I love the Institute for Justice and the types of cases they take on. This one, unfortunately, is weak. If we say that paid health advice is protected speech, then we can no longer have licensing requirements for doctors who merely give advice.

I like doctors to be licensed. I'm normally anti-regulation, but this is an exception.

The real issue here is the onerous occupational licensing requirements in Florida. To be a nutritionist in Florida, you need a degree and 900 hours of work. That's far too much.

Occupational licensing has become a way for an industry to form a cartel. It's a major public policy problem, and the IJ is right to take it on. They've fought against it in a great many cases and had some success.

Unfortunately, though, the First Amendment is a blunt tool and doesn't work very well in this particular case. I wish they had a better tool.