Chiles v. Salazar · ¶78

Petitioner Kaley Chiles is a licensed counselor who works in the State of Colorado. She does not dispute that conversion therapy can be harmful to minors in certain circumstances. Nor does she contest that Colorado has a significant interest in protecting minors from harm. Chiles complains nevertheless that, because the particular form of conversion therapy she wants to offer clients utilizes only speech, the First Amendment prevents Colorado from prohibiting that treatment. But “[t]he power of government to regulate the professions is not lost whenever the practice of a profession entails speech.” Lowe v. SEC, 472 U. S. 181, 228 (1985) (White, J., concurring in result). And “[m]edical professionals do not, generally speaking, have a right to use the Constitution as a weapon allowing them rigorously to control the content of . . . reasonable conditions” that a State imposes on licensed…

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