Situation:

We’ve all been there before: have bad allergies, had surgery or teeth pulled or some other ailment that required pain killers. For a good portion of Americans, prescription drugs are a part of their every day routine. However, many Americans also have tight financial circumstances that make affording these drugs harder. So, conventional wisdom would be that people would seek to find the cheapest solution they can, right? How would you be able to go about that best? Probably seeing advertised prices by different pharmacies.

Well, in the state of Virginia, pharmacies used to not be allowed to advertise the prices of prescription drugs. The Commonwealth of Virginia said companies that did such would be guilty of “unprofessional conduct.” So what happened?

Legal background:

The Virginia District Court found out that drug prices varied throughout the state, which did not make the citizens of Virginia happy, as they had no way of knowing this. Individual consumers and consumer groups challenges the law, and won the case before the Supreme Court. Justice Harry Blackmun wrote for the majority, saying that while previous cases similar to this one had been ruled on the economic due process clause of the 14th Amendment, and not on free speech grounds. He said that this case was not only about commercial regulation, but also about the free flow of information, essentially saying that commercial free speech is OK, as long as it is distinguished from unprotected forms of speech, such as obscenity.

Questions:

Do you agree with Blackmun’s opinion on “commercial speech,” especially in light of recent rulings granting corporations First Amendment rights?

Should prices for prescription drugs be advertised?

In his dissent, Justice William Rehnquist said that the First Amendment should be limited to political and social issues. Do you agree with this?