Thanks for posting - I would never have seen this otherwise.
This attitude is quite typical in my experience (I am a council person in a small town).
At least Gould’s town attorney sees the free speech violation for what it is. In my little village, the town attorney is as bad as the arrogant council members.
This was manifested in a ludicrous court case that our taxpayers had to waste their money on. Our town already had an ordinance that was a similarly blatant violation of the First Amendment.
When a citizen challenged the stupid ordinance, our town attorney urged the council to show this uppity citizen who was boss.
Our sheep-like council voted to support the town atty, and we went to court to defend the idiotic UNconstitutional ordinance. Only to lose, as was entirely predictable.
On what grounds did you lose? This seems like a blatant infringement of the First Amendment right to assembly. Did you appeal?
Oh, sorry. When you said “you” lost, I thought you meant the people who were sueing that Council, not the Council itself. What was the Council’s reaction when the law was overturned?
And what was going on that they didn’t want the public to know?