Cressman v. Thompson, No. 14-6020 (10th Cir. 2015)
Annotate this CaseIn 2007, the Oklahoma legislature created the Oklahoma License Plate Design Task Force to update the design of the standard Oklahoma vehicle license plate. The task force also viewed the redesign as an opportunity to “market Oklahoma as a tourist destination.” In 2008, the task force chose a design that included an image of a Native American man shooting an arrow towards the sky, and featured the words “Native America.” The image was based on a sculpture by a local artist which depicted the story of a young Apache warrior who fired an arrow that was blessed by a medicine man into the heavens; as the tale goes, the arrow carried prayers for rain to the Spirit World. Plaintiff-appellant Keith Cressman, professed "historic Christian beliefs," and objected to the license plate design, because in his view, taught that there were “multiple gods” and that “the arrow is an intermediary for prayer.” Finding the license plate image to be irreconcilable with his beliefs, plaintiff tried various means to avoid displaying it. Concealing a state-issued license plate was a misdemeanor under Oklahoma law. To avoid the image, plaintiff obtained specialty plates for his vehicles, paying a fee above that of a standard license plate (ranging from eighteen to thirty-eight dollars). Plaintiff sought reimbursement of that vanity-plate-fee from the State of Oklahoma, or be allowed to cover the image on the standard plate. When he did not receive a response to these requests, plaintiff brought a 42 U.S.C. 1983 civil-rights lawsuit, alleging that he was forced to display the Native American image (and thereby communicate its allegedly pantheistic message) in violation of his free-speech, free-exercise, and due-process rights under the First and Fourteenth Amendments. He sought an injunction prohibiting state officials from prosecuting him for covering the image on his license plate or, alternatively, an order requiring the Oklahoma Tax Commission to provide him with a specialty license plate at the same cost as a standard license plate. Defendants filed motions to dismiss based on a lack of standing and a failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted. The district court found that plaintiff had standing, but nonetheless dismissed the complaint. In a prior appeal, the Tenth Circuit determined that plaintiff had standing and that he had stated a plausible compelled-speech claim at the motion-to-dismiss stage. On remand, and after a bench trial, the district court concluded that a reasonable person would not understand the vehicle license plate image to convey the pantheistic message to which plaintiff objected; it thus held that he was not compelled to speak. The Tenth Circuit affirmed: "Mr. Cressman has repeatedly stated, both before this court and the district court, that he does not object to this message. His lack of objection to the only message that a reasonable observer would discern from the image is fatal to his compelled-speech claim; he has not been compelled to express a view he otherwise would not."
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.