| Bates v. City of Little Rock | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Argued November 18, 1959 Decided February 23, 1960 | |
| Full case name | Bates et al. v. City of Little Rock et al. |
| Citations | 361 U.S. 516 ( more ) 80 S. Ct. 412; 4 L. Ed. 2d 480; 1960 U.S. LEXIS 1601 |
| Case history | |
| Prior | Certiorari to the Supreme Court of Arkansas |
| Subsequent | 229 Ark. 819, 319 S. W. 2d 37, reversed. |
| Holding | |
| State governments cannot compel the disclosure of an organization's membership lists when it inhibits freedom of association. | |
| Court membership | |
| |
| Case opinions | |
| Majority | Stewart, joined by unanimous |
| Concurrence | Black & Douglas |
| Laws applied | |
| U.S. Const. amend. I and XIV | |
Bates v. City of Little Rock, 361 U.S. 516 (1960), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution forbade state government to compel the disclosure of an organization's membership lists via a tax-exemption regulatory scheme.
This was a companion case to NAACP v. Alabama (1958), which also held that NAACP membership records are protected by First Amendment freedom of association, and Talley v. California (1960), which held that Talley, a civil rights activist, could not be fined for an anonymous flyer. These cases help establish the right to privacy under the First Amendment, expanded on in Roe v. Wade (1973) and Brown v. Socialist Workers '74 Campaign Committee (1982).[ citation needed ]
