Gospel Army v. City of Los Angeles

Certain ordinances of the City of Los Angeles regulate transactions in secondhand goods and solicitations for charitable purposes. Plaintiff, an incorporated religious organization, brought this suit to enjoin the enforcement of these ordinances as applied to it on the ground they abridged its religious liberty in violation of the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of California. The trial court found that plaintiff is ‘‘ engaged exclusively in the promulgation, by literature and word of mouth, of its religious beliefs, by and through its auxiliaries, and in the procuring…