that the same conduct does not state a claim under a state law that uses the same or similar language as §1985(3), since state courts may of course choose to construe their own law more broadly (or more narrowly) than its federal counterpart. In any event, the language of the two statutes is noticeably different. See n. 4, supra. Thus, the dismissal of the §1985(3) claim in light of Bray did not also act as a dismissal of respondents' §40-c claim. This is confirmed by the District Court's comment in its post Bray opinion that "the preliminary injunction is grounded not only on the§1985(3) claim, but two state law claims as well." 828 F. Supp., at 1026, n. 4.

Although petitioners contend that the §40-c cause of action is no longer valid simply because the §1985(3) claim is no longer valid, an argument we reject, they do not contend that the District Court erred in concluding as an independent matter that respondents were likely to succeed on their §40-c and trespass claims. See Brief for Petitioners 32. The injunction's terms are clearly crafted to remedy these violations.

An injunction tailored to respondents' claims for relief may nonetheless violate the First Amendment. In making their First Amendment challenge, petitioners focus solely on the interests asserted by respondents in their complaint. But in assessing a First Amendment challenge, a court looks not only at the private claims asserted in the complaint, but also inquires into the governmental interests that are protected by the injunction, which may include an interest in public safety and order. Madsen, 512 U.S., at 767 -768; Milk Wagon Drivers, 312 U.S., at 294 -295. Both the injunction in Madsen and the injunction here are supported by this governmental interest. In Madsen, it was permissible to move protesters off the sidewalk and to the other side of the street in part because other options would block the free flow of traffic on the streets and sidewalks. 512 U.S., at 767 -768. Here, the District Court cited public safety as one of the interests justifying the injunction--certainly a reasonable conclusion, if only because of the dangerous situation created by the interaction between cars and protesters and because of the fights that threatened to (and sometimes did) develop. Even though the governmental interest in public safety is clearly a valid interest here, as it was in Madsen, plaintiffs in neither case pleaded a claim for "threat to public safety." Indeed, this would be a strange concept, since a plaintiff customarily allegesviolations of private rights, while "public safety" expresses a public right enforced by the government through its criminal laws and otherwise. Thus, the fact that "threat to public safety" is not listed anywhere in respondents' complaint as a claim does not preclude a court from relying on the significant governmental interest in public safety in assessing petitioners' First Amendment argument. 7  

Given the factual similarity between this case and Madsen, we conclude that the governmental interests underlying the injunction in Madsen--ensuring public safety and order, promoting the free flow of traffic on streets and sidewalks, protecting property rights, and protecting a woman's freedom to seek pregnancy related services, 8 ibid.--also underlie the injunction here, and in combination are certainly significant enough to justify an appropriately tailored injunction to secure unimpeded physical access to the clinics.

We strike down the floating buffer zones around people entering and leaving the clinics because theyburden more speech than is necessary to serve the relevant governmental interests. The floating buffer zones prevent defendants--except for two sidewalk counselors, while they are tolerated by the targeted individual--from communicating a message from a normal conversational distance or handing leaflets to people entering or leaving the clinics who are walking on the public sidewalks. This is a broad prohibition, both because of the type of speech that is restricted and the nature of the location. Leafletting and commenting on matters of public concern are classic forms of speech that lie at the heart of the First Amendment, and speech in public areas is at its most protected on public sidewalks, a prototypical example of a traditional public forum. See, e.g., Boos v. Barry, 485 U.S. 312, 322 (1988); United States v. Grace, 461 U.S. 171, 180 (1983). On the other hand, we have before us a record that shows physically abusive conduct, harassment of the police that hampered law enforcement, and the tendency of even peaceful conversations to devolve into aggressive and sometimes violent conduct. In some situations, a record of abusive conduct makes a prohibition on classic speech in limited parts of a public sidewalk permissible. See, e.g., Part II-D infra; Madsen, 512 U. S. at 769-770. We need not decide whether the governmental interests involved would ever justify some sort of zone of separation between individuals entering the clinics and protesters, measured by the distance between the two. We hold here that because this broad prohibition on speech "floats," it cannot be sustained on this record.

Since the buffer zone floats, protesters on the public sidewalks who wish (i) to communicate their message to an incoming or outgoing patient or clinic employee and (ii) to remain as close as possible (while maintaining an acceptable conversational distance) to this individual, must move as the individual moves, maintaining 15 feet of separation. But this would be difficult to accomplishat, for instance, the GYN Womenservices clinic in Buffalo, one of the respondent clinics. The sidewalk outside the clinic is 17 feet wide. This means that protesters who wish to walk alongside an individual entering or leaving the clinic are pushed into the street, unless the individual walks a straight line on the outer edges of the sidewalk. Protesters could presumably walk 15 feet behind the individual, or 15 feet in front of the individual while walking backwards. But they are then faced with the problem of watching out for other individuals entering or leaving the clinic who are heading the opposite way from the individual they have targeted. With clinic escorts leaving the clinic to pick up incoming patients and entering the clinic to drop them off, it would be quite difficult for a protester who wishes to engage in peaceful expressive activities to know how to remain in compliance with the injunction. 9 This lack of certainty leads to a substantial risk that much more speech will be burdened than the injunction by its terms prohibits. That is, attempts to stand 15 feet from someone entering or leaving a clinic and to communicate a message--certainly protected on the face of the injunction--will be hazardous if one wishes to remain in compliance with the injunction. 10 Sincethere may well be other ways to both effect such separation and yet provide certainty (so that speech protected by the injunction's terms is not burdened), we conclude that the floating buffer zones burden more speech than necessary to serve the relevant governmental interests. Because we strike down the floating buffer zones, we do not address the constitutionality of the "cease and desist" provision that allows sidewalk counselors within those buffer zones.

We likewise strike down the floating buffer zones around vehicles. Nothing in the record or the District Court's opinion contradicts the commonsense notion that a more limited injunction--which keeps protesters away from driveways and parking lot entrances (as the fixed buffer zones do) and off the streets, for instance--would be sufficient to ensure that drivers are not confused about how to enter the clinic and are able to gain access to its driveways and parking lots safely and easily. In contrast, the 15 foot floating buffer zones would restrict the speech of those who simply line the sidewalk or curb in an effort to chant, shout, or hold signs peacefully. We therefore conclude that the floating buffer zones around vehicles burden more speech than necessary to serve the relevant governmental interests.

We uphold the fixed buffer zones around the doorways, driveways, and driveway entrances. These buffer zones are necessary to ensure that people and vehicles trying to enter or exit the clinic property or clinic parking lots can do so. As in Madsen, the record shows that protesters purposefully or effectively blocked or hindered people from entering and exiting the clinic doorways, from driving up to and away from clinic entrances, and from driving in and out of clinic parking lots. Based on this conduct--both before and after the TRO issued--the District Court was entitled to conclude that the only way to ensure access was to move back the demonstrations away from the driveways and parking lot entrances. Similarly, sidewalk counselors--both before and after the TRO--followed and crowded people right up to the doorways of the clinics (and sometimesbeyond) and then tended to stay in the doorways, shouting at the individuals who had managed to get inside. In addition, as the District Court found, defendants' harassment of the local police made it far from certain that the police would be able to quickly and effectively counteract protesters who blocked doorways or threatened the safety of entering patients and employees. Based on this conduct, the District Court was entitled to conclude that protesters who were allowed close to the entrances would continue right up to the entrance, and that the only way to ensure access was to move all protesters away from the doorways. 11 Although one might quibble about whether 15 feet is too great or too small a distance if the goal is to ensure access, we defer to the District Court's reasonable assessment of the number of feet necessary to keep the entrances clear. See Madsen, 512 U.S., at 769 -770 ("[S]ome deference must be given to the state court's familiarity with the facts and the background of the dispute between the parties even under our heightened review").

Petitioners claim that unchallenged provisions of the injunction are sufficient to ensure this access, pointingto the bans on trespassing, excessive noise, and "blocking, impeding or obstructing access to" the clinics. They claim that in light of these provisions, the only effect of a ban on "demonstrating" within the fixed buffer zone is "a ban on peaceful, nonobstructive demonstrations on public sidewalks or rights of way." Brief for Petitioners 47. This argument, however, ignores the record in this case. Based on defendants' past conduct, the District Court was entitled to conclude that some of the defendants who were allowed within 5 to 10 feet of clinic entrances would not merely engage in stationary, nonobstructive demonstrations but would continue to do what they had done before: aggressively follow and crowd individuals right up to the clinic door and then refuse to move, or purposefully mill around parking lot entrances in an effort to impede or block the progress of cars. And because defendants' harassment of police hampered the ability of the police to respond quickly to a problem, a prophylactic measure was even more appropriate. Cf. Burson v. Freeman, 504 U.S. 191, 206 -207 (1992) (upholding 100 foot "no campaign zone" around polling places: "Intimidation and interference laws fall short of serving a State's compelling interests because they `deal with only the most blatant and specific attempts' to impede elections. Moreover, because law enforcement officers generally are barred [under state law] from the vicinity of the polls to avoid any appearance of coercion in the electoral process, many acts of interference would go undetected. These undetected or less than blatant acts may nonetheless drive the voter away before remedial action can be taken" (citations omitted)). The ban on "blocking, impeding, and obstructing access" was therefore insufficient by itself to solve the problem, and the fixed buffer zone was a necessary restriction on defendants' demonstrations.

Petitioners also argue that under Madsen, the fixed buffer zones are invalid because the District Court couldnot impose a "speech restrictive" injunction (or TRO) without first trying a "non speech restrictive" injunction, as the trial court did in Madsen. But in Madsen we simply stated that the failure of an initial injunction "to accomplish its purpose may be taken into consideration" in determining the constitutionality of a later injunction. 512 U.S., at 770 . The fact that the District Court's TRO included a "speech restrictive" provision certainly does not mean that the subsequent injunction is automatically invalid. Since we can uphold the injunction under the Madsen standard without this "consideration" being present, petitioners' argument fails.

Finally, petitioners make several arguments that may be quickly refuted. They argue that, unlike Madsen, there is "no extraordinary record of pervasive lawlessness," Brief for Petitioners 45, and that the buffer zones are therefore unnecessary. As explained above, our review of the record convinces us that defendants' conduct was indeed extraordinary, and that based on this conduct the District Court was entitled to conclude that keeping defendants away from the entrances was necessary to ensure access. Petitioners also argue that the term "demonstrating" is vague. When the injunction is read as a whole, see Grayned v. City of Rockford, 408 U.S. 104, 110 (1972), we believe that people "of ordinary intelligence" (and certainly defendants, whose demonstrations led to this litigation in the first place) have been given "a reasonable opportunity to know what is prohibited," id., at 108.

Petitioners also contend that the "cease and desist" provision which limits the exception for sidewalk counselors in connection with the fixed buffer zone is contrary to the First Amendment. We doubt that the District Court's reason for including that provision--%to protect the right of the people approaching and entering the facilities to be left alone"--accurately reflects our First Amendment jurisprudence in this area. Madsensustained an injunction designed to secure physical access to the clinic, but not on the basis of any generalized right "to be left alone" on a public street or sidewalk. As we said in Madsen, quoting from Boos v. Barry, 485 U.S. 322 , " `[a]s a general matter, we have indicated that in public debate our own citizens must tolerate insulting, and even outrageous, speech in order to provide adequate breathing space to the freedoms protected by the First Amendment.' " 512 U.S., at 774 .

But as earlier noted, the entire exception for sidewalk counselors was an effort to enhance petitioners' speech rights, see n. 11, supra, and the "cease and desist" limitation must be assessed in that light. 12  

Petitioners and some of their amici attack the "cease and desist" provision accompanying the exception for sidewalk counselors as content based, because it allows a clinic patient to terminate a protester's right to speak based on, among other reasons, the patient's disagreement with the message being conveyed. But in Madsen we held that the injunction in that case was not content based, even though it was directed only at abortion protesters, because it was only abortion protesters who had done the acts which were being enjoined. Here, the District Court found that "[m]any of the `sidewalk counselors' and other defendants ha[d] been arrested on more than one occasion for harassment, yet persist in harassing and intimidating patients, patient escorts and medical staff." 799 F. Supp., at 1425. These counselors remain free to espouse their message outside the 15 foot buffer zone, and the condition on their freedom to espouse it within the buffer zone is the result of their own previous harassment and intimidation of patients. 13  

The judgment of the Court of Appeals is affirmed in part and reversed in part, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.