A group of activists challenged the law after being convicted for protesting in front of the home of the mayor of Chicago regarding a lack of racial integration.

However, this Article does not apply to a person peacefully picketing his own residence or dwelling and does not prohibit the peaceful picketing of a place of employment involved in a labor dispute or the place of holding a meeting or assembly on premises commonly used to discuss subjects of general public interest.Members of the group then sued the government (including the city of Chicago, Cook County, and the state of Illinois) to block the law's enforcement and to have it declared unconstitutional.

[6] The members of the Committee Against Racism made a number of legal arguments, including that the statute was vague or overbroad, and Judge Grady disagreed with these, and the judge similarly disagreed with a number of technical arguments made by the government, such as waiver of certain issues because of the prior criminal trial (those who had been arrested simply plead guilty).

Justice Brennan, writing for the majority, explained that the court was applying the same reasoning it had used in Mosley: When government regulation discriminates among speech-related activities in a public forum, the Equal Protection Clause mandates that the legislation be finely tailored to serve substantial state interests, and the justifications offered for any distinctions it draws must be carefully scrutinized... As we explained in Mosley: "Chicago may not vindicate its interest in preventing disruption by the wholesale exclusion of picketing on all but one preferred subject.

The dissent expressed frustration that, while the Supreme Court had many "hymns of praise in prior opinions celebrating carefully drawn statutes," in cases like this, the state would have been better off including no exceptions at all in its law.