The expressive liberty of beggars

If the government wishes to limit entails that every citizen reserves for himself or negate the freedom of expression of some of or herself the right to assess the evidence and its citizens, then it can do so justifiably only if weigh the widest possible range of arguments it can show that the good to be promoted is su- in deciding what to believe and what policies to premely important and the mea [...] More- ernments to promote such goals as the efficient over, it must show that the good consequences passage of automobiles along the city’s streets, of such liberty-limiting behaviour significantly the clean and tidy appearance of those streets, outweigh the bad.6 and the safe passage of pedestrians along the It has been conceded that promoting the safe city’s sidewalks. [...] But if an attempt is made to restrict demonstrations on the ground that they would the right of peaceful beggars to solicit help from interfere with the efficient flow of traffic, or if pedestrians, then there is a burden of proof on it were to ban political posters and leaflets on government to show that the presence of peaceful the grounds that they cause mess and debris on panhandlers on the si [...] Encounters with homeless people — who gars in the downtown area has the potential to often look bedraggled and disheveled and who contribute to a deterioration of the downtown, may not have had recent opportunity to bathe one ought to keep in mind that the downtowns or shave — can be shocking or even disgusting of many large Canadian cities seem to flourish to the sensibilities of some middle-clas [...] Kelling and Coles, the authors of Fixing Bro- That’s why it would be unwise to rely on a ken Windows,23 famously contend that beggars claim, such as that made by Kelling and Coles, are a prime source of the kind of “urban chaos” that the criminalization of panhandling and other in which crime is alleged to flourish.