Chiles v. Salazar · ¶123

The “speech incident to conduct” doctrine thus ably balances the interests at stake by accommodating a State's traditional police power to regulate the practice of medicine for the protection of its residents while also ensuring that speech is not being targeted. As we explained in NIFLA, that doctrine recognizes that the treatments provided by licensed medical professionals can be prohibited even if, by doing so, the State incidentally restricts those providers' speech. Id., at 769–770. This is constitutionally permissible precisely because the restricted speech is not being regulated “as speech”—i. e., based on or due to its message or expressive content. Rather, the speech restriction is a mere byproduct of the State's healthcare regulation.

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