the action of a State court
in a pending case was privileged under this amendment as an exercise of
the right of petition. In Thomas _v._ Collins[260] a statute requiring
registration before solicitation of union membership was found to
violate the right of peaceable assembly. But a closely divided Court
subsequently sustained an order of a State Employment Relations Board
forbidding work stoppages by the calling of special union meetings
during working hours.[261] Finally, a divided Court held June 4, 1951,
that a combination to break up by force and threats of force of a
meeting called for the purpose of adopting a resolution against the
Marshall Plan did not afford a right of action against the conspirators
under the Ku Klux Act of April 20, 1871.[262] While the complaint
alleged that the conspiracy was entered into for the purpose of
depriving the plaintiffs as citizens of the United States of their right
"peaceably to assemble for the purpose of discussing and communicating
upon national public issues," the Ku Klux Act was found not to extend
to violations of that right except by State acts depriving persons of
their rights under the Fourteenth Amendment. But the Court, perhaps
significantly, left open the question whether Congress can protect such
rights against private action. "It is not for this Court," remarked
Justice Jackson sententiously, "to compete with Congress or attempt to
replace it as the Nation's law-making body."[263]

LOBBYING AND THE RIGHT OF PETITION

Today lobbying is frequently regarded as the most important expression
of the right of petition. During the last half century lobbying has
reached tremendous proportions; and there have been four Congressional
investigations of such activities, the latest by a Committee of the
House of Representatives. Meantime, in 1946 Congress passed the Federal
Regulation of Lobbying Act, under which more than 2,000 lobbyists have
registered and 495 organizations report lobbying contributions and
expenditures.[264] Recently doubts have been cast upon the
constitutionality of this statute by two decisions of lower federal
courts sitting in the District of Columbia. According to the District
Court therein, to subject a person, whose "principal purpose * * * is to
aid" in the defeat or passage of legislation and who violates this Act
by failing to file a detailed accounting, to a penalty entailing a
three-year prohibition from lobbying is to deprive such person