Licensing and exam requirements for tour guides

Fri Jul 4 12:50:32 PDT 2008

1.  The government licenses all sorts of things and people including music
halls, car inspectors, bars, lecture halls, schools, teachers, pharmacists,
doctors, lawyers, bus drivers, and many, many others.

2.  Requiring some knowledge of local history and geography to be a guide
seems to be a way to protect the public from charlatans.

3.  Can the government regulate guides by requiring them not to tell
falsehoods or give false information?  Last I checked the government could
do that for advertising and product information in general.  What
distinguishes this information?

4.  If 3 is true, then licensing seems to a permissible means to accomplish
this commercial end?  No?

5.  Even if the licensed guide then does not give accurate information, that
does not seem to undercut the power of the government to decide that this is
a rational means by which to accomplish its legitimate end.

6.  Now, in what way would free speech be implicated here?  Just the same as
any other sort of advertising, it seems to me.

7.  It seems to me that  the government could even regulate content to a
limited extent or  it could  simply decide that guides want to be
knowledgeable and will try to give good information out if they have it
(hence a licensing exam and training) and not police it.  They could use
"shoppers" to check up on guides during the year.  Or other approaches, I
suppose.

8.  One would, of course, need to distinguish hard-edged facts from
interpretation and opinion.  It is pretty clear that Philadelphia was not
founded by Incas in 1100 CE.  Nor by the Vikings 10 years ago.  But the
adequacy of the Declaration and the Constitution are subject to debate and
less regulation -- assuming the guides are not hired by the government to
get out its particular message.

I don't know that this actually answers Prof. Cruz's query.

Steve

On Fri, Jul 4, 2008 at 1:33 PM, David Cruz <dcruz at law.usc.edu> wrote:

>  Just to be clear:
>
>
>
> Steve, is it your position that the government can require any knowledge it
> wants to license tour guides, and penalize those who give tours
> (commercially?) without licenses, without implicating the First Amendment,
> so long as the tour guides remain free to say or not say whatever they want
> (despite having passed tests indicating certain things)?  So, the government
> could require extensive knowledge of Philadelphia history, but couldn't
> revoke licenses from guides who then disseminate lies (here meaning
> statements contradictory to those historical claims whose approved contours
> they reflected in their licensing exams)?
>
 And that the government could require extensive knowledge of differential
> equations for Philadelphia tour guides without implicating the First
> Amendment (though perhaps there would be a due process problem)?  Or are you
> saying the First Amendment is implicated but only demands a rational basis
> for whatever tests are imposed?  Or are you saying none of the above?
>
>
>
> David B. Cruz
>
> Professor of Law
>
> University of Southern California Gould School of Law
>
> Los Angeles, CA 90089-0071
>
> U.S.A.
>
>
>  ------------------------------
>
> *From:* conlawprof-bounces at lists.ucla.edu [mailto:
> conlawprof-bounces at lists.ucla.edu] *On Behalf Of *Steven Jamar
> *Sent:* Friday, July 04, 2008 10:23 AM
> *Cc:* conlawprof at lists.ucla.edu
> *Subject:* Re: Licensing and exam requirements for tour guides
> *Importance:* Low
>
>
>
> Surely the government can license guides, as noted by Prof. Wasserman.  The
> main issue is whether the government stop someone from acting as a guide for
> pay unless the person has a license.  And then require that person to pass a
> test.  I don't see any restriction in speech here.  The only time there
> would be a speech restriction is when the government required the guide to
> give certain speeches on the tour.
>
>
>
> Requiring knowledge as reflected in a test and some training through a
> course to get a license seems unobjectionable under first amendment grounds.
>
>
>
> There is no direct regulation of speech through this.
>
>
>
> Anyone would still be free to be an unlicensed soap-box "guide" or unpaid
> guide (in my hypo) without the course and test.
>
>
>
> This person is not a private guide of the Hershey Factory (back when they
> gave tours).  It is a guide of a city with a history and geography.
>
>
>
> Though, I do in fact enjoy some guides I've had in some parts of the world
> where one story that is associated with one particular location ends up
> being transfered through time and space to many different times and places
> -- and the story is a good one and true (the events happened even if not
> exactly when or where the guide claims), even if nearly all of the tourists
> don't know the degree of embellishment, fabrication, misplacement or
> mistiming of it.
>
>
>
> But the practice of places like the Galapagos of requiring high levels of
> training as part of an education function or of Greece as part of a heritage
> preservation and dissemination function seem to be pretty good ideas to me.
>
>
>
> Speech is not being impacted much, if at all, by this requirement.
>
>
>
> Steve
>
>
>
> --
>
> Prof. Steven D. Jamar                               vox:  202-806-8017
>
> Howard University School of Law                     fax:  202-806-8567
>
> 2900 Van Ness Street NW                   *mailto:stevenjamar at gmail.com<stevenjamar at gmail.com>
> *
>
> Washington, DC  20008                                http://iipsj.com/SDJ/
>
>
>
> "Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more
> violent.  It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage - to move in the
> opposite direction."
>
>
>
> Albert Einstein
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> To post, send message to Conlawprof at lists.ucla.edu
> To subscribe, unsubscribe, change options, or get password, see
> http://lists.ucla.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/conlawprof
>
> Please note that messages sent to this large list cannot be viewed as
> private.  Anyone can subscribe to the list and read messages that are
> posted; people can read the Web archives; and list members can (rightly or
> wrongly) forward the messages to others.
>

-- 
Prof. Steven Jamar
Howard University School of Law
Associate Director, Institute of Intellectual Property and Social Justice
(IIPSJ) Inc.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.ucla.edu/pipermail/conlawprof/attachments/20080704/3932d2d2/attachment.htm 