In the case of Pittsburgh Press Co. v. Pittsburgh Commission on Human Relations et al., 1972, the U.S Supreme Court upheld a ruling that prohibited sex-segregated job advertisements in newspapers. The Pittsburgh Press Company had been publishing employment ads in separate columns for men and women, which was challenged by the city's Commission on Human Relations as discriminatory under local laws. The newspaper company argued that this violated their First Amendment rights to free speech and press freedom. However, the court ruled 5-4 against them stating that commercial speech related to illegal activity (in this case, discrimination based on gender) is not protected by the First Amendment. This decision marked an important step towards equal opportunity employment practices.

In the dissenting opinion for Pittsburgh Press Co. v. Pittsburgh Commission on Human Relations, Justice William O. Douglas argued that the majority's decision infringed upon First Amendment rights of freedom of speech and press by allowing government regulation to dictate how a newspaper could categorize its classified ads. He contended that this was an overreach into editorial control and judgment, which should be protected from governmental interference under the First Amendment unless there is a compelling state interest at stake such as national security or public safety concerns - neither of which were present in this case involving gender-based job advertisements. Furthermore, he asserted that it was not within the Court’s purview to decide what constitutes harmful or offensive content; rather, these determinations should be left up to individual readers and consumers who can choose whether or not they wish to engage with certain types of content.