CONSTITUTIONAL LAW - FOURTEENTH AMENDMENT - PRIVILEGES AND IMMUNITIES CLAUSE - CIVIL LIBERTIES - THE HAGUE CASE

The decisions of the United States Supreme Court in recent years, interpreting the first section of the Fourteenth Amendment, have manifested two striking changes in trend. The first is towards less judicial restraint on governmental regulation of business; that is, towards tolerance of diminished "business liberty." The other is towards greater judicial restraint on governmental interference with individual liberty, commonly called civil liberty. A recent case/ which upheld freedom of speech and assembly and invalidated a city ordinance requiring the obtaining of a permit as prerequisite to a public meeting, not only illustrates the latter of these trends, but is unusual in that it extends the application of the "privileges and immunities clause" as a basis for the decision.