Corporate and Commercial Advertising

Learn a little more about corporate and commercial advertising and the restraints the first amendment holds.

The first amendment is one of the most popular amendments due to it being so unique in wording. This amendment provides American citizens with freedoms that many nations don’t provide. For example, freedom of religion, freedom of the press, freedom of petition, and freedom of assembly. But most importantly, in this blog, we will be reviewing the provided freedom of speech that the first amendment states.

Certain areas become gray with the first amendment. But commercial speech is a type of speech that is protected. So what is commercial speech? This is the idea that an organization has 100% control over how or what they advertise to the general public. This gray area comes into play because many question if a corporation should have the same amount of freedom rights as a human. Unfortunately, political issues do come into play and have to be considered, when taking a stance.

The timeline of how commercial speech became protected is unique. The supreme court always ruled against the idea of commercial speech being protected by the first amendment. The point of awareness was because of Valentine v. Chrestensen (1942) when a company used one side of a handout for advertising and the other for protesting a local city bill. Though the supreme court shot this idea down, this led to the Virginia State Board of Pharmacy v. Virginia Citizens Consumer Council, Inc. (1976). This case is where the supreme court ruled that commercial and corporate speech should be protected just at a lower tier. Now with the protection of the first amendment, commercial and corporate speech has become easier for organizations.

Let's take a look at where we can see these issues in the real world.

We have all seen a tobacco ad, right? How is something that is so harmful to humans able to advertise? It's because it is protected by the first amendment, they are just limited. In the 1990s more than 40 states filed suits against tobacco companies. The biggest issues the different states were reporting, was false information about the harmful effects their tobacco products have. They also fail to inform consumers in their advertising of the addiction that can arise from using their products. With the outcome of this rise in attention, the states and tobacco companies decided to meet in the middle. Both parties agreed that with limitations in the freedom of speech they would be able to continue their public advertising. This agreement is called the Master's Settlement Agreement.

It’s not only the tobacco industry that was majorly affected by the confusion of the first amendment. With this continuous gray area, businesses like alcohol, casinos, and pharmaceuticals have all seen the effects. This problem is never resting, we may only hear about the cases from half a century ago, but this is still an issue for corporate organizations today. For example, Barr v. The American Association of Political Consultants, just 2 years ago, went through a trial about the constitutional right of robocalls. Before you find a career in marketing and advertising, consider doing your homework to better understand the laws and regulations around commercial speech and corporate speech.