Mr. Justice Roberts

delivered the opinion of the Court.

The respondent, a citizen of Florida, owns a former United States Navy submarine which he exhibits for profit. *53In 1940 he brought it to New York City and moored it at a State pier in the East River. He prepared and printed a handbill advertising the boat and soliciting visitors for a stated admission fee. On his attempting to distribute the bill in the city streets, he was advised by the petitioner, as Police Commissioner, that this activity would violate § 318 of the Sanitary Code, which forbids distribution in the streets of commercial and business advertising matter,1 but was told that he might freely distribute handbills solely devoted to “information or a public protest.”

Respondent thereupon prepared and showed to the petitioner, in proof form, a double-faced handbill. On one side was a revision of the original, altered by the removal of the statement as to admission fee but consisting only of commercial advertising. On the other side was a protest against the action of the City Dock Department in refusing the respondent wharfage facilities at a city pier for the exhibition of his submarine, but no commercial advertising. The Police Department advised that distribution of a bill containing only the protest would not violate § 318, and would not be restrained, but that distribution of the double-faced bill was prohibited. The respondent, nevertheless, proceeded with the printing of his proposed bill and started to distribute it. He was restrained by the police.

*54Respondent then brought this suit to enjoin the petitioner from interfering with the distribution. In his complaint he alleged diversity of citizenship; an amount in controversy in excess of 13,000; the acts and threats of the petitioner under the purported authority of § 318; asserted a consequent violation of § 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution; and prayed an injunction. The District Court granted an interlocutory injunction,2 and after trial on a stipulation from which the facts appear as above recited, granted a permanent injunction. The Circuit Court of Appeals, by a divided court, affirmed.3

The question is whether the application of the ordinance to the respondent’s activity was, in the circumstances, an unconstitutional abridgement of the freedom of the press and of speech.

1. This court has unequivocally held that the streets are proper places for the exercise of the freedom of communicating information and disseminating opinion and that, though the states and municipalities may appropriately regulate the privilege in the public interest, they may not unduly burden or proscribe its employment in these public thoroughfares. We are equally clear that the Constitution imposes no such restraint on government as respects purely commercial advertising. Whether, and to what extent, one may promote or pursue a gainful occupation in the streets, to what extent such activity shall be adjudged a derogation of the public right of user, are matters for legislative judgment. The question is not whether the legislative body may interfere with the harmless pursuit of a lawful business, but whether it must permit such pursuit by what it deems an undesirable invasion of, or interference with, the full and free use of the *55highways by the people in fulfillment of the public use to which streets are dedicated. If the respondent was attempting to use the streets of New York by distributing commercial advertising, the prohibition of the code provision was lawfully invoked against his conduct.

2. The respondent contends that, in truth, he was engaged in the dissemination of matter proper for public information, none the less so because there was inextricably attached to the medium of such dissemination commercial advertising matter. The court below appears to have taken this view, since it adverts to the the difficulty of apportioning, in a given case, the contents of the communication as between what is of public interest and what is for private profit. We need not indulge nice appraisal based upon subtle distinctions in the present instance nor assume possible cases not now presented. It is enough for the present purpose that the stipulated facts justify the conclusion that the affixing of the protest against official conduct to the advertising circular was with the intent, and for the purpose, of evading the prohibition of the ordinance. If that evasion were successful, every merchant who desires to broadcast advertising leaflets in the streets need only append a civic appeal, or a moral platitude, to achieve immunity from the law’s command.

The decree is

Reversed.

Mr. Justice Blackmun

delivered the opinion of the Court.

The plaintiff-appellees in this case attack, as violative of the First and Fourteenth Amendments,1 that portion of § 54-524.35 of Va. Code Ann. (1974),-which provides that a pharmacist licensed in Virginia is guilty of unpro*750fessional conduct if he “(3) publishes, advertises or promotes, directly or indirectly, in any manner whatsoever, any amount, price, fee, premium, discount, rebate or credit terms ... for any drugs which may be dispensed only by prescription.” 2 The three-judge District Court declared the quoted portion of the statute “void and of no effect,” Jurisdictional Statement, App. 1, and enjoined the defendant-appellants, the Virginia State Board of Pharmacy and the individual members of that Board, from enforcing it. 373 F. Supp. 683 (ED Va. 1974). We noted probable jurisdiction of the appeal. 420 U. S. 971 (1975).

I

Since the challenged restraint is one that peculiarly concerns the licensed pharmacist in Virginia, we begin with a description of that profession as it exists under Virginia law.

The “practice of pharmacy” is statutorily declared to be “a professional practice affecting the public health, safety and welfare,” and to be “subject to regulation and control in the public interest.” Va. Code Ann. § 54-524.2 (a) (1974).3 Indeed, the practice is subject to ex*751tensive regulation aimed at preserving high professional standards. The regulatory body is the appellant Virginia State Board of Pharmacy. The Board is broadly charged by statute with various responsibilities, including the “ [m] aintenance of the quality, quantity, integrity, safety and efficacy of drugs or devices distributed, dispensed or administered.” § 54M524.I6 (a). It also is to concern itself with “ [m] aintaining the integrity of, and public confidence in, the profession and improving the delivery of quality pharmaceutical services to the citizens of Virginia.” § 54-524.16 (d). The Board is empowered to “make such bylaws, rules and regulations ... as may be necessary for the lawful exercise of its powers.” § 54-524.17.

The Board is also the licensing authority. It may issue a license, necessary for the practice of pharmacy in the State, only upon evidence that the applicant is “of good moral character,” is a graduate in pharmacy of a school approved by the Board, and has had “a suitable period of experience [the period required not to exceed 12 months] acceptable to the Board.” § 54 — 524.21. The applicant must pass the examination prescribed by the Board. Ibid. One approved school is the School of Pharmacy of the Medical College of Virginia, where the curriculum is for three years following two years of college. Prescribed prepharmacy courses, such as biology and chemistry, are to be taken in college, and study requirements at the school itself include courses in organic chemistry, biochemistry, comparative anatomy, physiology, and pharmacology. Students are also trained in the ethics of the profession, and there is some clinical experience in the school’s hospital pharmacies and in the medical center operated by the Medical College. This *752is “a rigid, demanding curriculum in terms of what the pharmacy student is expected to know about drugs.” 4

Once licensed, a pharmacist is subject to a civil monetary penalty, or to revocation or suspension of his license, if the Board finds that he “is not of good moral character,” or has violated any of a number of stated professional standards (among them that he not be “negligent in the practice of pharmacy” or have engaged in “fraud or deceit upon the consumer ... in connection with the practice of pharmacy”), or is guilty of “unprofessional conduct.” §54^-524.22:1. “Unprofessional conduct” is specifically defined in § 54-524.35, n. 2, supra, the third numbered phrase of which relates to advertising of the price for any prescription drug, and is the subject of this litigation.

Inasmuch as only a licensed pharmacist may dispense prescription drugs in Virginia, § 54^-524.48,5 advertising or other affirmative dissemination of prescription drug price information is effectively forbidden in the State. Some pharmacies refuse even to quote prescription drug prices over the telephone. The Board’s position, however, is that this would not constitute an unprofessional publication.6 It is clear, nonetheless, that all advertising of such prices, in the normal sense, is forbidden. The prohibition does not extend to nonprescription drugs, but neither is it confined to prescriptions that the pharmacist compounds himself. Indeed, about 95% of all prescriptions now are filled with dosage forms prepared by the pharmaceutical manufacturer.7

*753II

This is not the first challenge to the constitutionality of § 54^-524.35 and what is now its third-numbered phrase. Shortly after the phrase was added to the statute in 1968,8 a suit seeking to enjoin its operation was instituted by a drug retailing company and one of its pharmacists. Although the First Amendment was invoked, the challenge appears to have been based primarily on the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment. In any event, the prohibition on drug price advertising was upheld. Patterson Drug Co. v. Kingery, 305 F. Supp. 821 (WD Va. 1969). The three-judge court did find that the dispensation of prescription drugs “affects the public health, safety and welfare.” Id., at 824 — 825. No appeal was taken.

The present, and second, attack on the statute is one made not by one directly subject to its prohibition, that is, a pharmacist, but by prescription drug consumers who claim that they would greatly benefit if the prohibition were lifted and advertising freely allowed. The plaintiffs are an individual Virginia resident who suffers from diseases that require her to take prescription drugs on a daily basis,9 and two nonprofit organizations.10 Their *754claim is that the First Amendment entitles the user of prescription drugs to receive information that pharmacists wish to communicate to them through advertising and other promotional means, concerning the prices of such drugs.

Certainly that information may be of value. Drug prices in Virginia, for both prescription and nonprescription items, strikingly vary from outlet to outlet even within the same locality. It is stipulated, for example, that in Richmond “the cost of 40 Achromycin tablets ranges from $2.59 to $6.00, a difference of 140% [sic],” and that in the Newport News-Hampton area the cost of tetracycline ranges from $1.20 to $9.00, a difference of 650%.11

The District Court seized on the identity of the plaintiff-appellees as consumers as a feature distinguishing the *755present case from Patterson Drug Co. v. Kingery, supra. Because the unsuccessful plaintiffs in that earlier case were pharmacists, the court said, “theirs was a prima facie commercial approach,” 373 F. Supp., at 686. The present plaintiffs, on the other hand, were asserting an interest in their own health that was “fundamentally deeper than a trade consideration.” Ibid. In the District Court’s view, the expression in Valentine v. Chrestensen, 316 U. S. 52, 54—55 (1942), to the effect that “purely commercial advertising” is not protected had been tempered, by later decisions of this Court, to the point that First Amendment interests in the free flow of price information could be found to outweigh the countervailing interests of the State. The strength of the interest in the free flow of drug price information was borne out, the court felt, by the fact that three States by court decision had struck down their prohibitions on drug price advertising. Florida Board of Pharmacy v. Webb’s City, Inc., 219 So. 2d 681 (Fla. 1969); Maryland Board of Pharmacy v. Sav-A-Lot, Inc., 270 Md. 103, 311 A. 2d 242 (1973); Pennsylvania State Board of Pharmacy v. Pastor, 441 Pa. 186, 272 A. 2d 487 (1971).12 The District Court recognized that this Court had upheld — against federal constitutional challenges other than on First Amendment grounds — state restric*756tions on the advertisement of prices for optometrists’ services, Head v. New Mexico Board, 374 U. S. 424 (1963), for eyeglass frames, Williamson v. Lee Optical Co., 348 U. S. 483 (1955), and for dentists’ services, Semler v. Dental Examiners, 294 U. S. 608 (1935).13 The same dangers of abuse and deception were not thought to be present, however, when the advertised commodity was prescribed by a physician for his individual patient and was dispensed by a licensed pharmacist. The Board failed to justify the statute adequately, and it had to fall. 373 F. Supp., at 686-687.

Ill

The question first arises whether, even assuming that First Amendment protection attaches to the flow of drug price information, it is a protection enjoyed by the ap-pellees as recipients of the information, and not solely, if at all, by the advertisers themselves who seek to disseminate that information.

Freedom of speech presupposes a willing speaker. But where a speaker exists, as is the case here,14 the protection afforded is to the communication, to its source and to its recipients both. This is clear from the decided cases. In Lament v. Postmaster General, 381 U. S. 301 (1965), the Court upheld the First Amendment rights of citizens to receive political publications sent from abroad. *757More recently, in Kleindienst v. Mandel, 408 U. S. 753, 762-763 (1972), we acknowledged .that this Court has referred to a First Amendment right to “receive information and ideas,” and that freedom of speech “ ‘necessarily protects the right to receive.’ ” And in Procunier v. Martinez, 416 U. S. 396, 408-409 (1974), where censorship of prison inmates’ mail was under examination, we thought it unnecessary to assess the First Amendment rights of the inmates themselves, for it was reasoned that such censorship equally infringed the rights of noninmates to whom the correspondence was addressed. There are numerous other expressions to the same effect in the Court’s decisions. See, e. g„ Red Lion Broadcasting Co. v. FCC, 395 U. S. 367, 390 (1969); Stanley v. Georgia, 394 U. S. 557, 564 (1969); Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U. S. 479, 482 (1965); Marsh v. Alabama, 326 U. S. 501, 505 (1946); Thomas v. Collins, 323 U. S. 516, 534 (1945); Martin v. Struthers, 319 U. S. 141, 143 (1943). If there is a right to advertise, there is a reciprocal right to receive the advertising, and it may be asserted by these appellees.15

*758IV

The appellants contend that the advertisement of prescription drug prices is outside the protection of the First Amendment because it is “commercial speech.” There can be no question that in past decisions the Court has given some indication that commercial speech is unprotected. In Valentine v. Chrestensen, supra, the Court upheld a New York statute that prohibited the distribution of any “handbill, circular ... or other advertising matter whatsoever in or upon any street.” The Court concluded that, although the First Amendment would forbid the banning of all communication by handbill in the public thoroughfares, it imposed “no such restraint on government as respects purely commercial advertising.” 316 U. S., at 54. Further support for a “commercial speech” exception to the First Amendment may perhaps be found in Breard v. Alexandria, 341 U. S. 622 (1951), where the Court upheld a conviction for violation of an ordinance prohibiting door-to-door solicitation of magazine subscriptions. The Court reasoned: “The selling . . . brings into the transaction a commercial feature,” and it distinguished Martin v. Struthers, supra, where it had reversed a conviction for door-to-door distribution of leaflets publicizing a religious meeting, as a case involving “no element of the commercial.” 341 U. S., at 642-643. Moreover, the Court several times has stressed that communications to which First Amendment protection was given were not “purely commercial.” New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254, 266 *759(1964); Thomas v. Collins, 323 U. S., at 533; Murdock v. Pennsylvania, 319 U. S. 105, 111 (1943); Jamison v. Texas, 318 U. S. 413, 417 (1943).

Since the decision in Breará, however, the Court has never denied protection on the ground that the speech in issue was "commercial speech.” That simplistic approach, which by then had come under criticism or was regarded as of doubtful validity by Members of the Court,16 was avoided in Pittsburgh Press Co. v. Human Relations Comm’n, 413 U. S. 376 (1973). There the Court upheld an ordinance prohibiting newspapers from listing employment advertisements in columns according to whether male or female employees were sought to be hired. The Court, to be sure, characterized the advertisements as “classic examples of commercial speech,” id., at 385, and a newspaper’s printing of the advertisements as of the same character. The Court, however, upheld the ordinance on the ground that the restriction it imposed was permissible because the discriminatory hirings proposed by the advertisements, and by their newspaper layout, were themselves illegal.

Last Term, in Bigelow v. Virginia, 421 U. S. 809 (1975), the notion of unprotected “commercial speech” all but passed from the scene. We reversed a conviction for violation of a Virginia statute that made the circulation of any publication to encourage or promote the *760processing of an abortion in Virginia a misdemeanor. The defendant had published in his newspaper the availability of abortions in New York. The advertisement in question, in addition to announcing that abortions were legal in New York, offered the services of a referral agency in that State. We rejected the contention that the publication was unprotected because it was commercial. Chrestenserís continued validity was questioned, and its holding was described as “distinctly a limited one” that merely upheld “a reasonable regulation of the manner in which commercial advertising could be distributed.” 421 U. S., at 819. We concluded that “the Virginia courts erred in their assumptions that advertising, as such, was entitled to no First Amendment protection,” and we observed that the “relationship of speech to the marketplace of products or of services does not make it valueless in the marketplace of ideas.” Id., at 825-826.

Some fragment of hope for the continuing validity of a “commercial speech” exception arguably might have persisted because of the subject matter of the advertisement in Bigelow, We noted that in announcing the availability of legal abortions in New York, the advertisement “did more than simply propose a commercial transaction. It contained factual material of clear ‘public interest.’ ” Id., at 822. And, of course, the advertisement related to activity with which, at least in some respects, the State could not interfere. See Roe v. Wade, 410 U. S. 113 (1973); Doe v. Bolton, 410 U. S. 179 (1973). Indeed, we observed: “We need not decide in this case the precise extent to which the First Amendment permits regulation of advertising that is related to activities the State may legitimately regulate or even prohibit.” 421 U. S., at 825.

Here, in contrast, the question whether there is a First Amendment exception for “commercial speech” is *761squarely before us. Our pharmacist does not wish to editorialize on any subject, cultural, philosophical, or political. He does not wish to report any particularly newsworthy fact, or to make generalized observations even about commercial matters. The “idea” he wishes to communicate is simply this: “I will sell you the X prescription drug at the Y price.” Our question, then, is whether this communication is wholly outside the protection of the First Amendment.

V

We begin with several propositions that already are settled or beyond serious dispute. It is clear, for example, that speech does not lose its First Amendment protection because money is spent to project it, as in a paid advertisement of one form or another. Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1, 35-59 (1976); Pittsburgh Press Co. v. Human Relations Comm’n, 413 U. S., at 384; New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S., at 266. Speech likewise is protected even though it is carried in a form that is “sold” for profit, Smith v. California, 361 U. S. 147, 150 (1959) (books); Joseph Burstyn, Inc. v. Wilson, 343 U. S. 495, 501 (1952) (motion pictures); Murdock v. Pennsylvania, 319 U. S., at 111 (religious literature), and even though it may involve a solicitation to purchase or otherwise pay or contribute money. New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, supra; NAACP v. Button, 371 U. S. 415, 429 (1963); Jamison v. Texas, 318 U. S., at 417; Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U. S. 296, 306-307 (1940).

If there is a kind of commercial speech that lacks all First Amendment protection, therefore, it must be distinguished by its content. Yet the speech whose content deprives it of protection cannot simply be speech on a commercial subject. No one would contend that our pharmacist may be prevented from being heard on *762the subject of whether, in general, pharmaceutical prices should be regulated, or their advertisement forbidden. Nor can it be dispositive that a commercial advertisement is noneditorial, and merely reports a fact. Purely factual matter of public interest may claim protection. Bigelow v. Virginia, 421 U. S., at 822; Thornhill v. Alabama, 310 U. S. 88, 102 (1940).

Our question is whether speech which does “no more than propose a commercial transaction,” Pittsburgh Press Co. v. Human Relations Comm'n, 413 U. S., at 385, is so removed from any “exposition of ideas,” Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, 315 U. S. 568, 572 (1942), and from “ ‘truth, science, morality, and arts in general, in its diffusion of liberal sentiments on the administration of Government,’ ” Roth v. United States, 354 U. S. 476, 484 (1957), that it lacks all protection. Our answer is that it is not.

Focusing first on the individual parties to the transaction that is proposed in the commercial advertisement, we may assume that the advertiser’s interest is a purely economic one. That hardly disqualifies him from protection under the First Amendment. The interests of the contestants in a labor dispute are primarily economic, but it has long been settled that both the employee and the employer are protected by the First Amendment when they express themselves on the merits of the dispute in order to influence its outcome. See, e. g., NLRB v. Gissel Packing Co., 395 U. S. 575, 617-618 (1969); NLRB v. Virginia Electric & Power Co., 314 U. S. 469, 477 (1941); AFL v. Swing, 312 U. S. 321, 325-326 (1941); Thornhill v. Alabama, 310 U. S., at 102. We know of no requirement that, in order to avail themselves of First Amendment protection, the parties to a labor dispute need address themselves to the merits of unionism in general *763or to any subject beyond their immediate dispute.17- It was observed in Thornhill that “the practices in a single factory may have economic repercussions upon a whole region and affect widespread systems of marketing.” Id., at 103. Since the fate of such a “single factory” could as well turn on its ability to advertise its product as on the resolution of its labor difficulties, we see no satisfactory distinction between the two kinds of speech.

As to the particular consumer’s interest in the free flow of commercial information, that interest may be as keen, if not keener by far, than his interest in the day’s most urgent political debate. Appellees’ case in this respect is a convincing one. Those whom the suppression of prescription drug price information hits the hardest are the poor, the sick, and particularly the aged. A disproportionate amount of their income tends to be spent on prescription drugs; yet they are the least able to learn, by shopping from pharmacist to pharmacist, where their scarce dollars are best spent.18 When drug prices *764vary as strikingly as they do, information as to who is charging what becomes more than a convenience. It could mean the alleviation of physical pain or the enjoyment of basic necessities.

Generalizing, society also may have a strong interest in the free flow of commercial information. Even an individual advertisement, though entirely “commercial,” may be of general public interest. The facts of decided cases furnish illustrations: advertisements stating that referral services for legal abortions are available, Bigelow v. Virginia, supra; that a manufacturer of artificial furs promotes his product as an alternative to the extinction by his competitors of fur-bearing mammals, see Fur Information & Fashion Council, Inc. v. E. F. Timme & Son, 364 F. Supp. 16 (SDNY 1973); and that á domestic producer advertises his product as an alternative to imports that tend to deprive American residents of their jobs, cf. Chicago Joint Board v. Chicago Tribune Co., 435 F. 2d 470 (CA7 1970), cert. denied, 402 U. S. 973 (1971). Obviously, not all commercial messages contain the same or even a very great public interest element. There are few to which such an element, however, could not be added. Our pharmacist, for example, could cast himself as a commentator on store-to-store dispari*765ties in drug prices, giving his own and those of a competitor as proof. We see little point in requiring him to do so, and little difference if he does not.

Moreover, there is another consideration that suggests that no line between publicly “interesting” or “important” commercial advertising and the opposite kind could ever be drawn. Advertising, however tasteless and excessive it sometimes may seem, is nonetheless dissemination of information as to who is producing and selling what product, for what reason, and at what price. So long as we preserve a predominantly free enterprise economy, the allocation of our resources in large measure will be made through numerous private economic decisions. It is a matter of public interest that those decisions, in the aggregate, be intelligent and well informed. To this end, the free flow of commercial information is indispensable. See Dun & Bradstreet, Inc. v. Grove, 404 U. S. 898, 904-906 (1971) (Douglas, J., dissenting from denial of certiorari). See also FTC v. Procter & Gamble Co., 386 U. S. 568, 603-604 (1967) (Harlan, J., concurring). And if it is indispensable to the proper allocation of resources in a free enterprise system, it is also indispensable to the formation of intelligent opinions as to how that system ought to be regulated or altered. Therefore, even if the First Amendment were thought to be primarily an instrument to enlighten public decisionmaking in a democracy,19 we could not say that the free flow of information does not serve that goal.20

*766Arrayed against these substantial individual and societal interests are a number of justifications for the advertising ban. These have to do principally with maintaining a high degree of professionalism on the part of licensed pharmacists.21 Indisputably, the State has a strong interest in maintaining that professionalism. It is exercised in a number of ways for the consumer’s benefit. There is the clinical skill involved in the compounding of drugs, although, as has been noted, these now make up only a small percentage of the prescriptions filled. Yet, even with respect to manufacturer-prepared compounds, there is room for the pharmacist *767to serve his customer well or badly. Drugs kept too long on the shelf may lose their efficacy or become adulterated. They can be packaged for the user in such a way that the same results occur. The expertise of the pharmacist may supplement that of the prescribing physician, if the latter has not specified the amount to be dispensed or the directions that are to appear on the label. The pharmacist, a specialist in the potencies and dangers of drugs, may even be consulted by the physician as to what to prescribe. He may know of a particular antagonism between the prescribed drug and another that the customer is or might be taking, or with an allergy the customer may suffer. The pharmacist himself may have supplied the other drug or treated the allergy. Some pharmacists, concededly not a large number, “monitor” the health problems and drug consumptions of customers who come to them repeatedly.22 A pharmacist who has a continuous relationship with his customer is in the best position, of course, to exert professional skill for the customer’s protection.

Price advertising, it is argued, will place in jeopardy the pharmacist’s expertise and, with it, the customer’s health. It is claimed that the aggressive price competition that will result from unlimited advertising will make it impossible for the pharmacist to supply professional services in the compounding, handling, and dispensing *768of prescription drugs. Such services are time consuming and expensive; if competitors who economize by eliminating them are permitted to advertise their resulting lower prices, the more painstaking and conscientious pharmacist will be forced either to follow suit or to go out of business. It is also claimed that prices might not necessarily fall as a result of advertising. If one pharmacist advertises, others must, and the resulting expense will inflate the cost of drugs. It is further claimed that advertising will lead people to shop for their prescription drugs among the various pharmacists who offer the lowest prices, and the loss of stable pharmacist-customer relationships will make individual attention — and certainly the practice of monitoring — impossible. Finally, it is argued that damage will be done to the professional image of the pharmacist. This image, that of a skilled and specialized craftsman, attracts talent to the profession and reinforces the better habits of those who are in it. Price advertising, it is said, will reduce the pharmacist’s status to that of a mere retailer.23

The strength of these proffered justifications is greatly undermined by the fact that high professional standards, to a substantial extent, are guaranteed by the close regulation to which pharmacists in Virginia are subject. And this case concerns the retail sale by the pharmacist more than it does his professional standards. Surely, any pharmacist guilty of professional dereliction that actually endangers his customer will promptly lose his *769license. At the same time, we cannot discount the Board’s justifications entirely. The Court regarded justifications of this type sufficient to sustain the advertising bans challenged on due process and equal protection grounds in Head v. New Mexico Board, supra; Williamson v. Lee Optical Co., supra; and Semler v. Dental Examiners, supra.

The challenge now made, however, is based on the First Amendment. This casts the Board’s justifications in a different light, for on close inspection it is seen that the State’s protectiveness of its citizens rests in large measure on the advantages of their being kept in ignorance. The advertising ban does not directly affect professional standards one way or the other. It affects them only through the reactions it is assumed people will have to the free flow of drug price information. There is no claim that the advertising ban in any way prevents the cutting of corners by the pharmacist who is so inclined. That pharmacist is likely to cut comers in any event. The only effect the advertising ban has on him is to insulate him from price competition and to open the way for him to make a substantial, and perhaps even excessive, profit in addition to providing an inferior service. The more painstaking pharmacist is also protected but, again, it is a protection based in large part on public ignorance.

It appears to be feared that if the pharmacist who wishes to provide low cost, and assertedly low quality, services is permitted to advertise, he will be taken up on his offer by too many unwitting customers. They will choose the low-cost, low-quality service and drive the “professional” pharmacist out of business. They will respond only to costly and excessive advertising, and end up paying the price. They will go from one pharmacist to another, following the discount, and destroy the pharmacist-customer relationship. They will lose respect for *770the profession because it advertises. All this is not in their best interests, and all this can be avoided if they are not permitted to know who is charging what.

There is, of course, an alternative to this highly paternalistic approach. That alternative is to assume that this information is not in itself harmful, that people will perceive their own best interests if only they are well enough informed, and that the best means to that end is to open the channels of communication rather than to close them. If they are truly open, nothing prevents the “professional” pharmacist from marketing his own assertedly superior product, and contrasting it with that of the low-cost, high-volume prescription drug retailer. But the choice among these alternative approaches is not ours to make or the Virginia General Assembly’s. It is precisely this kind of choice, between the dangers of suppressing information, and the dangers of its misuse if it is freely available, that the First Amendment makes for us. Virginia is free to require whatever professional standards it wishes of its pharmacists; it may subsidize them or protect them from competition in other ways. Cf. Parker v. Brown, 317 U. S. 341 (1943). But it may not do so by keeping the public in ignorance of the entirely lawful terms that competing pharmacists are offering. In this sense, the justifications Virginia has offered for suppressing the flow of prescription drug price information, far from persuading us that the flow is not protected by the First Amendment, have reinforced our view that it is. We so hold.

VI

In concluding that commercial speech, like other varieties, is protected, we of course do not hold that it can never be regulated in any way. Some forms of commercial speech regulation are surely permissible. We mention a few only to make clear that they are not before us and therefore are not foreclosed by this case.

*771There is no claim, for example, that the prohibition on prescription drug price advertising is a mere time, place, and manner restriction. We have often approved restrictions of that kind provided that they are justified without reference to the content of the regulated speech, that they serve a significant governmental interest, and that in so doing they leave open ample alternative channels for communication of the information. Compare Grayned v. City of Rockford, 408 U. S. 104, 116 (1972); United States v. O’Brien, 391 U. S. 367, 377 (1968); and Kovacs v. Cooper, 336 U. S. 77, 85-87 (1949), with Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1; Erznoznik v. City of Jacksonville, 422 U. S. 205, 209 (1975); Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U. S., at 304-308; and Saia v. New York, 334 U. S. 558, 562 (1948). Whatever may be the proper bounds of time, place, and manner restrictions on commercial speech, they are plainly exceeded by this Virginia statute, which singles out speech of a particular content and seeks to prevent its dissemination completely.

Nor is there any claim that prescription drug price advertisements are forbidden because they are false or misleading in any way. Untruthful speech, commercial or otherwise, has never been protected for its own sake. Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U. S. 323, 340 (1974); Konigsberg v. State Bar, 366 U. S. 36, 49, and n. 10 (1961). Obviously, much commercial speech is not provably false, or even wholly false, but only deceptive or misleading. We foresee no obstacle to a State’s dealing effectively with this problem.24 The First Amendment, *772as we construe it today, does not prohibit the State from insuring that the stream of commercial information flow cleanly as well as freely. See, for example, Va. Code Ann. § 18.2-216 (1975).

Also, there is no claim that the transactions proposed in the forbidden advertisements are themselves illegal in any way. Cf. Pittsburgh Press Co. v. Human Relations Comm’n, 413 U. S. 376 (1973); United States *773v. Hunter, 459 F. 2d 205 (CA4), cert. denied, 409 U. S. 934 (1972). Finally, the special problems of the electronic broadcast media are likewise not in this case. Cf. Capitol Broadcasting Co. v. Mitchell, 333 F. Supp. 582 (DC 1971), aff’d sub nom. Capitol Broadcasting Co. v. Acting Attorney General, 405 U. S. 1000 (1972).

What is at issue is whether a State may completely suppress the dissemination of concededly truthful information about entirely lawful activity, fearful of that information’s effect upon its disseminators and its recipients. Reserving other questions,25 we conclude that the answer to this one is in the negative.

The judgment of the District Court is affirmed.

It is so ordered.

Mr. Justice Stevens took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.

Mr. Chief Justice Burger,

concurring.

The Court notes that roughly 95% of all prescriptions are filled with dosage units already prepared by the manufacturer and sold to the pharmacy in that form. These are the drugs that have a market large enough to make their preparation profitable to the manufacturer; for the same reason, they are the drugs that it is profitable for the pharmacist to advertise. In dispensing *774these prepackaged items, the pharmacist performs largely a packaging rather than a compounding function of former times. Our decision today, therefore, deals largely with the State's power to prohibit pharmacists from advertising the retail price of prepackaged drugs. As the Court notes, ante, at 773 n. 25, quite different factors would govern were we faced with a law regulating or even prohibiting advertising by the traditional learned professions of medicine or law. “The interest of the States in regulating lawyers is especially great since lawyers are essential to the primary governmental function of administering justice, and have historically been ‘officers of the courts.’ ” Goldfarb v. Virginia State Bar, 421 U. S. 773, 792 (1975). See also Cohen v. Hurley, 366 U. S. 117, 123-124 (1961). We have also recognized the State’s substantial interest in regulating physicians. See, e. g., United States v. Oregon Medical Society, 343 U. S. 326, 336 (1952); Semler v. Oregon-State Board of Dental Examiners, 294 U. S. 608, 612 (1935). Attorneys and physicians are engaged primarily in providing services in which professional judgment is a large component, a matter very different from the retail sale of labeled drugs already prepared by others.

MR. Justice Stewart aptly observes that the “differences between commercial price and product advertising . . . and ideological communication” allow the State a scope in regulating the former that would be unacceptable under the First Amendment with respect to the latter. I think it important to note also that the advertisement of professional services carries with it quite different risks from the advertisement of standard products. The Court took note of this in Semler, supra, at 612, in upholding a state statute prohibiting entirely certain types of advertisement by dentists:

“The legislature was not dealing with traders in *775commodities, but with the vital interest of public health, and with a profession treating bodily ills and demanding different standards of conduct from those which are traditional in the competition of the market place. The community is concerned with the maintenance of professional standards which will insure not only competency in individual practitioners, but protection against those who would prey upon a public peculiarly susceptible to imposition through alluring promises of physical relief. And the community is concerned in providing safeguards not only against deception, but against practices which would tend to demoralize the profession by forcing its members into an unseemly rivalry which would enlarge the opportunities of the least scrupulous.”

I doubt that we know enough about evaluating the quality of medical and legal services to know which claims of superiority are “misleading” and which are justifiable. Nor am I sure that even advertising the price of certain professional services is not inherently misleading, since what the professional must do will vary greatly in individual cases. It is important to note that the Court wisely leaves these issues to another day.

Mr. Justice Stewart,

concurring.

In Thornhill v. Alabama, 310 U. S. 88, the Court observed that “[fjreedom of discussion, if it would fulfill its historic function in this nation, must embrace all issues about which information is needed or appropriate to enable the members of society to cope with the exigencies of their period.” Id., at 102. Shortly after the Thorn-hill decision, the Court identified a single category of communications that is constitutionally unprotected: communications “which by their very utterance inflict *776injury.” Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, 315 U. S. 568, 572. Yet only a month after Chaplinsky, and without reference to that decision, the Court stated in Valentine v. Chrestensen, 316 U. S. 52, 54, that “the Constitution imposes no such restraint on government as respects purely commercial advertising.” For more than 30 years this “casual, almost offhand” statement in Chrestensen has operated to exclude commercial speech from the protection afforded by the First Amendment to other types of communication. Cammarano v. United States, 358 U. S. 498, 514 (Douglas, J., concurring).1

Today the Court ends the anomalous situation created by Chrestensen and holds that a communication which does no more than propose a commercial transaction is not “wholly outside the protection of the First Amendment.” Ante, at 761. But since it is a cardinal principle of the First Amendment that “government has no power to restrict expression because of its message, its ideas, its subject matter, or its content,” 2 the Court's decision calls into immediate question the constitutional legitimacy of every state and federal law regulating false or deceptive advertising. I write separately to explain why I think today’s decision does not preclude such governmental regulation.

*777The Court has on several occasions addressed the problem posed by false statements of fact in libel cases. Those cases demonstrate that even with respect to expression at the core of the First Amendment, the Constitution does not provide absolute protection for false factual statements that cause private injury. In Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U. S. 323, 340, the Court concluded that “there is no constitutional value in false statements of fact.” As the Court had previously recognized in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254, however, factual errors are inevitable in free debate, and the imposition of liability for erroneous factual assertions can “dampe[n] the vigor and limi[t] the variety of public debate” by inducing “self-censorship.” Id., at 279. In order to provide ample “breathing space” for free expression, the Constitution places substantial limitations on the discretion of government to permit recovery for libelous communications. See Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., supra, at 347-349.

The principles recognized in the libel decisions suggest that government may take broader action to protect the public from injury produced by false or deceptive price or product advertising than from harm caused by defamation. In contrast to the press, which must often attempt to assemble the true facts from sketchy and sometimes conflicting sources under the pressure of publication deadlines, the commercial advertiser generally knows the product or service he seeks to sell and is in a position to verify the accuracy of his factual representations before he disseminates them. The advertiser’s access to the truth about his product and its price substantially eliminates any danger that governmental regulation of false or misleading price or product advertising will chill accurate and nondeceptive commercial expression. There *778is, therefore, little need to sanction “some falsehood in order to protect speech that matters.” Id., at 341.

The scope of constitutional protection of communicative expression is not universally inelastic. In the area of labor relations, for example, the Court has recognized that “an employer’s free speech right to communicate his views to his employees is firmly established and cannot be infringed by a union or the National Labor Relations Board.” NLRB v. Gissel Packing Co., 395 U. S. 575, 617. See NLRB v. Virginia Electric & Power Co., 314 U. S. 469. Yet, in that context, the Court has concluded that the employer’s freedom to communicate his views to his employees may be restricted by the requirement that any predictions “be carefully phrased on the basis of objective fact.” 3 395 U. S., at 618. In response to the contention that the “line between so-called permitted predictions and proscribed threats is too vague to stand up under traditional First Amendment analysis,” the Court relied on the employer’s intimate knowledge of the employer-employee relationship and his ability to “avoid coercive speech simply by avoiding conscious overstatements he has reason to believe will mislead his em*779ployees.” Id., at 620. Cf. United States v. 95 Barrels of Vinegar, 265 U. S. 438, 443 (“It is not difficult to choose statements, designs and devices which will not deceive”). Although speech in the labor relations setting may be distinguished from commercial advertising,4 the Gissel Packing Co. opinion is highly significant in the present context because it underscores the constitutional importance of the speaker’s specific and unique knowledge of the relevant facts and establishes that a regulatory scheme monitoring “the impact of utterances” is not invariably inconsistent with the First Amendment.5 See 395 U. S., at 620.

The Court’s determination that commercial advertising of the kind at issue here is not “wholly outside the protection of” the First Amendment indicates by its very phrasing that there are important differences between commercial price and product advertising, on the one hand, and ideological communication on the other. See ante, at 771-772, n. 24. Ideological expression, be it oral, literary, pictorial, or theatrical, is integrally related to the exposition of thought — thought that may shape our concepts of the whole universe of man. Although such expression may convey factual information relevant to social and individual decisionmaking, it is protected by *780the Constitution, whether or not it contains factual representations and even if it includes inaccurate assertions of fact. Indeed, disregard of the “truth” may be employed to give force to the underlying idea expressed by the speaker.6 “Under the First Amendment there is no such thing as a false idea,” and the only way that ideas can be suppressed is through “the competition of other ideas,” Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U. S., at 339-340.

Commercial price and product advertising differs markedly from ideological expression because it is confined to the promotion of specific goods or services.7 The First Amendment protects the advertisement because of the “information of potential interest and value” conveyed, Bigelow v. Virginia, 421 U. S. 809, 822, rather than because of any direct contribution to the interchange of ideas. See ante, at 762-765, 770.8 Since the factual claims contained in commercial price or product advertisements relate to tangible goods or services, they may be tested empirically and corrected to reflect the truth without in any manner jeopardizing the free dis*781semination of thought. Indeed, the elimination of false and deceptive claims serves to promote the one facet of commercial price and product advertising that warrants First Amendment protection — its contribution to the flow of accurate and rehable information relevant to public and private decisionmaking.

Mr. Justice Rehnquist,

dissenting.

The logical consequences of the Court's decision in this case, a decision which elevates commercial intercourse between a seller hawking his wares and a buyer seeking to strike a bargain to the same plane as has been previously reserved for the free marketplace of ideas, are far reaching indeed. Under the Court’s opinion the way will be open not only for dissemination of price information but for active promotion of prescription drugs, liquor, cigarettes, and other products the use of which it has previously been thought desirable to discourage. Now, however, such promotion is protected by the First Amendment so long as it is not misleading or does not promote an illegal product or enterprise. In coming to this conclusion, the Court has overruled a legislative determination that such advertising should not be allowed and has done so on behalf of a consumer group which is not directly disadvantaged by the statute in question. This effort to reach a result which the Court obviously considers desirable is a troublesome one, for two reasons. It extends standing to raise First Amendment claims beyond the previous decisions of this Court. It also extends the protection of that Amendment to purely commercial endeavors which its most vigorous champions on this Court had thought to be beyond its pale.

I

I do not find the question of the appellees’ standing to urge the claim which the Court decides quite as easy *782as the Court does. The Court finds standing on the part of the consumer appellees based upon a “right to 'receive information.’ ” Ante, at 757. Yet it has been stipulated in this case that the challenged statute does not prohibit anyone from receiving this information either in person or by phone. Ante, at 752, and n. 6. The statute forbids “only publish [ing], advertís [ing] or promot[ing]” prescription drugs.

While it may be generally true that publication of information by its source is essential to effective communication, it is surely less true, where, as here, the potential recipients of the information have, in the Court’s own words, a “keen, if not keener by far,” interest in it than “in the day’s most urgent political debate.” Ante, at 763. Appellees who have felt so strongly about their right to receive information as to litigate the issue in this lawsuit must also have enough residual interest in the matter to call their pharmacy and inquire.

The statute, in addition, only forbids pharmacists to publish this price information. There is no prohibition against a consumer group, such as appellees, collecting and publishing comparative price information as to various pharmacies in an area. Indeed they have done as much in their briefs in this case. Yet, though appellees could both receive and publish the information in question the Court finds that they have standing to protest that pharmacists are not allowed to advertise. Thus, contrary to the assertion of the Court, appellees are not asserting their “right to receive information” at all but rather the right of some third party to publish. In the cases relied upon by the Court, ante, at 756-757, the plaintiffs asserted their right to receive information which would not be otherwise reasonably available to them.* They did not seek to assert the right of a third *783party, not before the Court, to disseminate information. Here, the only group truly restricted by this statute, the pharmacists, have not even troubled to join in this litigation and may well feel that the expense and competition of advertising is not in their interest.

II

Thus the issue on the merits is not, as the Court phrases it, whether “[o]ur pharmacist” may communicate the fact that he “will sell you the X prescription drug at the Y price.” No pharmacist is asserting any such claim to so communicate. The issue is rather whether appellee consumers may override the legislative determination that pharmacists should not advertise even though the pharmacists themselves do not object. In deciding that they may do so, the Court necessarily adopts a rule which cannot be limited merely to dissemination of price alone, and which cannot possibly be confined to pharmacists but must likewise extend to lawyers, doctors, and all other professions.

The Court speaks of the consumer’s interest in the free flow of commercial information, particularly in the case of the poor, the sick, and the aged. It goes on to observe that “society also may have a strong interest in the free flow of commercial information.” Ante, at 764. One need not disagree with either of these statements in order to feel that they should presumptively be the concern of the Virginia Legislature, which sits to balance these and other claims in the process of making laws such as the one here under attack. The Court speaks of the *784importance in a “predominantly free enterprise economy” of intelligent and well-informed decisions as to allocation of resources. Ante, at 765. While there is again much to be said for the Court’s observation as a matter of desirable public policy, there is certainly nothing in the United States Constitution which requires the Virginia Legislature to hew to the teachings of Adam Smith in its legislative decisions regulating the pharmacy profession. E. g., Nebbia v. New York, 291 U. S. 502 (1934); Olsen v. Nebraska, 313 U. S. 236 (1941).

As Mr. Justice Black, writing for the Court, observed in Ferguson v. Skrupa, 372 U. S. 726, 730 (1963):

“The doctrine . . . that due process authorizes courts to hold laws unconstitutional when they believe the legislature has acted unwisely — has long since been discarded. We have returned to the original constitutional proposition that courts do not substitute their social and economic beliefs for the judgment of legislative bodies who are elected to pass laws.”

Similarly in Williamson v. Lee Optical Co., 348 U. S. 483 (1955), the Court, in dealing with a state prohibition against the advertisement of eyeglass frames, held: “We see no constitutional reason why a State may not treat all who deal with the human eye as members of a profession who should use no merchandising methods for obtaining customers.” Id., at 490.

The Court addresses itself to the valid justifications which may be found for the Virginia statute, and apparently discounts them because it feels they embody a “highly paternalistic approach.” Ante, at 770. It concludes that the First Amendment requires that channels of advertising communication with respect to prescription drugs must be opened, and that Virginia may not *785keep “the public in ignorance of the entirely lawful terms that competing pharmacists are offering.” Ibid.

The Court concedes that legislatures may prohibit false and misleading advertisements, and may likewise prohibit advertisements seeking to induce transactions which are themselves illegal. In a final footnote the opinion tosses a bone to the traditionalists in the legal and medical professions by suggesting that because they sell services rather than drugs the holding of this case is not automatically applicable to advertising in those professions. But if the sole limitation on permissible state proscription of advertising is that it may not be false or misleading, surely the difference between pharmacists' advertising and lawyers' and doctors’ advertising can be only one of degree and not of kind. I cannot distinguish between the public’s right to know the price of drugs and its right to know the price of title searches or physical examinations or other professional services for which standardized fees are charged. Nor is it apparent how the pharmacists in this case are less engaged in a regulatable profession than were the opticians in Williamson, supra.

Nor will the impact of the Court’s decision on existing commercial and industrial practice be limited to allowing advertising by the professions. The Court comments that in labor disputes “it has long been settled that both the employee and the employer are protected by the First Amendment when they express themselves on the merits of the dispute in order to influence its outcome.” Ante, at 762. But the first case cited by the Court in support of this proposition, NLRB v. Gissel Packing Co., 395 U. S. 575, 617-618 (1969), falls a good deal short of supporting this general statement. The Court there said that “an employer is free to communicate to his employees any of his general views about unionism or any of his specific views about a particular union, so long as the *786communications do not contain a ‘threat of reprisal or force or promise of benefit.’ ” Id., at 618. This carefully guarded language is scarcely a ringing endorsement of even the second-class First Amendment rights which the Court has today created in commercial speech.

It is hard to see why an employer’s right to publicize a promise of benefit may be prohibited by federal law, so long as the promise is neither false nor deceptive, if pharmacists’ price advertising may not be prohibited by the Virginia Legislature. Yet such a result would be wholly inconsistent with established labor law.

Both the Courts of Appeals and the National Labor Relations Board have not hesitated to set aside representation elections in which the employer made statements which were undoubtedly truthful but which were found to be implicitly coercive. For instance, in NLRB v. Realist, Inc., 328 F. 2d 840 (CA7 1964), an election was set aside when the employer, in a concededly nonthreatening manner, raised the specter of plant closings which would result from unionism. In Oak Mfg. Co., 141 N. L. R. B. 1323, 1328-1330 (1963), the Board set aside an election where the employer stated “categorically” that the union “cannot and will not obtain any wage increase for you,” and with respect to seniority said that it could “assure” the employees that the union’s program “will be worse” than the present system. In Freeman Mfg. Co., 148 N. L. R. B. 577 (1964), the employer sent letters to employees in which he urged that unionization might cause customers to cease buying the company’s product because of delays and higher prices. The Board found this to be ground for invalidating the election. Presumably all of these holdings will require re-evaluation in the fight of today’s decision with a view toward allowing the employer’s speech because it is now protected by the First Amendment, as expanded by this decision.

*787There are undoubted difficulties with an effort to draw a bright line between “commercial speech” on the one hand and “protected speech” on the other, and the Court does better to face up to these difficulties than to attempt to hide them under labels. In this case, however, the Court has unfortunately substituted for the wavering line previously thought to exist between commercial speech and protected speech a no more satisfactory line of its own — that between “truthful” commercial speech, on the one hand, and that which is “false and misleading” on the other. The difficulty with this line is not that it wavers, but on the contrary that it is simply too Procrustean to take into account the congeries of factors which I believe could, quite consistently with the First and Fourteenth Amendments, properly influence a legislative decision with respect to commercial advertising.

The Court insists that the rule it lays down is consistent even with the view that the First Amendment is “primarily an instrument to enlighten public decisionmaking in a democracy.” Ante, at 765, I had understood this view to relate to public decisionmaking as to political, social, and other public issues, rather than the decision of a particular individual as to whether to purchase one or another kind of shampoo. It is undoubtedly arguable that many people in the country regard the choice of shampoo as just as important as who may be elected to local, state, or national political office, but that does not automatically bring information about competing shampoos within the protection of the First Amendment. It is one thing to say that the line between strictly ideological and political commentaries and other kinds of commentary is difficult to draw, and that the mere fact that the former may have in it an element of commercialism does not strip it of First Amendment protection. See New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254 (1964). But it is another thing to say that because that *788line is difficult to draw, we will stand at the other end of the spectrum and reject out of hand the observation of so dedicated a champion of the First Amendment as Mr. Justice Black that the protections of that Amendment do not apply to a “ ‘merchant’ who goes from door to door ‘selling pots.’ ” Breard v. City of Alexandria, 341 U. S. 622, 650 (1951) (dissenting).

In the case of “our” hypothetical pharmacist, he may now presumably advertise not only the prices of prescription drugs, but may attempt to energetically promote their sale so long as he does so truthfully. Quite consistently with Virginia law requiring prescription drugs to be available only through a physician, “our” pharmacist might run any of the following representative advertisements in a local newspaper:

“Pain getting you down? Insist that your physician prescribe Demerol. You pay a little more than for aspirin, but you get a lot more relief.”

“Can’t shake the flu? Get a prescription for Tetracycline from your doctor today.”

“Don’t spend another sleepless night. Ask your doctor to prescribe Seconal without delay.”

Unless the State can show that these advertisements are either actually untruthful or misleading, it presumably is not free to restrict in any way commercial efforts on the part of those who profit from the sale of prescription drugs to put them in the widest possible circulation. But such a line simply makes no allowance whatever for what appears to have been a considered legislative judgment in most States that while prescription drugs are a necessary and vital part of medical care and treatment, there are sufficient dangers attending their widespread use that they simply may not be promoted in the same manner as hair creams, deodorants, and toothpaste. The very real dangers that general advertising for such drugs *789might create in terms of encouraging, even though not sanctioning, illicit use of them by individuals for whom they have not been prescribed, or by generating patient pressure upon physicians to prescribe them, are simply not dealt with in the Court's opinion. If prescription drugs may be advertised, they may be advertised on television during family viewing time. Nothing we know about the acquisitive instincts of those who inhabit every business and profession to a greater or lesser extent gives any reason to think that such persons will not do everything they can to generate demand for these products in much the same manner and to much the same degree as demand for other commodities has been generated.

Both Congress and state legislatures have by law sharply limited the permissible dissemination of information about some commodities because of the potential harm resulting from those commodities, even though they were not thought to be sufficiently demonstrably harmful to warrant outright prohibition of their sale. Current prohibitions on television advertising of liquor and cigarettes are prominent in this category, but apparently under the Court’s holding so long as the advertisements are not deceptive they may no longer be prohibited.

This case presents a fairly typical First Amendment problem — that of balancing interests in individual free speech against public welfare determinations embodied in a legislative enactment. As the Court noted in American Communications Assn. v. Douds, 339 U. S. 382, 399 (1950):

“[Ilegitímate attempts to protect the public, not from the remote possible effects of noxious ideologies, but from the present excesses of direct, active conduct, are not presumptively bad because they *790interfere with and, in some of its manifestations, restrain the exercise of First Amendment rights.”

Here the rights of the appellees seem to me to be marginal at best. There is no ideological content to the information which they seek and it is freely available to them — they may even publish it if they so desire. The only persons directly affected by this statute are not parties to this lawsuit. On the other hand, the societal interest against the promotion of drug use for every ill, real or imaginary, seems to me extremely strong. I do not believe that the First Amendment mandates the Court’s “open door policy” toward such commercial advertising.

Me. Justice Powell

delivered the opinion of the Court.

This case presents the question whether a regulation of the Public Service Commission of the State of New York violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments because it completely bans promotional advertising by an electrical utility.

I

In December 1973, the Commission, appellee here, ordered electric utilities in New York State to cease all advertising that “promot[es] the use of electricity.” App. to Juris. *559Statement 31a. The order was based on the Commission’s finding that “the interconnected utility system in New York State does not have sufficient fuel stocks or sources of supply to continue furnishing all customer demands for the 1973-1974 winter.” Id., at 26a.

Three years later, when the fuel shortage had eased, the Commission requested comments from the public on its proposal to continue the ban on promotional advertising. Central Hudson Gas & Electric Corp., the appellant in this case, opposed the ban on First Amendment grounds. App. A10. After reviewing the public comments, the Commission extended the prohibition in a Policy Statement issued on February 25, 1977.

The Policy Statement divided advertising expenses “into two broad categories: promotional — advertising intended to stimulate the purchase of utility services — and institutional and informational, a broad category inclusive of all advertising not clearly intended to promote sales.” 1 App. to Juris. Statement 35a. The Commission declared all promotional advertising contrary to the national policy of conserving energy. It acknowledged that the ban is not a perfect vehicle for conserving energy. For example, the Commission’s order prohibits promotional advertising to develop consumption during periods when demand for electricity is low. By limiting growth in “off-peak” consumption, the ban limits the “beneficial side effects” of such growth in terms of more efficient use of existing powerplants. Id., at 37a. And since oil dealers are not under the Commission’s jurisdiction and *560thus remain free to advertise, it was recognized that the ban can achieve only “piecemeal conservationism” Still, the Commission adopted the restriction because it was deemed likely to “result in some dampening of unnecessary growth” in energy consumption. Ibid.

The Commission’s order explicitly permitted “informational” advertising designed to encourage “shifts of consumption” from peak demand times to periods of low electricity demand. Ibid, (emphasis in orginal). Informational advertising would not seek to increase aggregate consumption, but would invite a leveling of demand throughout any given 24-hour period. The agency offered to review “specific proposals by the companies for specifically described [advertising] programs that meet these criteria.” Id., at 38a.

When it rejected requests for rehearing on the Policy Statement, the Commission supplemented its rationale for the advertising ban. The agency observed that additional electricity probably would be more expensive to produce than existing output. Because electricity rates in New York were not then based on marginal cost,2 the Commission feared that additional power would be priced below the actual cost of generation. The additional electricity would be subsidized by all consumers through generally higher rates. Id., at 57a-58a. The state agency also thought that promotional advertising would give “misleading signals” to the public by appearing to encourage energy consumption at a time when conservation is needed. Id., at 59a.

Appellant challenged the order in state court, arguing that the Commission had restrained commercial speech in violation of the First and Fourteenth Amendments.3 The Commis*561sion’s order was upheld by the trial court and at the intermediate appellate level.4 The New York Court of Appeals affirmed. It found little value to advertising in “the noncompetitive market in which electric corporations operate.” Consolidated Edison Co. v. Public Service Comm’n, 47 N. Y. 2d 94, 110, 390 N. E. 2d 749, 757 (1979). Since consumers “have no choice regarding the source of their electric power,” the court denied that “promotional advertising of electricity might contribute to society’s interest in ‘informed and reliable’ economic decisionmaking.” Ibid. The court also observed that by encouraging consumption, promotional advertising would only exacerbate the current energy situation. Id., at 110, 390 N. E. 2d, at 758. The court concluded that the governmental interest in the prohibition outweighed the limited constitutional value of the commercial speech at issue. We noted probable jurisdiction, 444 U. S. 962 (1979), and now reverse.

The Commission’s order restricts only commercial speech, that is, expression related solely to the economic interests of the speaker and its audience. Virginia Pharmacy Board v. Virginia Citizens Consumer Council, 425 U. S. 748, 762 (1976); Bates v. State Bar of Arizona, 433 U. S. 350, 363-364 (1977); Friedman v. Rogers, 440 U. S. 1, 11 (1979). The First Amendment, as applied to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment, protects commercial speech from unwarranted governmental regulation. Virginia Pharmacy Board, 425 U. S., at 761-762. Commercial expression not only serves the economic interest of the speaker, but also assists consumers and furthers the societal interest in the fullest possible *562dissemination of information. In applying the First Amendment to this area, we have rejected the “highly paternalistic” view that government has complete power to suppress or regulate commercial speech. “[P]eople will perceive their own best interests if only they are well enough informed, and . . . the best means to that end is to open the channels of communication, rather than to close them. . . .” Id., at 770; see Linmark Associates, Inc. v. Willingboro, 431 U. S. 85, 92 (1977). Even when advertising communicates only an incomplete version of the relevant facts, the First Amendment presumes that some accurate information is better than no information at all. Bates v. State Bar of Arizona, supra, at 374.

Nevertheless, our decisions have recognized "the ‘commonsense’ distinction between speech proposing a commercial transaction, which occurs in an area traditionally subject to government regulation, and other varieties of speech.” Ohralik v. Ohio State Bar Assn., 436 U. S. 447, 455-456 (1978); see Bates v. State Bar of Arizona, supra, at 381; see also Jackson & Jeffries, Commercial Speech: Economic Due Process and the First Amendment, 65 Ya. L. Rev. 1, 38-39 (1979).5 The *563Constitution therefore accords a lesser protection to commercial speech than to other constitutionally guaranteed expression. 436 U. S., at 456, 457. The protection available for particular commercial expression turns on the nature both of the expression and of the governmental interests served by its regulation.

The First Amendment’s concern for commercial speech is based on the informational function of advertising. See First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti, 435 U. S. 765, 783 (1978). Consequently, there can be no constitutional objection to the suppression of commercial messages that do not accurately inform the public about lawful activity. The government may ban forms of communication more likely to deceive the public than to inform it, Friedman v. Rogers, supra, at 13, 15-16; Ohralik v. Ohio State Bar Assn., supra, at 46A-465, or *564commercial speech related to illegal activity, Pittsburgh Press Co. v. Human Relations Comm’n, 413 U. S. 376, 388 (1973).6

If the communication is neither misleading nor related to unlawful activity, the government’s power is more circumscribed. The State must assert a substantial interest to be achieved by restrictions on commercial speech. Moreover, the regulatory technique must be in proportion to that interest. The limitation on expression must be designed carefully to achieve the State’s goal. Compliance with this requirement may be measured by two criteria. First, the restriction must directly advance the state interest involved; the regulation may not be sustained if it provides only ineffective or remote support for the government’s purpose. Second, if the governmental interest could be served as well by a more limited restriction on commercial speech, the excessive restrictions cannot survive.

Under the first criterion, the Court has declined to uphold regulations that only indirectly advance the state interest involved. In both Bates and Virginia Pharmacy Board, the Court concluded that an advertising ban could not be imposed to protect the ethical or performance standards of a profession. The Court noted in Virginia Pharmacy Board that “[t]he advertising ban does not directly affect professional standards one way or the other.” 425 U. S., at 769. In Bates, the Court overturned an advertising prohibition that was designed to protect the “quality” of a lawyer’s work. *565“Restraints on advertising . . . are an ineffective way of deterring shoddy work.” 433 U. S., at 378.7

The second criterion recognizes that the First Amendment mandates that speech restrictions be “narrowly drawn.” In re Primus, 436 U. S. 412, 438 (1978).8 The regulatory technique may extend only as far as the interest it serves. The State cannot regulate speech that poses no danger to the asserted state interest, see First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti, supra, at 794-795, nor can it completely suppress information when narrower restrictions on expression would serve its interest as well. For example, in Bates the Court explicitly did not “foreclose the possibility that some limited supplementation, by way of warning or disclaimer or the like, might be required” in promotional materials. 433 U. S., at 384. See Virginia Pharmacy Board, supra, at 773. And in Carey v. Population Services International, 431 U. S. 678, 701-702 (1977), we held that the State’s “arguments ... do not justify the total suppression of advertising concerning contraceptives.” This holding left open the possibility that *566the State could implement more carefully drawn restrictions. See id., at 712 (Powell, J., concurring in part and in judgment) ; id., at 716-717 (Stevens, J., concurring in part and in judgment).9

In commercial speech cases, then, a four-part analysis has developed. At the outset, we must determine whether the expression is protected by the First Amendment. For commercial speech to come within that provision, it at least must concern lawful activity and not be misleading. Next, we ask whether the asserted governmental interest is substantial. If both inquiries yield positive answers, we must determine whether the regulation directly advances the governmental interest asserted, and whether it is not more extensive than is necessary to serve that interest.

Ill

We now apply this four-step analysis for commercial speech to the Commission’s arguments in support of its ban on promotional advertising.

A

The Commission does not claim that the expression at issue either is inaccurate or relates to unlawful activity. Yet the New York Court of Appeals questioned whether Central Hudson’s advertising is protected commercial speech. Because appellant holds a monopoly over the sale of electricity in its service area, the state court suggested that the Commission’s order restricts no commercial speech of any worth. The court stated that advertising in a "noncompetitive market” *567could not improve the decisionmaking of consumers. 47 N. Y. 2d, at 110, 390 N. E. 2d, at 757. The court saw no constitutional problem with barring commercial speech that it viewed as conveying little useful information.

This reasoning falls short of establishing that appellant’s advertising is not commercial speech protected by the First Amendment. Monopoly over the supply of a product provides no protection from competition with substitutes for that product. Electric utilities compete with suppliers of fuel oil and natural gas in several markets, such as those for home heating and industrial power. This Court noted the existence of interfuel competition 45 years ago, see West Ohio Gas Co. v. Public Utilities Comm’n, 294 U. S. 63, 72 (1935). Each energy source continues to offer peculiar advantages and disadvantages that may influence consumer choice. For consumers in those competitive markets, advertising by utilities is just as valuable as advertising by unregulated firms.10

Even in monopoly markets, the suppression of advertising reduces the information available for consumer decisions and thereby defeats the purpose of the First Amendment. The New York court’s argument appears to assume that the providers of a monopoly service or product are willing to pay for wholly ineffective advertising. Most businesses— even regulated monopolies — are unlikely to underwrite promotional advertising that is of no interest or use to consumers. Indeed, a monopoly enterprise legitimately may wish to inform the public that it has developed new services or terms of doing business. A consumer may need information to aid his decision whether or not to use the monopoly service at all, or how much of the service he should purchase. In the absence of factors that would distort the decision to advertise, we *568may assume that the willingness of a business to promote its products reflects a belief that consumers are interested in the advertising.11 Since no such extraordinary conditions have been identified in this case, appellant’s monopoly position does not alter the First Amendment’s protection for its commercial speech.

B

The Commission offers two state interests as justifications for the ban on promotional advertising. The first concerns energy conservation. Any increase in demand for electricity— during peak or off-peak periods — means greater consumption of energy. The Commission argues, and the New York, court agreed, that the State’s interest in conserving energy is sufficient to support suppression of advertising designed to increase consumption of electricity. In view of our country’s dependence on energy resources beyond our control, no one can doubt the importance of energy conservation. Plainly, therefore, the state interest asserted is substantial.

The Commission also argues that promotional advertising will aggravate inequities caused by the failure to base the utilities’ rates on marginal cost. The utilities argued to the Commission that if they could promote the use of electricity in periods of low demand, they would improve their utilization of generating capacity. The Commission responded that promotion of off-peak consumption also would increase consumption during peak periods. If peak demand were to rise, the absence of marginal cost rates would mean that the rates charged for the additional power would not reflect the true costs of expanding production. Instead, the extra costs would *569be borne by all consumers through higher overall rates. Withqut promotional advertising, the Commission stated, this inequitable turn of events would be less likely to occur. The choice among rate structures involves difficult and important questions of economic supply and distributional fairness.12 The State’s concern that rates be fair and efficient represents a clear and substantial governmental interest.

C

Next, we focus on the relationship between the State’s interests and the advertising ban. Under this criterion, the Commission’s laudable concern over the equity and efficiency of appellant’s rates does not provide a constitutionally adequate reason for restricting protected speech. The link between the advertising prohibition and appellant’s rate structure is, at most, tenuous. The impact of promotional advertising on the equity of appellant’s rates is highly speculative. Advertising to increase off-peak usage would have to increase peak usage, while other factors that directly affect the fairness and efficiency of appellant’s rates remained constant. Such conditional and remote eventualities simply cannot justify silencing appellant’s promotional advertising.

In contrast, the State’s interest in energy conservation is directly advanced by the Commission order at issue here. There is an immediate connection between advertising and demand for electricity. Central Hudson would not contest the advertising ban unless it believed that promotion would increase its sales. Thus, we find a direct link between the state interest in conservation and the Commission’s order.

D

We come finally to the critical inquiry in this case: whether the Commission’s complete suppression of speech ordinarily protected by the First Amendment is no more extensive than *570necessary to further the State’s interest in energy conservation. The Commission’s order reaches all promotional advertising, regardless of the impact of the touted service on overall energy use. But the energy conservation rationale, as important as it is, cannot justify suppressing information about electric devices or services that would cause no net increase in total energy use. In addition, no showing has been made that a more limited restriction on the content of promotional advertising would not serve adequately the State’s interests.

Appellant insists that but for the ban, it would advertise products and services that use energy efficiently. These include the “heat pump,” which both parties acknowledge to be a major improvement in electric heating, and the use of electric heat as a “backup” to solar and other heat sources. Although the Commission has questioned the efficiency of electric heating before this Court, neither the Commission’s Policy Statement nor its order denying rehearing made findings on this issue. In the absence of authoritative findings to the contrary, we must credit as within the realm of possibility the claim that electric heat can be an efficient alternative in some circumstances.

The Commission’s order prevents appellant from promoting electric services that would reduce energy use by diverting demand from less efficient sources, or that would consume roughly the same amount of energy as do alternative sources. In neither situation would the utility’s advertising endanger conservation or mislead the public. To. the extent that the Commission’s order suppresses speech that in no way impairs the State’s interest in energy conservation, the Commission’s order violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments and must be invalidated. See First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti, 435 U. S. 765 (1978).

The Commission also has not demonstrated that its interest in conservation cannot be protected adequately by more limited regulation of appellant’s commercial expression. To fur*571ther its policy of conservation, the Commission could attempt to restrict the format and content of Central Hudson’s advertising. It might, for example, require that the advertisements include information about the relative efficiency and expense of the offered service, both under current conditions and for the foreseeable future. Cf. Banzhaf v. FCC, 132 U. S. App. D. C. 14, 405 F. 2d 1082 (1968), cert. denied sub nom. Tobacco Institute, Inc. v. FCC, 396 U. S. 842 (1969).13 In the absence of a showing that more limited speech regulation would be ineffective, we cannot approve the complete suppression of Central Hudson’s advertising.14

IV

Our decision today in no way disparages the national interest in energy conservation. We accept without reservation the argument that conservation, as well as the development of alternative energy sources, is an imperative national goal. Administrative bodies empowered to regulate electric utilities have the authority — and indeed the duty — -to take appropriate action to further this goal. When, however, such action in*572volves the suppression of speech, the First and Fourteenth Amendments require that the restriction be no more extensive than is necessary to serve the state interest. In this case, the record before us fails to show that the total ban on promotional advertising meets this requirement.15

Accordingly, the judgment of the New York Court of Appeals is

Reversed.

Mr. Justice Brennan,

concurring in the judgment.

One of the major difficulties in this case is the proper characterization of the Commission’s Policy Statement. I find it impossible to determine on the present record whether the Commission’s ban on all “promotional” advertising, in contrast to “institutional and informational” advertising, see ante, at 559, is intended to encompass more than “commercial speech.” I am inclined to think that Mr. Justice Stevens is correct that the Commission’s order prohibits more than mere proposals to engage in certain kinds of commercial transactions, and therefore I agree with his conclusion that the ban surely violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments. But even on the assumption that the Court is correct that the Commission’s order reaches only commercial speech, I agree with Mr. Justice Blackmun that “[n]o differences between commercial speech and other protected speech justify suppression of commercial speech in order to influence public conduct through manipulation of the availability of information.” Post, at 578.

Accordingly, with the qualifications implicit in the pre*573ceding paragraph, I join the opinions of Mr. Justice Black-mun and Mr. Justice Stevens concurring in the judgment.

Mr. Justice Blackmun,

with whom Mr. Justice Brennan joins, concurring in the judgment.

I agree with the Court that the Public Service Commission’s ban on promotional advertising of electricity by public utilities is inconsistent with the First and Fourteenth Amendments. I concur only in the Court’s judgment, however, because I believe the test now evolved and applied by the Court is not consistent with our prior cases and does not provide adequate protection for truthful, nonmisleading, non-coercive commercial speech.

The Court asserts, ante, at 566, that “a four-part analysis has developed” from our decisions concerning commercial speech. Under this four-part test a restraint on commercial “communication [that] is neither misleading nor related to unlawful activity” is subject to an intermediate level of scrutiny, and suppression is permitted whenever it “directly advances” a “substantial” governmental interest and is “not more extensive than is necessary to serve that interest.” Ante, at 564 and 566. I agree with the Court that this level of intermediate scrutiny is appropriate for a restraint on commercial speech designed to protect consumers from misleading or coercive speech, or a regulation related to the time, place, or manner of commercial speech. I do not agree, however, that the Court’s four-part test is the proper one to be applied when a State seeks to suppress information about a product in order to manipulate a private economic decision that the State .cannot or has not regulated or outlawed directly.

Since the Court, without citing empirical data or other authority, finds a “direct link” between advertising and energy consumption, it leaves open the possibility that the State may suppress advertising of electricity in order to lessen demand for electricity. I, of course, agree with the Court that, *574in today’s world, energy conservation is a goal of paramount national and local importance. I disagree with the Court, however, when it says that suppression of speech may be a permissible means to achieve that goal. Mr. Justice Stevens appropriately notes: “The justification for the regulation is nothing more than the expressed fear that the audience may find the utility’s message persuasive. Without the aid of any coercion, deception, or misinformation, truthful communication may persuade some citizens to consume more electricity than they otherwise would.” Post, at 581.

The Court recognizes that we have never held that commercial speech may be suppressed in order to further the State’s interest in discouraging purchases of the underlying product that is advertised. Ante, at 566, n. 9. Permissible restraints on commercial speech have been limited to measures designed to protect consumers from fraudulent, misleading, or coercive sales techniques.1 Those designed to deprive consumers of information about products or services that are legally offered for sale consistently have been invalidated.2

I seriously doubt whether suppression of information concerning the availability and price of a legally offered product is ever a permissible way for the State to “dampen” demand for or use of the product. Even though “commercial” speech is involved, such a regulatory measure strikes at the heart of the First Amendment. This is because it is a covert attempt *575by the State to manipulate the choices of its citizens, not by persuasion or direct regulation, but by depriving the public of the information needed to make a free choice. As the Court recognizes, the State’s policy choices are insulated from the visibility and scrutiny that direct regulation would entail and the conduct of citizens is molded by the information that government chooses to give them. Ante, at 566, n. 9 (“We review with special care regulations that entirely suppress commercial speech in order to pursue a nonspeech-related policy. In those circumstances, a ban on speech could screen from public view the underlying governmental policy”). See Rotunda, The Commercial Speech Doctrine in the Supreme Court, 1976 U. Ill. Law Forum 1080, 1080-1083.

If the First Amendment guarantee means anything, it means that, absent clear and present danger, government has no power to restrict expression because of the effect its message is likely to have on the public. See generally Comment, First Amendment Protection for Commercial Advertising: The New Constitutional Doctrine, 44 U. Chi. L. Rev. 205, 243-251 (1976). Our cases indicate that this guarantee applies even to commercial speech. In Virginia Pharmacy Board v. Virginia Consumer Council, 425 U. S. 748 (1976), we held that Virginia could not pursue its goal of encouraging the public to patronize the “professional pharmacist” (one who provided individual attention and a stable pharmacist-customer relationship) by “keeping the public in ignorance of the entirely lawful terms that competing pharmacists are offering.” Id., at 770. We noted that our decision left the State free to pursue its goal of maintaining high standards among its pharmacists by “requiring] whatever professional standards it wishes of its pharmacists.” Ibid.

We went on in Virginia Pharmacy Board to discuss the types of regulation of commercial speech that, due to the “commonsense differences” between this form of speech and other forms, are or may be constitutionally permissible. We indicated that government may impose reasonable “time, *576place, and manner” restrictions, and that it can deal with false, deceptive, and misleading commercial speech. We noted that the question of advertising of illegal transactions and the special problems of the electronic broadcast media were not presented.

Concluding with a restatement of the type of restraint that is not permitted, we said: “What is at issue is whether a State may completely suppress the dissemination of con-cededly truthful information about entirely lawful activity, fearful of that information’s effect upon its disseminators and its recipients. . . . [W]e conclude that the answer to this [question] is in the negative.” Id., at 773.

Virginia Pharmacy Board did not analyze the State’s interests to determine whether they were “substantial.” Obviously, preventing professional dereliction and low quality health care are “substantial,” legitimate, and important state goals. Nor did the opinion analyze the ban on speech to determine whether it “directly advance [d],” ante, at 566, 569, these goals. We also did not inquire whether a “more limited regulation of . . . commercial expression,” ante, at 570, would adequately serve the State’s interests. Rather, we held that the State “may not [pursue its goals] by keeping the public in ignorance.” 425 U. S., at 770. (Emphasis supplied.)

Until today, this principle has governed. In Linmark Associates, Inc. v. Willingboro, 431 U. S. 85 (1977), we considered whether a town could ban “For Sale” signs on residential property to further its goal of promoting stable, racially integrated housing. We did note that the record did not establish that the ordinance was necessary to enable the State to achieve its goal. The holding of Linmark, however, was much broader.3 We stated:

“The constitutional defect in this ordinance, however, *577is far more basic. The Township Council here, like the Virginia Assembly in Virginia Pharmacy Bd., acted to prevent its residents from obtaining certain information . . . which pertains to sales activity in Willing-boro. . . . The Council has sought to restrict the free flow of these data because it fears that otherwise homeowners will make decisions inimical to what the Council views as the homeowners’ self-interest and the corporate interest of the township: they will choose to leave town. The Council’s concern, then, was not with any commercial aspect of “For Sale” signs — with offerors communicating offers to offerees — but with the substance of the information communicated to Willingboro citizens.” Id., at 96.

The Court in Linmark resolved beyond all doubt that a strict standard of review applies to suppression of commercial information, where the purpose of the restaint is to influence behavior by depriving citizens of information. The Court followed the strong statement above with an explicit adoption of the standard advocated by Mr. Justice Brandéis in his concurring opinion in Whitney v. California, 274 U. S. 357, 377 (1927): “If there be time to expose through discussion the falsehood and fallacies, to avert the evil by the processes of education, the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence. Only an emergency can justify repression.” 431 U. S., at 97.

Carey v. Population Services International, 431 U. S. 678, 700-702 (1977), also applied to content-based restraints on commercial speech the same standard of review we have applied to other varieties of speech. There the Court held that a ban on advertising of contraceptives could not be justified *578by the State’s interest in avoiding “ 'legitimation’ of illicit sexual behavior” because the advertisements could not be characterized as “ 'directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and . . . likely to incite or produce such action,’ ” id., at 701, quoting Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U. S. 444, 447 (1969).

Our prior references to the “ 'commonsense differences’ ” between commercial speech and other speech " 'suggest that a different degree of protection is necessary to insure that the flow of truthful and legitimate commercial information is unimpaired.’ ” Limnark Associates, 431 U. S., at 98, quoting Virginia Pharmacy Board, 425 U. S., at 771-772, n. 24. We have not suggested that the “commonsense differences” between commercial speech and other speech justify relaxed scrutiny of restraints that suppress • truthful, nondeceptive, noneoercive commercial speech. The differences articulated by the Court, see ante, at 564, n. 6, justify a more permissive approach to regulation of the manner of commercial speech for the purpose of protecting consumers from deception or coercion, and these differences explain why doctrines designed to prevent “chilling” of protected speech are inapplicable to commercial speech. No differences between commercial speech and other protected speech justify suppression of commercial speech in order to influence public conduct through manipulation of the availability of information. The Court stated in Carey v. Population Services International:

“Appellants suggest no distinction between commercial and noncommercial speech that would render these discredited arguments meritorious when offered to justify prohibitions on commercial speech. On the contrary, such arguments are clearly directed not at any commercial aspect of the prohibited advertising but at the ideas conveyed and form of expression — the core of First Amendment values.” 431 U. S., at 701, n. 28 (emphasis added).

*579It appears that the Court would permit the State to ban all direct advertising of air conditioning, assuming that a more limited restriction on such advertising would not effectively deter the public from cooling its homes.. In my view, our cases do not support this type of suppression. If a governmental unit believes that use or overuse of air conditioning is a serious problem, it must attack that problem directly, by prohibiting air conditioning or regulating thermostat levels. Just as the Commonwealth of Virginia may promote professionalism of pharmacists directly, so too New York may not promote energy conservation “by keeping the public in ignorance.” Virginia Pharmacy Board, 425 U. S., at 770.

Me. Justice Stevens,

with whom Me. Justice Beennan joins, concurring in the judgment.

Because “commercial speech” is afforded less constitutional protection than other forms of speech,1 it is important that the commercial speech concept not be defined too broadly lest speech deserving of greater constitutional protection be inadvertently suppressed. The issue in this case is whether New York’s prohibition on the promotion of the use of electricity through advertising is a ban on nothing but commercial speech.

In my judgment one of the two definitions the Court uses in addressing that issue is too broad and the other may be somewhat too narrow. The Court first describes commercial speech as “expression related solely to the economic interests of the speaker and its audience.” Ante, at 561. Although it is not entirely clear whether this definition uses the subject matter of the speech or the motivation of the speaker as the limiting factor, it seems clear to me that it encompasses speech that is entitled to the maximum protection afforded by the First Amendment. Neither a labor leader’s exhortation to *580strike, nor an economist’s dissertation on the money supply, should receive any lesser protection because the subject matter concerns only the economic interests of the audience. Nor should the economic motivation of a speaker qualify his constitutional protection; even Shakespeare may have been motivated by the prospect of pecuniary reward. Thus, the Court’s first definition of commercial speech is unquestionably too broad.2

The Court’s second definition refers to “ ‘speech proposing a commercial transaction.’ ” Ante, at 562. A saleman’s solicitation, a broker’s offer, and a manufacturer’s publication of a price list or the terms of his standard warranty would unquestionably fit within this concept.3 Presumably, the definition is intended to encompass advertising that advises possible buyers of the availability of specific products at specific prices and describes the advantages of purchasing such items. Perhaps it also extends to other communications that do little more than make the name of a product or a service more familiar to the general public. Whatever the precise contours of the concept, and perhaps it is too early to enunciate an exact formulation, I am persuaded that it should not include the entire range of communication that is embraced within the term “promotional advertising.”

This case involves a governmental regulation that completely bans promotional advertising by an electric utility. This ban encompasses a great deal more than mere proposals to engage in certain kinds of commercial transactions. It prohibits all advocacy of the immediate or future use of elec*581tricity. It curtails expression by an informed and interested group of persons of their point of view on questions relating to the production and consumption of electrical energy — questions frequently discussed and debated by our political leaders. For example, an electric company’s advocacy of the use of electric heat for environmental reasons, as opposed to wood-burning stoves, would seem to fall squarely within New York’s promotional advertising ban and also within the bounds of maximum First Amendment protection. The breadth of the ban thus exceeds the boundaries of the commercial speech concept, however that concept may be defined.4

The justification for the regulation is nothing more than the expressed fear that the audience may find the utility’s message persuasive. Without the aid of any coercion, deception, or misinformation, truthful communication may persuade some citizens to consume more electricity than they otherwise would. I assume that such a consequence would be undesirable and that government may therefore prohibit and punish the unnecessary or excessive use of electricity. But if the perceived harm associated with greater electrical usage is not sufficiently serious to justify direct regulation, surely it does'not constitute the kind of clear and present danger that can justify the suppression of speech.

*582Although they were written in a different context, the words used by Mr. Justice Brandéis in his concurring opinion in Whitney v. California, 274 U. S. 357, 376-377, explain my reaction to the prohibition against advocacy involved in this case:

“But even advocacy of violation, however reprehensible morally, is not a justification for denying free speech where the advocacy falls short of incitement and there is nothing to indicate that the advocacy would be immediately acted on. The wide difference between advocacy and incitement, between preparation and attempt, between assembling and conspiracy, must be borne in mind. In order to support a finding of clear and present danger it must be shown either that immediate serious violence was to be expected or was advocated, or that the past conduct furnished reason to believe that such advocacy was then contemplated.

“Those who won our independence by revolution were not cowards. They did not fear political change. They did not exalt order at the cost of liberty. To courageous, self-reliant men, with confidence in the power of free and fearless reasoning applied through the processes of popular government, no danger flowing from speech can be deemed clear and present, unless the incidence of the evil apprehended is so imminent that it may befall before there is opportunity for full discussion. If there be time to expose through discussion the falsehood and fallacies, to avert the evil by the processes of education, the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence. Only an emergency can justify repression. Such must be the rule if authority is to be reconciled with freedom. Such, in my opinion, is the command of the Constitution.” (Footnote omitted.)5

*583In sum, I concur in the result because I do not consider this to be a “commercial speech” case. Accordingly, I see no need to decide whether the Court’s four-part analysis, ante, at 566, adequately protects commercial speech — as properly defined— in the face of a blanket ban of the sort involved in this case.

Mr. Justice Rehnquist,

dissenting.

The Court today invalidates an order issued by the New York Public Service Commission designed to promote a policy that has been declared to be of critical national concern. The order was issued by the Commission in 1973 in response to the Mideastern oil embargo crisis. It prohibits electric corporations “from promoting the use of electricity through the use of advertising, subsidy payments ... , or employee incentives.” State of New York Public Service Commission, Case No. 26532 (Dec. 5, 1973), App. to Juris. Statement 31a (emphasis added). Although the immediate crisis created by the oil embargo has subsided, the ban on promotional advertising remains in effect. The regulation was re-examined by the New York Public Service Commission in 1977. Its constitutionality was subsequently upheld by the New York Court of Appeals, which concluded that the paramount national interest in energy conservation justified its retention.1

*584The Court’s asserted justification for invalidating the New York law is the public interest discerned by the Court to underlie the First Amendment in the free flow of commercial information. Prior to this Court’s recent decision in Virginia Pharmacy Board v. Virginia Citizens Consumer Council, 425 U. S. 748 (1976), however, commercial speech was afforded no protection under the First Amendment whatsoever. See, e. g.¡ Breard v. Alexandria, 341 U. S. 622 (1951); Valentine v. Chrestensen, 316 U. S. 52 (1942). Given what seems to me full recognition of the holding of Virginia Pharmacy Board that commercial speech is entitled to some degree of First Amendment protection, I think the Court is nonetheless incorrect in invalidating the carefully considered state ban on promotional advertising in light of pressing national and state energy needs.

The Court’s analysis in my view is wrong in several respects. Initially, I disagree with the Court’s conclusion that the speech of a state-created monopoly, which is the subject of a comprehensive regulatory scheme, is entitled to protection under the First Amendment. I also think that the Court errs here in failing to recognize that the state law is most accurately viewed as an economic regulation and that the speech involved (if it falls within the scope of the First Amendment at all) occupies a significantly more subordinate position in the hierarchy of First Amendment values than the Court gives it today. Finally, the Court in reaching its decision improperly substitutes its own judgment for that of the State in deciding how a proper ban on promotional advertising should be drafted. With regard to this latter point, the Court adopts as its final part of a four-part test a “no more *585extensive than necessary” analysis that will unduly impair a state legislature’s ability to adopt legislation reasonably designed to promote interests that have always been rightly thought to be of great importance to the State.

I

In concluding that appellant’s promotional advertising constitutes protected speech, the Court reasons that speech by electric utilities is valuable to consumers who must decide whether to use the monopoly service or turn to an alternative energy source, and if they decide to use the service how much of it to purchase. Ante, at 567. The Court in so doing “assume [s] that the willingness of a business to promote its products reflects a belief that consumers are interested in the advertising.” Ante, at 568. The Court’s analysis ignores the fact that the monopoly here is entirely state-created and subject to an extensive state regulatory scheme from which it derives benefits as well as burdens.

While this Court has stated that the “capacity [of speech] for informing the public does not depend upon the identity of its source,” First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti, 435 U. S. 765, 777 (1978), the source of the speech nevertheless may be relevant in determining whether a given message is protected under the First Amendment.2 When the source of the speech is a state-created monopoly such as this, traditional First Amendment concerns, if they come into play at all, certainly do not justify the broad interventionist role adopted by the Court today. In Consolidated Edison Co. v. *586Public Service Comm’n, ante, at 549-550, Mr. Justice Black-mun observed:

“A public utility is a state-created monopoly. See, e. g., N. Y. Pub. Serv. Law § 68 (McKinney 1955); Jones, Origins of the Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity; Developments in the States 1870-1920, 79 Colum. L. Rev. 426, 458-461 (1979); Comment, Utility Rates, Consumers, and the New York State Public Service Commission, 39 Albany L. Rev. 707, 709-714 (1975). Although monopolies generally are against the public policies of the United States and of the State of New York, see, e. g., N. Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 340 (McKinney 1968 and Supp. 1979-1980), . . . utilities are permitted to operate as monopolies because of a determination by the State that the public interest is better served by protecting them from competition. See 2 A. Kahn, The Economics of Regulation 113-171 (1971).

“This exceptional grant of power to private enterprises justifies extensive oversight on the part of the State to protect the ratepayers from exploitation of the monopoly power through excessive rates and other forms of overreaching. . . . New York law gives its Public Service Commission plenary supervisory powers over all property, real and personal, 'used or to be used for or in connection with or to facilitate the . . . sale or furnishing of electricity for light, heat or power.’ N. Y. Pub. Serv. Law §§ 2 (12) and 66 (1) (McKinney 1955).”

Thus, although First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti, supra, holds that speech of a corporation is entitled to some First Amendment protection, it by no means follows that a utility with monopoly power conferred by a State is also entitled to such protection.

The state-created monopoly status of a utility arises from the unique characteristics of the services that a utility provides. As recognized in Cantor v. Detroit Edison Co., 428 U. S. 579, 595-596 (1976), “public utility regulation typically *587assumes that the private firm is a natural monopoly and that public controls are necessary to protect the consumer from exploitation.” The consequences of this natural monopoly in my view justify much more wide-ranging supervision and control of a utility under the First Amendment than this Court held in Bellotti to be permissible with regard to ordinary corporations. Corporate status is generally conferred as a result of a State’s determination that the corporate characteristics “enhance its efficiency as an economic entity.” First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti, supra, at 825-826 (Rehnqtjist, J., dissenting). A utility, by contrast, fulfills a function that serves special public interests as a result of the natural monopoly of the service provided. Indeed, the extensive regulations governing decisionmaking by public utilities suggest that for purposes of First Amendment analysis, a utility is far closer to a state-controlled enterprise than is an ordinary corporation.3 Accordingly, I think a State has broad discretion in determining the statements that a utility may make in that such statements emanate from the entity created by the State to provide important and unique public services. And a state regulatory body charged with the oversight of these types of services may reasonably decide to impose on the utility a special duty to conform its conduct to *588the agency’s conception of the public interest. Thus I think it is constitutionally permissible for it to decide that promotional advertising is inconsistent with the public interest in energy conservation. I also think New York’s ban on such advertising falls within the scope of permissible state regulation of an economic activity by an entity that could not exist in corporate form, say nothing of enjoy monopoly status, were it not for the laws of New York.4

II

This Court has previously recognized that although commercial speech may be entitled to First Amendment protection, that protection is not as extensive as that accorded to the advocacy of ideas. Thus, we stated in Ohralik v. Ohio State Bar Assn., 436 U. S. 447, 455-456 (1978):

“Expression concerning purely commercial transactions has come within the ambit of the Amendment’s protec*589tion only recently. In rejecting the notion that such speech 'is wholly outside the protection of the First Amendment/ Virginia Pharmacy, supra, at 761, we were careful not to hold 'that it is wholly undifferentiable from other forms’ of speech. 425 U. S., at 771, n. 24. We have not discarded the 'common-sense’ distinction between speech proposing a commercial transaction, which occurs in an area traditionally subject to government regulation, and other varieties of speech. Ibid. To require a parity of constitutional protection for commercial and noncommercial speech alike could invite dilution, simply by a leveling process, of the force of the Amendment’s guarantee with respect to the latter kind of speech. Rather than subject the First Amendment to such a devitalization, we instead have afforded commercial speech a limited measure of protection, commensurate with its subordinate position in the scale of First Amendment values, while allowing modes of regulation that might be impermissible in the realm of noncommercial expression.” (Footnote omitted.)

The Court’s decision today fails to give due deference to this subordinate position of commercial speech. The Court in so doing returns to the bygone era of Lochner v. New York, 198 U. S. 45 (1905), in which it was common practice for this Court to strike down economic regulations adopted by a State based on the Court’s own notions of the most appropriate means for the State to implement its considered policies.

I had thought by now it had become well established that a State has broad discretion in imposing economic regulations. As this Court stated in Nebbia v. New York, 291 U. S. 502, 537 (1934):

''[T]here can be no doubt that upon proper occasion and by appropriate measures the state may regulate a business in any of its aspects. . . .

*590“So far as the requirement of due process is concerned, and in the absence of other constitutional restriction, a state is free to adopt whatever economic policy may reasonably be deemed to promote public welfare, and to enforce that policy by legislation adapted to its purpose. The courts are without authority either to declare such policy, or, when it is declared by the legislature, to override it. If the laws passed are seen to have a reasonable relation to a proper legislative purpose, and are neither arbitrary nor discriminatory, the requirements of due process are satisfied, and judicial determination to that effect renders a court functus officio. ... [I]t does not lie with the courts to determine that the rule is unwise.”

And Mr. Justice Black, writing for the Court, observed more recently in Ferguson v. Skrupa, 372 U. S. 726, 730 (1963):

“The doctrine . . . that due process authorizes courts to hold laws unconstitutional when they believe the legislature has acted unwisely — has long since been discarded. We have returned to the original constitutional proposition that courts do not substitute their social and economic beliefs for the judgment of legislative bodies, who are elected to pass laws.”

The State of New York has determined here that economic realities require the grant of monopoly status to public utilities in order to distribute efficiently the services they provide, and in granting utilities such status it has made them subject to an extensive regulatory scheme. When the State adopted this scheme and when its Public Service Commission issued its initial ban on promotional advertising in 1973, commercial speech had not been held to fall within the scope of the First Amendment at all. Virginia Pharmacy Board v. Virginia Citizens Consumer Council, 425 U. S. 748 (1976), however, subsequently accorded commercial speech a limited measure of First Amendment protection.

*591The Court today holds not only that commercial speech is entitled to First Amendment protection, but also that when it is protected a State may not regulate it unless its reason for doing so amounts to a “substantial” governmental interest, its regulation “directly advances” that interest, and its manner of regulation is “not more extensive than necessary” to serve the interest. Ante, at 566. The test adopted by the Court thus elevates the protection accorded commercial speech that falls within the scope of the First Amendment to a level that is virtually indistinguishable from that of noncommercial speech. I think the Court in so doing has effectively accomplished the “devitalization” of the First Amendment that it counseled against in Ohralik. I think it has also, by labeling economic regulation of business conduct as a restraint on “free speech,” gone far to resurrect the discredited doctrine of cases such as Lochner and Tyson & Brother v. Banton, 273 U. S. 418 (1927). New York’s order here is in my view more akin to an economic regulation to which virtually complete deference should be accorded by this Court.

I doubt there would be any question as to the constitutionality of New York’s conservation effort if the Public Service Commission had chosen to raise the price of electricity, see, e. g., Sunshine Anthracite Coal Co. v. Adkins, 310 U. S. 381 (1940); Old Dearborn Distributing Co. v. Seagram-Distillers Cory., 299 U. S. 183 (1936), to condition its sale on specified terms, see, e. g., Nebbia v. New York, supra, at 527-528, or to restrict its production, see, e. g., Wickard v. Filburn, 317 U. S. 111 (1942). In terms of constitutional values, I think that such controls are virtually indistinguishable from the State’s ban on promotional advertising.

An ostensible justification for striking down New York’s ban on promotional advertising is that this Court has previously “rejected the 'highly paternalistic’ view that government has complete power to suppress or regulate commercial speech. '[PJeople will perceive their own best interests if *592only they are well enough informed and . . . the best means to that end is to open the channels of communication, rather than to close them. . ..’ ” Ante, at 562. Whatever the merits of this view, I think the Court has carried its logic too far here.

The view apparently derives from the Court’s frequent reference to the “marketplace of ideas,” which was deemed analogous to the commercial market in which a laissez-faire policy would lead to optimum economic decisionmaking under the guidance of the “invisible hand.” See, e. g., Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations (1776). This notion was expressed by Mr. Justice Holmes in his dissenting opinion in Abrams v. United States, 250 U. S. 616, 630 (1919), wherein he stated that “the best test of truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market. . . .” See also, e. g., Consolidated Edison v. Public Service Comm’n, ante, at 534; J. Mill, On Liberty (1858); J. Milton, Areo-pagitica, A Speech for the Liberty of Unlicensed Printing (1644).

While it is true that an important objective of the First Amendment is to foster the free flow of information, identification of speech that falls within its protection is not aided by the metaphorical reference to a “marketplace of ideas.” There is no reason for believing that the marketplace of ideas is free from market imperfections any more than there is to believe that the invisible hand will always lead to optimum economic decisions in the commercial market. See, e. g., Baker, Scope of the First Amendment, Freedom of Speech, 25 UCLA L. Rev. 964, 967-981 (1978). Indeed, many types of speech have been held to fall outside the scope of the First Amendment, thereby subject to governmental regulation, despite this Court’s references to a marketplace of ideas. See, e. g., Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, 315 U. S. 568 (1942) (fighting words); Beauharnais v. Illinois. 343 U. S. 250 (1952) (group libel); Roth v. United States, 354 U. S. 476 (1957) (obscenity). It also has been held that the government has *593a greater interest in regulating some types of protected speech than others. See, e. g., FCC v. Pacifica Foundation, 438 U. S. 726 (1978) (indecent speech); Virginia Pharmacy Board v. Virginia Citizens Consumer Council, supra (commercial speech). And as this Court stated in Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U. S. 323, 344, n. 9 (1974): “Of course, an opportunity for rebuttal seldom suffices to undo [the] harm of a defamatory falsehood. Indeed the law of defamation is rooted in our experience that the truth rarely catches up with a lie.” The Court similarly has recognized that false and misleading commercial speech is not entitled to any First Amendment protection. See, e. g., ante, at 566.

The above examples illustrate that in a number of instances government may constitutionally decide that societal interests justify the imposition of restrictions on the free flow of information. When the question is whether a given commercial message is protected, I do not think this Court’s determination that the information will “assist” consumers justifies judicial invalidation of a reasonably drafted state restriction on such speech when the restriction is designed to promote a concededly substantial state interest. I consequently disagree with the Court’s conclusion that the societal interest in the dissemination of commercial information is sufficient to justify a restriction on the State’s authority to regulate promotional advertising by utilities; indeed, in the case of a regulated monopoly, it is difficult for me to distinguish “society” from the state legislature and the Public Service Commission. Nor do I think there is any basis for concluding that individual citizens of the State will recognize the need for and act to promote energy conservation to the extent the government deems appropriate, if only the channels of communication are left open.5 Thus, even if I were *594to agree that commercial speech is entitled to some First Amendment protection, I would hold here that the State’s decision to ban promotional advertising, in light of the substantial state interest at stake, is a constitutionally permissible exercise of its power to adopt regulations designed to promote the interests of its citizens.

The plethora of opinions filed in this case highlights the doctrinal difficulties that emerge from this Court’s decisions granting First Amendment protection to commercial speech. My Brother Stevens, quoting Mr. Justice Brandeis in Whitney v. California, 274 U. S. 357, 376-377 (1927), includes Mr. Justice Brandéis’ statement that “[t]hose who won our independence by revolution were not cowards. They did-not fear political change. They did not exalt order at the cost of liberty.” Ante, at 582. Mr. Justice Blackmun, in his separate opinion, joins only in the Court’s judgment because he believes that the Court’s opinion “does not provide adequate protection for truthful, nonmisleading, noncoercive commercial speech.” Ante, at 573. Both Mr. Justice Stevens, ante, at 582, and Mr. Justice Blackmun, ante, at 577, would apply the following formulation by Mr. Justice Brandéis of the clear-and-present-danger test to the regulation of speech at issue in this case:

“If there be time to expose through discussion the false*595hood and fallacies, to avert the evil by the processes of education, the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence. Only an emergency can justify repression.” Whitney v. California, supra, at 377 (concurring opinion).

Although the Court today does not go so far as to adopt this position, its reasons for invalidating New York’s ban on promotional advertising make it quite difficult for a legislature to draft a statute regulating promotional advertising that will satisfy the First Amendment requirements established by the Court in this context. See Part III, infra.

Two ideas are here at war with one another, and their resolution, although it be on a judicial battlefield, will be a very difficult one. The sort of “advocacy” of which Mr. Justice Brandéis spoke was not the advocacy on the part of a utility to use more of its product. Nor do I think those who won our independence, while declining to “exalt order at the cost of liberty,” would have viewed a merchant’s unfettered freedom to advertise in hawking his wares as a “liberty” not subject to extensive regulation in light of the government’s substantial interest in attaining “order” in the economic sphere.

While I agree that when the government attempts to regulate speech of those expressing views on public issues, the speech is protected by the First Amendment unless it presents “a clear and present danger” of a substantive evil that the government has a right to prohibit, see, e. g., Schenck v. United States, 249 U. S. 47, 52 (1919), I think it is important to recognize that this test is appropriate in the political context in light of the central importance of such speech to our system of self-government. As observed in Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1, 14 (1976):

“Discussion of public issues and debate on the qualifications of candidates are integral to the operation of the system of government established by our Constitution. The First Amendment affords the broadest protection to *596such political expression in order ‘to assure [the] unfettered interchange of ideas for the bringing about of political and social changes desired by the people/ ”

And in Garrison v. Louisiana, 379 U. S. 64, 74-75 (1964), this Court stated that “speech concerning public affairs is more than self-expression; it is the essence of self-government.”

The First Amendment, however, does not always require a clear and present danger to be present before the government may regulate speech. Although First Amendment protection is not limited to the “exposition of ideas” on public issues, see, e. g., Winters v. New York, 333 U. S. 507, 510 (1948)— both because the line between the informing and the entertaining is elusive and because art, literature, and the like may contribute to important First Amendment interests of the individual in freedom of speech — it is well established that the government may regulate obscenity even though its does not present a clear and present danger. Compare, e. g., Paris Adult Theatre I v. Slaton, 413 U. S. 49, 57-58 (1973), with Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U. S. 444, 447 (1969). Indecent speech, at least when broadcast over the airwaves, also may be regulated absent a clear and present danger of the type described by Mr. Justice Brandéis and required by this Court in Brandenburg. FCC v. Pacifica Foundation, 438 U. S. 726 (1978). And in a slightly different context this Court declined to apply the clear-and-present-danger test to a conspiracy among members of the press in violation of the Sherman Act because to do so would “degrade” that doctrine. Associated Press v. United States, 326 U. S. 1, 7 (1945). Nor does the Court today apply the clear-and-present-danger test in invalidating New York’s ban on promotional advertising. As noted above, in these and other contexts the Court has clearly rejected the notion that there must be a free “marketplace of ideas.”

If the complaint of those who feel the Court’s opinion does not go far enough is that the “only test of truth is its ability *597to get itself accepted in the marketplace of ideas” — the test advocated by Thomas Jefferson in his first inaugural address, and by Mr. Justice Holmes in Abrams v. United States, 250 U. S. 616, 630 (1919) (dissenting opinion) — there is no reason whatsoever to limit the protection accorded commercial speech to “truthful, nonmisleading, noncoercive” speech. See ante, at 573 (Blackmun, J., concurring in judgment). If the “commercial speech” is in fact misleading, the “marketplace of ideas” will in time reveal that fact. It may not reveal it sufficiently soon to avoid harm to numerous people, but if the reasoning of Brandéis and Holmes is applied in this context, that was one of the risks we took in protecting free speech in a democratic society.

Unfortunately, although the “marketplace of ideas” has a historically and sensibly defined context in the world of political speech, it has virtually none in the realm of business transactions. Even so staunch a defender of the First Amendment as Mr. Justice Black, in his dissent in Breará v. Alexandria, 341 U. S., at 650, n., stated:

“Of course I believe that the present ordinance could constitutionally be applied to a 'merchant’ who goes from door to door 'selling pots.’ ”

And yet, with the change in solicitation and advertising techniques, the line between what Central Hudson did here and the peddler selling pots in Alexandria a generation ago is difficult, if not impossible to fix. Doubtless that was why Mr. Justice Black joined the unanimous opinion of the Court in Valentine v. Chrestensen, 316 U. S., at 54, in which the Court stated:

“This court has unequivocally held that the streets are proper places for the exercise of the freedom of communicating information and disseminating opinion and that, though the states and municipalities may appropriately regulate the privilege in the public interest, they may not unduly burden or proscribe its employment in these pub-*598lie thoroughfares. We are equally clear that the Constitution imposes no such restraint on government as respects purely commercial advertising. Whether, and to what extent, one may promote or pursue a gainful occupation in the streets, to what extent such activity shall be adjudged a derogation of the public right of user, are matters for legislative judgment.” (Emphasis added.)

I remain of the view that the Court unlocked a Pandora’s Box when it “elevated” commercial speech to the level of traditional political speech by according it First Amendment protection in Virginia Pharmacy Board v. Virginia Citizens Consumer Council, 425 U. S. 748 (1976). The line between “commercial speech,” and the kind of speech that those who drafted the First Amendment had in mind, may not be a technically or intellectually easy one to draw, but it surely produced far fewer problems than has the development of judicial doctrine in this area since Virginia Pharmacy Board. For in the world of political advocacy and its marketplace of ideas, there is no such thing as a “fraudulent” idea: there may be useless proposals, totally unworkable schemes, as well as very sound proposals that will receive the imprimatur of the “marketplace of ideas” through our majoritarian system of election and representative government. The free flow of information is important in this context not because it will lead, to the discovery of any objective “truth,” but because it is essential to our system of self-government.

The notion that more speech is the remedy to expose falsehood and fallacies is wholly out of place in the commercial bazaar, where if applied logically the remedy of one who was defrauded would be merely a statement, available upon request, reciting the Latin maxim “caveat emptor.” But since “fraudulent speech” in this area is to be remediable under Virginia Pharmacy Board, supra, the remedy of one defrauded is a lawsuit or an agency proceeding based on common-law notions of fraud that are separated by a world of difference *599from the realm of politics and government. What time, legal decisions, and common sense have so widely severed, I declined to join in Virginia Pharmacy Board, and regret now to see the Court reaping the seeds that it there sowed. For in a democracy, the economic is subordinate to the political, a lesson that our ancestors learned long ago, and that our descendants will undoubtedly have to relearn many years hence.

Ill

The Court concedes that the state interest in energy conservation is plainly substantial, ante, at 568, as is the State’s concern that its rates be fair and efficient. Ante, at 569. It also concedes that there is a direct link between the Commission’s ban on promotional advertising and the State’s interest in conservation. Ibid. The Court nonetheless strikes down the ban on promotional advertising because the Commission has failed to demonstrate, under the final part of the Court’s four-part test, that its regulation is no more extensive than necessary to serve the State’s interest. Ante, at 569-571. In reaching this conclusion, the Court conjures up potential advertisements that a utility might make that conceivably would result in net energy savings. The Court does not indicate that the New York Public Service Commission has in fact construed its ban on “promotional” advertising to preclude the dissemination of information that clearly would result in a net energy savings, nor does it even suggest that the Commission has been confronted with and rejected such an advertising proposal.6 The final part of the Court’s test *600thus leaves room for so many hypothetical “better” ways that any ingenious lawyer will surely seize on one of them to secure the invalidation of what the state agency actually did. As Mr. Justice Blackmun observed in Illinois Elections Bd. v. Socialist Workers Party, 440 U. S. 173, 188-189 (1979) (concurring opinion):

“A° judge would be unimaginative indeed if he could not come up with something a little less ‘drastic’ or a little less ‘restrictive’ in almost any situation, and thereby enable himself to vote to strike legislation down.”

Here the Court concludes that the State’s interest in energy conservation cannot justify a blanket ban on promotional advertising. In its statement of the facts, the Court observes that the Commission’s ban on promotional advertising is not “a perfect vehicle for conserving energy.” It states:

“[T]he Commission’s order prohibits promotional advertising to develop consumption during periods when demand for electricity is low. By limiting growth in ‘off-peak’ consumption, the ban limits the ‘beneficial side effects’ of such growth in terms of more efficient use of existing powerplants. [App. to Juris. Statement] 37a.” Ante, at 559.

The Court’s analysis in this regard is in my view fundamentally misguided because it fails to recognize that the beneficial side effects of “more efficient use” may be inconsistent with the goal of energy conservation. Indeed, the Commission explicitly found that the promotion of off-peak consumption would impair conservation efforts.7 The Commission stated:

“Increased off-peak generation, . . . while conferring *601some beneficial side effects, also consumes valuable energy resources and, if it is the result of increased sales, necessarily creates incremental air pollution and thermal discharges to waterways. More important, any increase in off-peak generation from most of the major companies producing electricity in this State would not, at this time, be produced from coal or nuclear resources, but would require the use of oil-fired generating facilities. The increased requirement for fuel oil to serve the incremental off-peak load created by promotional advertising would aggravate the nation’s already unacceptably high level of dependence on foreign sources of supply and would, in addition, frustrate rather than encourage conservation efforts.” App. to Juris. Statement 37a.8

The Court also observes, as the Commission acknowledged, that the ban on promotional advertising can achieve only “piecemeal conservationism” because oil dealers are not under the Commission’s jurisdiction, and they remain free to advertise. Until I have mastered electrical engineering and marketing, I am not prepared to contradict by virtue of my judicial office those who assume that the ban will be successful in making a substantial contribution to conservation efforts. *602And I doubt that any of this Court’s First Amendment decisions justify striking down the Commission’s order because more steps toward conservation could have been made This is especially true when, as here, the Commission lacks authority over oil dealers.

The Court concludes that the Commission’s ban on promotional advertising must be struck down because it is more extensive than necessary: it may result in the suppression of advertising by utilities that promotes the use of electrical devices or services that cause no net increase in total energy use. The Court’s reasoning in this regard, however, is highly speculative. The Court provides two examples that it claims support its conclusion. It first states that both parties acknowledge that the “heat pump” will be “a major improvement in electric heating,” and that but for the ban the utilities would advertise this type of “energy efficien[t]” product.9 The New York Public Service Commission, however, considered the merits of the heat pump and concluded that it would most likely result in an overall increase in electric energy consumption. The Commission stated:

“[Installation of a heat pump means also installation of central air-conditioning. To this extent, promotion of off-peak electric space heating involves promotion of on-peak summer air-conditioning as well as on-peak usage *603of electricity for water heating. And the price of electricity to most consumers in the State does not now fully reflect the much higher marginal costs of on-peak consumption in summer peaking markets. In these circumstances, there would be a subsidization of consumption on-peak, and consequently, higher rates for all consumers.” App. to Juris. Statement 58a.

Subsidization of peak consumption not only may encourage the use of scarce energy resources during peak periods, but also may lead to larger Preserve generating capacity requirements for the State.

The Court next asserts that electric heating as a backup to solar and other heat may be an efficient alternative energy source. Ante, at 570. The Court fails to establish, however, that an advertising proposal of this sort was properly presented to the Commission. Indeed, the Court’s concession that the Commission did not make findings on this issue suggests that the Commission did not even consider it. Nor does the Court rely on any support for its assertion other than the assertion of appellant. Rather, it speculates that “[i]n the absence of authoritative findings to the contrary, we must credit as within the realm of possibility the claim that electric heat can be an efficient alternative in some circumstances.” Ibid10

Ordinarily it is the role of the State Public Service Commission to make factual determinations concerning whether a device or service will result in a net energy savings and, if so, whether and to what extent state law permits dissemination of information about the device or service. Otherwise, *604as here, this Court will have no factual basis for its assertions. And the State will never have an opportunity to consider the issue and thus to construe its law in a manner consistent with the Federal Constitution. As stated in Barrows v. Jackson, 346 U. S. 249, 256-257 (1953):

“It would indeed be undesirable for this Court to consider every conceivable situation which might possibly arise in the application of complex and comprehensive legislation. Nor are we so ready to frustrate the expressed will of Congress or that of the state legislatures. Cf. Southern Pacific Co. v. Gallagher, 306 U. S. 167, 172.”

I think the Court would do well to heed the admonition in Barrows here. The terms of the order of the New York Public Service Commission in my view indicate that advertising designed to promote net savings in energy use does not fall within the scope of the ban. The order prohibits electric corporations “from promoting the use of electricity through the use of advertising, subsidy payments ... , or employee incentives.” App. to Juris. Statement 31a (emphasis added). It is not clear to me that advertising that is likely to result in net savings of energy is advertising that “promot[es] the use of electricity,” nor does the Court point to any language in the Commission order that suggests it has adopted this construction. Rather, it would seem more accurate to characterize such advertising as designed to “discourage” the use of electricity.11 Indeed, I think it is quite likely that the Com*605mission would view advertising that would clearly result in a net savings in energy as consistent with the objectives of its order and therefore permissible.12 The Commission, for example, has authorized the dissemination of information that would result in shifts in electrical energy demand, thereby reducing the demand for electricity during peak periods. Id., at 37a.13 It has also indicated a willingness to consider at least some other types of “specific proposals” submitted by utilities. Id., at 37a-38a. And it clearly permits informational as opposed to promotional dissemination of information. Id., at 43a-46a. Even if the Commission were ultimately to reject the view that its ban on promotional advertising does not include advertising that results in net energy savings, I think the Commission should at least be given an opportunity to consider it.

It is in my view inappropriate for the Court to invalidate the State’s ban on commercial advertising here, based on its speculation that in some cases the advertising may result in a net savings in electrical energy use, and in the cases in which it is clear a net energy savings would result from utility advertising, the Public Service Commission would apply its *606ban so as to proscribe such advertising. Even assuming that the Court’s speculation is correct, I do not think it follows that facial invalidation of the ban is the appropriate course. As stated in Parker v. Levy, 417 U. S. 733, 760 (1974), “even if there are marginal applications in which a statute would infringe on First Amendment values, facial invalidation is inappropriate if the 'remainder of the statute . . . covers a whole range of easily identifiable and constitutionally pre-scribable . . . conduct. . . .’ CSC v. Letter Carriers, 413 U. S. 548, 580-581 (1973).” This is clearly the case here.

For the foregoing reasons, I would affirm the judgment of the New York Court of Appeals.

*557Justice Kennedy

delivered the opinion of the Court.

Vermont law restricts the sale, disclosure, and use of pharmacy records that reveal the prescribing practices of individual doctors. Vt. Stat. Ann., Tit. 18, §4631 (Supp. 2010). Subject to certain exceptions, the information may not be sold, disclosed by pharmacies for marketing purposes, or used for marketing by pharmaceutical manufacturers. Vermont argues that its prohibitions safeguard medical privacy and diminish the likelihood that marketing will lead to prescription decisions not in the best interests of patients or the State. It can be assumed that these interests are significant. Speech in aid of pharmaceutical marketing, however, is a form of expression protected by the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment. As a consequence, Vermont’s statute must be subjected to heightened judicial scrutiny. The law cannot satisfy that standard.

I

A

Pharmaceutical manufacturers promote their drugs to doctors through a process called “detailing.” This often in*558volves a scheduled visit to a doctor’s office to persuade the doctor to prescribe a particular pharmaceutical. Detailers bring drug samples as well as medical studies that explain the “details” and potential advantages of various prescription drugs. Interested physicians listen, ask questions, and receive followup data. Salespersons can be more effective when they know the background and purchasing preferences of their clientele, and pharmaceutical salespersons are no exception. Knowledge of a physician’s prescription practices — called “prescriber-identifying information” — enables a detailer better to ascertain which doctors are likely to be interested in a particular drug and how best to present a particular sales message. Detailing is an expensive undertaking, so pharmaceutical companies most often use it to promote high-profit brand-name drugs protected by patent. Once a brand-name drug’s patent expires, less expensive bioequivalent generic alternatives are manufactured and sold.

Pharmacies, as a matter of business routine and federal law, receive prescriber-identifying information when processing prescriptions. See 21 U. S. C. § 353(b); see also Vt. Bd. of Pharmacy Admin. Rule 9.1 (2009); Rule 9.2. Many pharmacies sell this information to “data miners,” firms that analyze prescriber-identifying information and produce reports on prescriber behavior. Data miners lease these reports to pharmaceutical manufacturers subject to nondisclosure agreements. Detailers, who represent the manufacturers, then use the reports to refine their marketing tactics and increase sales.

In 2007, Vermont enacted the Prescription Confidentiality Law. The measure is also referred to as Act 80. It has several components. The central provision of the present case is § 4631(d).

“A health insurer, a self-insured employer, an electronic transmission intermediary, a pharmacy, or other similar entity shall not sell, license, or exchange for value regu*559lated records containing prescriber-identifiable information, nor permit the use of regulated records containing prescriber-identifiable information for marketing or promoting a prescription drug, unless the prescriber consents .... Pharmaceutical manufacturers and pharmaceutical marketers shall not use prescriber-identifiable information for marketing or promoting a prescription drug unless the prescriber consents . . . .”

The quoted provision has three component parts. The provision begins by prohibiting pharmacies, health insurers, and similar entities from selling prescriber-identifying information, absent the prescriber’s consent. The parties here dispute whether this clause applies to all sales or only to sales for marketing. The provision then goes on to prohibit pharmacies, health insurers, and similar entities from allowing prescriber-identifying information to be used for marketing, unless the prescriber consents. This prohibition in effect bars pharmacies from disclosing the information for marketing purposes. Finally, the provision’s second sentence bars pharmaceutical manufacturers and pharmaceutical marketers from using prescriber-identifying information for marketing, again absent the prescriber’s consent. The Vermont attorney general may pursue civil remedies against violators. § 4631(f).

Separate statutory provisions elaborate the scope of the prohibitions set out in § 4631(d). “Marketing” is defined to include “advertising, promotion, or any activity” that is “used to influence sales or the market share of a prescription drug.” § 4631(b)(5). Section 4631(c)(1) further provides that Vermont’s Department of Health must allow “a prescriber to give consent for his or her identifying information to be used for the purposes” identified in § 4631(d). Finally, the Act’s prohibitions on sale, disclosure, and use are subject to a list of exceptions. For example, prescriber-identifying information may be disseminated or used for “health care research”; to enforce “compliance” with health insurance formularies *560or preferred drug lists; for “care management educational communications provided to” patients on such matters as “treatment options”; for law enforcement operations; and for purposes “otherwise provided by law.” § 4631(e).

Act 80 also authorized funds for an “evidence-based prescription drug education program” designed to provide doctors and others with “information and education on the therapeutic and cost-effective utilization of prescription drugs.” § 4622(a)(1). An express aim of the program is to advise prescribers “about commonly used brand-name drugs for which the patent has expired” or will soon expire. § 4622(a)(2). Similar efforts to promote the use of generic pharmaceuticals are sometimes referred to as “counter-detailing.” App. 211; see also IMS Health Inc. v. Ayotte, 550 F. 3d 42, 91 (CA1 2008) (Lipez, J., concurring and dissenting). The counterdetailer’s recommended substitute may be an older, less expensive drug and not a bioequivalent of the brand-name drug the physician might otherwise prescribe. Like the pharmaceutical manufacturers whose efforts they hope to resist, counterdetailers in some States use prescriber-identifying information to increase their effectiveness. States themselves may supply the prescriber-identifying information used in these programs. See App. 313; id., at 375 (“[W]e use the data given to us by the State of Pennsylvania ... to figure out which physicians to talk to”); see also id., at 427-429 (Director of the Office of Vermont Health Access explaining that the office collects prescriber-identifying information but “does not at this point in time have a counterdetailing or detailing effort”). As first enacted, Act 80 also required detailers to provide information about alternative treatment options. The Vermont Legislature, however, later repealed that provision. 2008 Vt. Laws No. 89, § 3.

Act 80 was accompanied by legislative findings. 2007 Vt. Laws No. 80, §1. Vermont found, for example, that the “goals of marketing programs are often in conflict with the *561goals of the state” and that the “marketplace for ideas on medicine safety and effectiveness is frequently one-sided in that brand-name companies invest in expensive pharmaceutical marketing campaigns to doctors.” §§ 1(3), (4). Detailing, in the legislature’s view, caused doctors to make decisions based on “incomplete and biased information.” §1(4). Because they “are unable to take the time to research the quickly changing pharmaceutical market,” Vermont doctors “rely on information provided by pharmaceutical representatives.” §1(13). The legislature further found that detailing increases the cost of health care and health insurance, §1(15); encourages hasty and excessive'reliance on brand-name drugs, before the profession has observed their effectiveness as compared with older and less expensive generic alternatives, §1(7); and fosters disruptive and repeated marketing visits tantamount to harassment, §§ l(27)-(28). The legislative findings further noted that use of prescriber-identifying information “increase^] the effect of detailing programs” by allowing detailers to target their visits to particular doctors. §§ l(23)-(26). Use of prescriber-identifying data also helps detailers shape their messages by “tailoring” their “presentations to individual prescriber styles, preferences, and attitudes.” § 1(25).

B

The present ease involves two consolidated suits. One was brought by three Vermont data miners, the other by an association of pharmaceutical manufacturers that produce ■brand-name drugs. These entities are the respondents here. Contending that § 4631(d) violates their First Amendment rights as incorporated by the Fourteenth Amendment, respondents sought declaratory and injunctive relief against petitioners, the Attorney General and other officials of the State of Vermont.

After a bench trial, the United States District Court for the District of Vermont denied relief. 631 F. Supp. 2d 434 *562(2009). The District Court found that “[pjharmaceutical manufacturers are essentially the only paying customers of the data vendor industry” and that, because detailing unpat-ented generic drugs is not “cost-effective,” pharmaceutical sales representatives “detail only branded drugs.” Id., at 451, 442. As the District Court further concluded, “the Legislature’s determination that [prescriber-identifying] data is an effective marketing tool that enables detailers to increase sales of new drugs is supported in the record.” Id., at 451. The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit reversed and remanded. It held that § 4631(d) violates the First Amendment by burdening the speech of pharmaceutical marketers and data miners without an adequate justification. 630 F. 3d 263 (2010). Judge Livingston dissented.

The decision of the Second Circuit is in conflict with decisions of the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit concerning similar legislation enacted by Maine and New Hampshire. See IMS Health Inc. v. Mills, 616 F. 3d 7 (CA1 2010) (Maine); Ayotte, supra (New Hampshire). Recognizing a division of authority regarding the constitutionality of state statutes, this Court granted certiorari. 562 U. S. 1127 (2011).

II

The beginning point is the text of § 4631(d). In the proceedings below, Vermont stated that the first sentence of § 4631(d) prohibits pharmacies and other regulated entities from selling or disseminating prescriber-identifying information for marketing. The information, in other words, could be sold or given away for purposes other than marketing. The District Court and the Court of Appeals accepted the State’s reading. See 630 F. 3d, at 276. At oral argument in this Court, however, the State for the first time advanced an alternative reading of § 4631(d) — namely, that pharmacies, health insurers, and similar entities may not sell prescriber-identifying information for any purpose, subject to the statu*563tory exceptions set out at § 4631(e). See Tr. of Oral Arg. 19-20. It might be argued that the State’s newfound interpretation comes too late in the day. See Sprietsma v. Mercury Marine, 537 U. S. 51, 56, n. 4 (2002) (waiver); New Hampshire v. Maine, 532 U. S. 742, 749 (2001) (judicial estop-pel). Respondents, the District Court, and the Court of Appeals were entitled to rely on the State’s plausible interpretation of the law it is charged with enforcing. For the State to change its position is particularly troubling in a First Amendment case, where plaintiffs have a special interest in obtaining a prompt adjudication of their rights, despite potential ambiguities of state law. See Houston v. Hill, 482 U. S. 451, 467-468, and n. 17 (1987); Zwickler v. Koota, 389 U. S. 241, 252 (1967).

In any event, § 4631(d) cannot be sustained even under the interpretation the State now adopts. As a consequence this Court can assume that the opening clause of § 4631(d) prohibits pharmacies, health insurers, and similar entities from selling prescriber-identifying information, subject to the statutory exceptions set out at § 4631(e). Under that reading, pharmacies may sell the information to private or academic researchers, see § 4631(e)(1), but not, for example, to pharmaceutical marketers. There is no dispute as to the remainder of § 4631(d). It prohibits pharmacies, health insurers, and similar entities from disclosing or otherwise allowing prescriber-identifying information to be used for marketing. And it bars pharmaceutical manufacturers and detailers from using the information for marketing. The questions now are whether § 4631(d) must be tested by heightened judicial scrutiny and, if so, whether the State can justify the law

A

1

On its face, Vermont’s law enacts content- and speaker-based restrictions on the sale, disclosure, and use of *564prescriber-identifying information. The provision first forbids sale subject to exceptions based in large part on the content of a purchaser’s speech. For example, those who wish to engage in certain “educational communications,” § 4681(e)(4), may purchase the information. The measure then bars any disclosure when recipient speakers will use the information for marketing. Finally, the provision’s second sentence prohibits pharmaceutical manufacturers from using the information for marketing. The statute thus disfavors marketing, that is, speech with a particular content. More than that, the statute disfavors specific speakers, namely pharmaceutical manufacturers. As a result of these content- and speaker-based rules, detailers cannot obtain prescriber-identifying information, even though the information may be purchased or acquired by other speakers with diverse purposes and viewpoints. Detailers are likewise barred from using the information for marketing, even though the information may be used by a wide range of other speakers. For example, it appears that Vermont could supply academic organizations with prescriber-identifying information to use in countering the messages of brand-name pharmaceutical manufacturers and in promoting the prescription of generic drugs. But § 4631(d) leaves detail-ers no means of purchasing, acquiring, or using prescriber-identifying information. The law on its face burdens disfavored speech by disfavored speakers.

Any doubt that § 4631(d) imposes an aimed, content-based burden on detailers is dispelled by the record and by formal legislative findings. As the District Court noted, “[p]har-maceutical manufacturers are essentially the only paying customers of the data vendor industry”; and the almost invariable rule is that detailing by pharmaceutical manufacturers is in support of brand-name drugs. 631 F. Supp. 2d, at 451. Vermont’s law thus has the effect of preventing detail-ers — and only detailers — from communicating with physicians in an effective and informative manner. Cf. Edenfield *565v. Fane, 507 U. S. 761, 766 (1993) (explaining the “considerable value” of in-person solicitation). Formal legislative findings accompanying § 4631(d) confirm that the law’s express purpose and practical effect are to diminish the effectiveness of marketing by manufacturers of brand-name drugs. Just as the “inevitable effect of a statute on its face may render it unconstitutional,” a statute’s stated purposes may also be considered. United States v. O’Brien, 391 U. S. 367, 384 (1968). Here, the Vermont Legislature explained that detailers, in particular those who promote brand-name drugs, convey messages that “are often in conflict with the goals of the state.” 2007 Vt. Laws No. 80, § 1(3). The legislature designed § 4631(d) to target those speakers and their messages for disfavored treatment. “In its practical operation,” Vermont’s law “goes even beyond mere content discrimination, to actual viewpoint discrimination.” R. A. V. v. St. Paul, 505 U. S. 377, 391 (1992). Given the legislature’s expressed statement of purpose, it is apparent that § 4631(d) imposes burdens that are based on the content of speech and that are aimed at a particular viewpoint.

Act 80 is designed to impose a specific, content-based burden on protected expression. It follows that heightened judicial scrutiny is warranted. See Cincinnati v. Discovery Network, Inc., 507 U. S. 410, 418 (1993) (applying heightened scrutiny to “a categorical prohibition on the use of newsracks to disseminate commercial messages”); id., at 429 (“[TJhe very basis for the regulation is the difference in content between ordinary newspapers and commercial speech” in the form of “commercial handbills .... Thus, by any commonsense understanding of the term, the ban in this case is ‘content based’” (some internal quotation marks omitted)); see also Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. v. FCC, 512 U. S. 622, 658 (1994) (explaining that strict scrutiny applies to regulations reflecting “aversion” to what “disfavored speakers” have to say). The Court has recognized that the “distinction between laws burdening and laws banning speech is but a *566matter of degree” and that the “Government’s content-based burdens must satisfy the same rigorous scrutiny as its content-based bans.” United States v. Playboy Entertainment Group, Inc., 529 U. S. 803, 812 (2000). Lawmakers may no more silence unwanted speech by burdening its utterance than by censoring its content. See Simon & Schuster, Inc. v. Members of N. Y. State Crime Victims Bd., 502 U. S. 105, 115 (1991) (content-based financial burden); Minneapolis Star & Tribune Co. v. Minnesota Comm’r of Revenue, 460 U. S. 575 (1983) (speaker-based financial burden).

The First Amendment requires heightened scrutiny whenever the government creates “a regulation of speech because of disagreement with the message it conveys.” Ward v. Rock Against Racism, 491 U. S. 781, 791 (1989); see also Renton v. Playtime Theatres, Inc., 475 U. S. 41, 48 (1986) (explaining that “'content-neutral’ speech regulations” are “those that are justified without reference to the content of the regulated speech” (internal quotation marks omitted)). A government bent on frustrating an impending demonstration might pass a law demanding two years’ notice before the issuance of parade permits. Even if the hypothetical measure on its face appeared neutral as to content and speaker, its purpose to suppress speech and its unjustified burdens on expression would render it unconstitutional. Ibid. Commercial speech is no exception. See Discovery Network, supra, at 429-430 (commercial speech restriction lacking a “neutral justification” was not content neutral). A “consumer’s concern for the free flow of commercial speech often may be far keener than his concern for urgent political dialogue.” Bates v. State Bar of Ariz., 433 U. S. 350, 364 (1977). That reality has great relevance in the fields of medicine and public health, where information can save lives.

2

The State argues that heightened judicial scrutiny is unwarranted because its law is a mere commercial regulation. *567It is true that restrictions on protected expression are distinct from restrictions on economic activity or, more generally, on nonexpressive conduct. It is also true that the First Amendment does not prevent restrictions directed at commerce or conduct from imposing incidental burdens on speech. That is why a ban on race-based hiring may require employers to remove “‘White Applicants Only’” signs, Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic arid Institutional Rights, Inc., 547 U. S. 47, 62 (2006); why “an ordinance against outdoor fires” might forbid “burning a flag,” R. A. V., supra, at 385; and why antitrust laws can prohibit “agreements in restraint of trade,” Gihoney v. Empire Storage & Ice Co., 886 U. S. 490, 502 (1949).

But § 4631(d) imposes more than an incidental burden on protected expression. Both on its face and in its practical operation, Vermont’s law imposes a burden based on the content of speech and the identity of the speaker. See supra, at 563-565. While the burdened speech results from an economic motive, so too does a great deal of vital expression. See Bigelow v. Virginia, 421 U. S. 809, 818 (1975); New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254, 266 (1964); see also United States v. United Foods, Inc., 533 U. S. 405, 410-411 (2001) (applying “First Amendment scrutiny” where speech effects were not incidental and noting that “those whose business and livelihood depend in some way upon the product involved no doubt deem First Amendment protection to be just as important for them as it is for other discrete, little noticed groups”). Vermont’s law does not simply have an effect on speech, but is directed at. certain content and is aimed at particular speakers. The Constitution “does not enact Mr. Herbert Spencer’s Social Statics.” Lochner v. New York, 198 U. S. 45, 75 (1905) (Holmes, J., dissenting). It does enact the First Amendment.

Vermont further argues that § 4631(d) regulates not speech but simply access to information. Prescriber-identifying information was generated in compliance with a *568legal mandate, the State argues, and so could be considered a kind of governmental information. This argument finds some support in Los Angeles Police Dept. v. United Reporting Publishing Corp., 528 U. S. 32 (1999), where the Court held that a plaintiff could not raise a facial challenge to a content-based restriction on access to government-held information. Because no private party faced a threat of legal punishment, the Court characterized the law at issue as “nothing more than a governmental denial of access to information in its possession.” Id., at 40. Under those circumstances the special reasons for permitting First Amendment plaintiffs to invoke the rights of others did not apply. Id., at 38-39. Having found that the plaintiff could not raise a facial challenge, the Court remanded for consideration of an as-applied challenge. Id., at 41. United Reporting is thus a case about the availability of facial challenges. The Court did not rule on the merits of any First Amendment claim.

United Reporting is distinguishable in at least two respects. First, Vermont has imposed a restriction on access to information in private hands. This confronts the Court with a point reserved, and a situation not addressed, in United Reporting. Here, unlike in United Reporting, we do have “a case in which the government is prohibiting a speaker from conveying information that the speaker already possesses.” Id., at 40. The difference is significant. An individual’s right to speak is implicated when information he or she possesses is subjected to “restraints on the way in which the information might be used” or disseminated. Seattle Times Co. v. Rhinehart, 467 U. S. 20, 32 (1984); see also Bartnicki v. Vopper, 532 U. S. 514, 527 (2001); Florida Star v. B. J. F., 491 U. S. 524 (1989); New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U. S. 713 (1971) (per curiam). In Seattle Times, this Court applied heightened judicial scrutiny before sustaining a trial court order prohibiting a newspaper’s disclosure of information it learned through coercive discovery. It is true that respondents here, unlike the newspaper in *569Seattle Times, do not themselves possess information whose disclosure has been curtailed. That information, however, is in the hands of pharmacies and other private entities. There is no question that the “threat of prosecution... hangs over their heads.” United Reporting, 528 U. S., at 41. For that reason United Reporting does not bar respondents’ facial challenge.

United Reporting is distinguishable for a second and even more important reason. The plaintiff in United Reporting had neither “attempted] to qualify” for access to the government’s information nor presented an as-applied claim in this Court. Id., at 40. As a result, the Court assumed that the plaintiff had not suffered a personal First Amendment injury and could prevail only by invoking the rights of others through a facial challenge. Here, by contrast, respondents claim — with good reason — that § 4631(d) burdens their own speech. That argument finds support in the separate writings in United Reporting, which were joined by eight Justices. All of those writings recognized that restrictions on the disclosure of government-held information can facilitate or burden the expression of potential recipients and so transgress the First Amendment. See id., at 42 (Scalia, J., concurring) (suggesting that “a restriction upon access that allows access to the press . . ., but at the same time denies access to persons who wish to use the information for certain speech purposes, is in reality a restriction upon speech”); id., at 43 (Ginsburg, J., concurring) (noting that “the provision of [government] information is a kind of subsidy to people who wish to speak” about certain subjects, “and once a State decides to make such a benefit available to the public, there are no doubt limits to its freedom to decide how that benefit will be distributed”); id., at 46 (Stevens, J., dissenting) (concluding that, “because the State’s discrimination is based on its desire to prevent the information from being used for constitutionally protected purposes, [i]t must assume the burden of justifying its conduct”). Vermont’s law imposes *570a content- and speaker-based burden on respondents’ own speech. That consideration provides a separate basis for distinguishing United Reporting and requires heightened judicial scrutiny.

The State also contends that heightened judicial scrutiny is unwarranted in this case because sales, transfer, and use of prescriber-identifying information are conduct, not speech. Consistent with that submission, the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit has characterized prescriber-identifying information as a mere “commodity” with no greater entitlement to First Amendment protection than “beef jerky.” Ayotte, 550 F. 3d, at 52-53. In contrast the courts below concluded that a prohibition on the sale of prescriber-identifying information is a content-based rule akin to a ban on the sale of cookbooks, laboratory results, or train schedules. See 630 F. 3d, at 271-272 (“The First Amendment protects even dry information, devoid of advocacy, political relevance, or artistic expression” (internal quotation marks and brackets omitted)); 631 F. Supp. 2d, at 446 (“A restriction on disclosure is a regulation of speech, and the ‘sale’ of [information] is simply disclosure for profit”).

This Court has held that the creation and dissemination of information are speech within the meaning of the First Amendment. See, e. g., Bartnicki, supra, at 527 (“[I]f the acts of ‘disclosing’ and ‘publishing’ information do not constitute speech, it is hard to imagine what does fall within that category, as distinct from the category of expressive conduct” (some internal quotation marks omitted)); Rubin v. Coors Brewing Co., 514 U. S. 476, 481 (1995) (“information on beer labels” is speech); Dun & Bradstreet, Inc. v. Greenmoss Builders, Inc., 472 U. S. 749, 759 (1985) (plurality opinion) (credit report is “speech”). Facts, after all, are the beginning point for much of the speech that is most essential to advance human knowledge and to conduct human affairs. There is thus a strong argument that prescriber-identifying information is speech for First Amendment purposes.

*571The State asks for an exception to the rule that information is speech, but there is no need to consider that request in this case. The State has imposed content- and speaker-based restrictions on the availability and use of prescriber-identifying information. So long as they do not engage in marketing, many speakers can obtain and use the information. But detailers cannot. Vermont’s statute could be compared with a law prohibiting trade magazines from purchasing or using ink. Cf. Minneapolis Star, 460 U. S. 575. Like that hypothetical law, § 4631(d) imposes a speaker- and content-based burden on protected expression, and that circumstance is sufficient to justify application of heightened scrutiny. As a consequence, thiG eaoc can be resolved even assuming, as the State argues, that preseriber-identifying information is a mere commodity.

B

In the ordinary case it is all but dispositive to conclude that a law is content based and, in practice, viewpoint discriminatory. See R. A. V., 505 U. S., at 382 (“Content-based regulations are presumptively invalid”); id., at 391-392. The State argues that a different analysis applies here because, assuming § 4631(d) burdens speech at all, it at most burdens only commercial speech. As in previous cases, however, the outcome is the same whether a special commercial speech inquiry or a stricter form of judicial scrutiny is applied. See, o. g., Greater New Orleans Broadcasting Assn., Inc. v. United States, 527 U. S. 173, 184 (1999). For the same reason there is no need to determine whether all speech hampered by § 4631(d) is commercial, as our cases have used that term. Cf. Board of Trustees of State Univ. of N. Y. v. Fox, 492 U. S. 469, 474 (1989) (discussing whether “pure speech and commercial speech” were inextricably intertwined, so that “the entirety must... be classified as noncommercial”).

Tinder a commercial speech inquiry, it is the State’s burden to justify its content-based law as consistent with the First *572Amendment. Thompson v. Western States Medical Center, 535 U. S. 357, 373 (2002). To sustain the targeted, content-based burden § 4631(d) imposes on protected expression, the State must show at least that the statute directly advances a substantial governmental interest and that the measure is drawn to achieve that interest. See Fox, supra, at 480-481; Central Hudson Gas & Elec. Corp. v. Public Serv. Comm’n of N. Y., 447 U. S. 557, 566 (1980). There must be a “fit between the legislature’s ends and the means chosen to accomplish those ends.” Fox, supra, at 480 (internal quotation marks omitted). As in other contexts, these standards ensure not only that the State’s interests are proportional to the resulting burdens placed on speech but also that the law does not seek to suppress a disfavored message. See Turner Broadcasting, 512 U. S., at 662-663.

The State’s asserted justifications for § 4631(d) come under two general headings. First, the State contends that its law is necessary to protect medical privacy, including physician confidentiality, avoidance of harassment, and the integrity of the doctor-patient relationship. Second, the State argues that § 4631(d) is integral to the achievement of policy objectives — namely, improved public health and reduced healthcare costs. Neither justification withstands scrutiny.

1

Vermont argues that its physicians have a “reasonable expectation” that their preseriber-identifying information “will not be used for purposes other than . . . filling and processing” prescriptions. See 2007 Vt. Laws No. 80, § 1(29). It may be assumed that, for many reasons, physicians have an interest in keeping their prescription decisions confidential. But § 4631(d) is not drawn to serve that interest. Under Vermont's law, pharmacies may share preseriber-identifying information with anyone for any reason save one: They must not allow the information to be used for marketing. Exceptions further allow pharmacies to sell preseriber-identifying *573information for certain purposes, including “health care research.” § 4631(e). And.< the .measure permits insurers, researchers, journalists, the State itself, and others to use the information. See § 4631(d); cf. App. 370-372; id., at 211. A1 but conceding that § 4631(d) does not in itself advance confidentiality interests, the State suggests that other laws might impose separate bars on the disclosure of prescriber-identifying information. See Vt. Bd. of Pharmacy Admin. Rule 20.1. But the potential effectiveness of other measures cannot justify the distinctive set of prohibitions and sanctions imposed by § 4631(d).

Perhaps the State could have addressed physician confidentiality through “a more coherent policy.” Greater New Orleans Broadcasting, supra, at 195; see also Discovery Network, 507 U. S., at 428. For instance, the State might have advanced its asserted privacy interest by allowing the information’s sale or disclosure in only a few narrow and well-justified circumstances. See, e. g., Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, 42 U. S. C. § 1320d-2; 45 CFR pts. 160 and 164 (2010). A statute of that type would present quite a different ease from the one presented here. But the State did not enact a statute with that purpose or design. Instead, Vermont made prescriber-identifying information available to an almost limitless audience. The explicit structure of the statute allows the information to be studied and used by all but a narrow class of disfavored speakers. Given the information’s widespread availability and many permissible uses, the State’s asserted interest in physician confidentiality does not justify the burden that § 4631(d) places on protected expression.

The State points out that it allows doctors to forgo the advantages of § 4631(d) by consenting to the sale, disclosure, and use of their preseriber-identifying information. See § 4631(c)(1). It is true that private decisionmaking can avoid governmental partiality and thus insulate privacy measures from First Amendment challenge. See Rowan v. Post Office *574Dept., 397 U. S. 728 (1970); cf. Bolger v. Youngs Drug Products Corp., 463 U. S. 60, 72 (1983). But that principle is inap-posite here. Vermont has given its doctors a contrived choice: Either consent, which will allow your prescriber-identifying information to be disseminated and used without constraint; or, withhold consent, which will allow your information to be used by those speakers whose message the State supports. Section 4631(d) may offer a limited degree of privacy, but only on terms favorable to the speech the State prefers. Cf. Rowan, supra, at 734, 737, 739, n. 6 (sustaining a law that allowed private parties to make “unfettered,” “unlimited,” and “unreviewable” choices regarding their own privacy). This is not to say that all privacy measures must avoid content-based rules. Here, however, the State has conditioned privacy on acceptance of a content-based rule that is not drawn to serve the State’s asserted interest. To obtain the limited privacy allowed by § 4631(d), Vermont physicians are forced to acquiesce in the State’s goal of burdening disfavored speech by disfavored speakers.

Respondents suggest that a further defect of § 4631(d) lies in its presumption of applicability absent a physician’s election to the contrary. Vermont’s law might burden less speech if it came into operation only after an individual choice, but a revision to that effect would not necessarily save § 4631(d). Even reliance on a prior election would not suffice, for instance, if available categories of coverage by design favored speakers of one political persuasion over another. Rules that burden protected expression may not be sustained when the options provided by the State are too narrow to advance legitimate interests or too broad to protect speech. As already explained, § 4631(d) permits extensive use of prescriber-identifying information and so does not advance the State’s asserted interest in physician confidentiality. The limited range of available privacy options instead reflects the State’s impermissible purpose to burden *575disfavored speech. Vermont’s argument accordingly fails, even if the availability and scope of private election might be relevant in other contexts, as when the statute’s design is unrelated to any purpose to advance a preferred message.

The State also contends that § 4631(d) protects doctors from “harassing sales behaviors.” 2007 Vt. Laws No. 80, § 1(28). “Some doctors in Vermont are experiencing an undesired increase in the aggressiveness of pharmaceutical sales representatives,” the Vermont Legislature found, “and a few have reported that they felt coerced and harassed.” § 1(20). It is doubtful that concern for “a few” physicians who may have “felt coerced and harassed” by pharmaceutical marketers can sustain a broad content-based rule like § 4631(d). Many are those who must endure speech they do not like, but that is a necessary cost of freedom. See Erznoznik v. Jacksonville, 422 U. S. 205, 210-211 (1975); Cohen v. California, 403 U. S. 15, 21 (1971). In any event the State offers no explanation why remedies other than content-based rules would be inadequate. See 44 Liquormart, Inc. v. Rhode Island, 517 U. S. 484, 503 (1996) (opinion of Stevens, J.). Physicians can, and often do, simply decline to meet with detailers, including detailers who use prescriber-identifying information. See, e. g., App. 180, 333-334. Doctors who wish to forgo detailing altogether are free to give “No Solicitation” or “No Detailing” instructions to their office managers or to receptionists at their places of work. Personal privacy even in one’s own home receives “ample protection” from the “resident’s unquestioned right to refuse to engage in conversation with unwelcome visitors.” Watchtower Bible & Tract Soc. of N. Y., Inc. v. Village of Stratton, 536 U. S. 150, 168 (2002); see also Bolger, supra, at 72. A physician’s office is no more private and is entitled to no greater protection.

Vermont argues that detailers’ use of prescriber-identifying information undermines the doctor-patient relationship by allowing detailers to influence treatment deci*576sions. According to the State, “unwanted pressure occurs” when doctors learn that their prescription decisions are being “monitored” by detailers. 2007 Vt. Laws No. 80, § 1(27). Some physicians accuse detailers of “spying” or of engaging in “underhanded” conduct in order to “subvert” prescription decisions. App. 336, 380, 407-408; see also id., at 326-328. And Vermont claims that detailing makes people “anxious” about whether doctors have their patients' best interests at heart. Id., at 327. But the State does not explain why detailers' use of prescriber-identifying information is more likely to prompt these objections than many other uses permitted by § 4631(d). In any event, this asserted interest is- contrary to basic First Amendment principles. Speech remains protected even when it may “stir people to action,” “move them to tears,” or “inflict great pain.” Snyder v. Phelps, 562 U. S. 443, 460-461 (2011). The more benign and, many would say, beneficial speech of pharmaceutical marketing is also entitled to the protection of the First Amendment. If pharmaceutical marketing affects treatment decisions, it does so because doctors find it persuasive. Absent circumstances far from those presented here, the fear that speech might persuade provides no lawful basis for quieting it. Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U. S. 444, 447 (1969) (per curiam).

2

The State contends that § 4631(d) advances important public policy goals by lowering the costs of medical services and promoting public health. If prescriber-identifying information were available for use by detailers, the State contends, then detailing would be effective in promoting brand-name drugs that are more expensive, and less safe than generic alternatives. This logic is set out at length in the legislative findings accompanying § 4631(d). Yet at oral argument here, the State declined to acknowledge that §4631(d)’s objective purpose and practical effect were to inhibit detailing and alter doctors’ prescription decisions. See Tr. of Oral Arg. *5775-6. The State’s reluctance to embrace its own legislature’s rationale reflects the vulnerability of its position.

While Vermont’s stated policy goals may be proper, § 4631(d) does not advance them in a permissible way. As the Court of Appeals noted, the “state’s own explanation of how" § 4631(d) "advances its interests cannot be said to be direct.” 630 F. 3d, at 277. The State seeks to achieve its policy objectives through the indirect means of restraining certain speech by certain speakers — that is, by diminishing detailers’ ability to influence prescription decisions. Those who seek to censor or burden free expression often assert that disfavored speech has adverse effects. But the “fear that people would make bad decisions if given truthful information” cannot justify content-based burdens on speech. Thompson, 535 U. S., at 374; see also Virginia Bd. of Pharmacy v. Virginia Citizens Consumer Council, Inc., 425 U. S. 748, 769-770 (1976). “The First Amendment directs us to be especially skeptical of regulations that seek to keep people in the dark for what the government perceives to be their own good.” 44 Liquormart, supra, at 503 (opinion of Stevens, J.); see also Linmark Associates, Inc. v. Willingboro, 431 U. S. 85, 97 (1977). These precepts apply with full force when the audience, in this case prescribing physicians, consists of “sophisticated and experienced” consumers. Edenfield, 507 U. S., at 775.

As Vermont’s legislative findings acknowledge, the premise of § 4631(d) is that the force of speech can justify the government’s attempts to stifle it. Indeed the State defends the law by insisting that “pharmaceutical marketing has a strong influence on doctors’ prescribing practices.” Brief for Petitioners 49-50. This reasoning is incompatible with the First Amendment. In an attempt to reverse a disfavored trend in public opinion, a State could not ban campaigning with slogans, picketing with signs, or marching during the daytime. Likewise the State may not seek to remove a popular but disfavored product from the market*578place by prohibiting truthful, nonmisleading advertisements that contain impressive endorsements or catchy jingles. That the State finds expression too persuasive does not permit it to quiet the speech or to burden its messengers.

The defect in Vermont’s law is made clear by the fact that many listeners find detailing instructive. Indeed the record demonstrates that some Vermont doctors view targeted detailing based on prescriber-identifying information as “very helpful” because it allows detailers to shape their messages to each doctor’s practice. App. 274; see also id., at 181, 218, 271-272. Even the United States, which appeared here in support of Vermont, took care to dispute the State’s “unwarranted view that the dangers of [n]ew drugs outweigh their benefits to patients.” Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 24, n. 4. There are divergent views regarding detailing and the prescription of brand-name drugs. Under the Constitution, resolution of that debate must result from free and uninhibited speech. As one Vermont physician put it: “We have a saying in medicine, information is power. And the more you know, or anyone knows, the better decisions can be made.” App. 279. There are similar sayings in law, including that “information is not in itself harmful, that people will perceive their own best interests if only they are well enough informed, and that the best means to that end is to open the channels of communication rather than to close them.” Virginia Bd., 425 U. S., at 770. The choice, “between the dangers of suppressing information, and the dangers of its misuse if it is freely available,” is one that “the First Amendment makes for us.” Ibid.

Vermont may be displeased that detailers who use prescriber-identifying information are effective in promoting brand-name drugs. The State can express that view through its own speech. See Linmark, supra, at 97; cf. § 4622(a)(1) (establishing a prescription drug educational program). But a State’s failure to persuade does not allow it to hamstring the opposition. The State may not burden the speech of others in order to tilt public debate in a pre*579ferred direction. “The commercial marketplace, like other spheres of our social and cultural life, provides a forum where ideas and information flourish. Some of the ideas and information are vital, some of slight worth. But the general rule is that the speaker and the audience, not the government, assess the value of the information presented.” Eden field, supra, at 767.

It is true that content-based restrictions on protected expression are sometimes permissible, and that principle applies to commercial speech. Indeed the government’s legitimate interest in protecting consumers from “commercial harms” explains “why commercial speech can be subject to greater governmental regulation than noncommercial speech.” Discovery Network, 507 U. S., at 426; see also 44 Liquormart, 517 U. S., at 502 (opinion of Stevens, J.). The Court has noted, for example, that “a State may choose to regulate price advertising in one industry but not in others, because the risk of fraud ... is in its view greater there.” R. A. V., 505 U. S., at 388-389 (citing Virginia Bd., supra, at 771-772). Here, however, Vermont has not shown that its law has a neutral justification.

The State nowhere contends that detailing is false or misleading within the meaning of this Court’s First Amendment precedents. See Thompson, supra, at 373. Nor does the State argue that the provision challenged here will prevent false or misleading speech. Cf. post, at 589-590 (Breyer, J., dissenting) (collecting regulations that the government might defend on this ground). The State’s interest in burdening the speech of detailers instead turns on nothing more than a difference of opinion. See Bolger, 463 U. S., at 69; Thompson, supra, at 376.

* * *

The capacity of technology to find and publish personal information, including records required by the government, presents serious and unresolved issues with respect to personal privacy and the dignity it seeks to secure. In con*580sidering how to protect those interests, however, the State cannot engage in content-based discrimination to advance its own side of a debate.

If Vermont’s statute provided that prescriber-identifying information could not be sold or disclosed except in narrow circumstances then the State might have a stronger position. Here, however, the State gives possessors of the information broad discretion and wide latitude in disclosing the information, while at the same time restricting the information’s use by some speakers and for some purposes, even while the State itself can use the information to counter the speech it seeks to suppress. Privacy is a concept too integral to the person and a right too essential to freedom to allow its manipulation to support just those ideas the government prefers.

When it enacted § 4631(d), the Vermont Legislature found that the “marketplace for ideas on medicine safety and effectiveness is frequently one-sided in that brand-name companies invest in expensive pharmaceutical marketing campaigns to doctors.” 2007 Vt. Laws No. 80, §1(4). “The goals of marketing programs,” the legislature said, “are often in conflict with the goals of the state.” § 1(3). The text of § 4631(d), associated legislative findings, and the record developed in the District Court establish that Vermont enacted its law for this end. The State has burdened a form of protected expression that it found too persuasive. At the same time, the State has left unburdened those speakers whose messages are in accord with its own views. This the State cannot do.

The judgment of the Court of Appeals is affirmed.

It is so ordered.

Justice Breyer,

with whom Justice Ginsburg and Justice Kagan join,

dissenting.

The Vermont statute before us adversely affects expression in one, and only one, way. It deprives pharmaceutical *581and data-mining companies of data, collected pursuant to the government's regulatory mandate, that could help pharmaceutical companies create better sales messages. In my view, this effect on expression is inextricably related to a lawful governmental effort to regulate a commercial enterprise. The First Amendment does not require courts to apply a special “heightened” standard of review when reviewing such an effort. And, in any event, the statute meets the First Amendment standard this Court has previously applied when the government seeks to regulate commercial speech. For any or all of these reasons, the Court should uphold the statute as constitutional.

I

The Vermont statute before us says pharmacies and certain other entities

“shall not [(1)] sell . . . regulated records containing preseriber-identifiable information, nor [(2)] permit the use of [such] records ... for marketing or promoting a prescription drug, unless the prescriber consents.” Vt. Stat. Ann., Tit. 18, § 4631(d) (Supp. 2010).

It also says that

“[(3)] [pharmaceutical manufacturers and pharmaceutical marketers shall not use preseriber-identifiable information for marketing or promoting a prescription drug unless the prescriber consents.” Ibid.

For the most part, I shall focus upon the first and second of these prohibitions. In Part IV, I shall explain why the third prohibition makes no difference to the result.

I — i

In Glickman v. Wileman Brothers & Elliott, Inc., 521 U. S. 457 (1997), this Court considered the First Amendment’s application to federal agricultural commodity mar*582keting regulations that required growers of fruit to make compulsory contributions to pay for collective advertising. The Court reviewed the lawfulness of the regulation’s negative impact on the growers’ freedom voluntarily to choose their own commercial messages “under the standard appropriate for the review of economic regulation.” Id., at 469.

In this case I would ask whether Vermont’s regulatory provisions work harm to First Amendment interests that is disproportionate to their furtherance of legitimate regulatory objectives. And in doing so, I would give significant weight to legitimate commercial regulatory objectives — as this Court did in Glickman. The far stricter, specially “heightened” First Amendment standards that the majority would apply to this instance of commercial regulation are out of place here. Ante, at 657, 563, 565, 566, 568, 570, 571.

A

Because many, perhaps most, activities of human beings living together in communities take place through speech, and because speech-related risks and offsetting justifications differ depending upon context, this Court has distinguished for First Amendment purposes among different contexts in which speech takes place. See, e. g., Snyder v. Phelps, 562 U. S. 443, 451-452 (2011). Thus, the First Amendment imposes tight constraints upon government efforts to restrict, e.g., “core” political speech, while imposing looser constraints when the government seeks to restrict, e. g., commercial speech, the speech of its own employees, or the regulation-related speech of a firm subject to a traditional regulatory program. Compare Boos v. Barry, 485 U. S. 312, 321 (1988) (political speech), with Central Hudson Gas & Elec. Corp. v. Public Serv. Comm’n of N. Y., 447 U. S. 557 (1980) (commercial speech), Pickering v. Board of Ed. of Township High School Dist. 205, Will Cty., 391 U. S. 563 (1968) (government employees), and Glickman, supra (economic regulation).

*583These test-related distinctions reflect the constitutional importance of maintaining a free marketplace of ideas, a marketplace that provides access to “social, political, esthetic, moral, and other ideas and experiences.” Red Lion Broadcasting Co. v. FCC, 395 U.S. 867, 390 (1969); see Abrams v. United States, 250 U. S. 616, 630 (1919) (Holmes, J., dissenting). Without such a marketplace, the public could not freely choose a government pledged to implement policies that reflect the people's informed will.

At the same time, our cases make clear that the First Amendment offers considerably less protection to the maintenance of a free marketplace for goods and services. See Florida Bar v. Went For It, Inc., 515 U. S. 618, 623 (1995) (“We have always been careful to distinguish commercial speech from speech at the First Amendment’s core”). And they also reflect the democratic importance of permitting an elected government to implement through effective programs policy choices for which the people’s elected representatives have voted.

Thus this Court has recognized that commercial speech including advertising has an “informational function” and is not “valueless in the marketplace of ideas.” Central Hudson, supra, at 563; Bigelow v. Virginia, 421 U. S. 809, 826 (1975). But at the same time it has applied a less than strict, “intermediate” First Amendment test when the government directly restricts commercial speech. Under that test, government laws and regulations may significantly restrict speech, as long as they also “directly advance” a “substantial” government interest that could not “be served as well by a more limited restriction.” Central Hudson, supra, at 564. Moreover, the Court has found that “sales practices” that are “misleading, deceptive, or aggressive” lack the protection of even this “intermediate” standard. 44 Liquormart, Inc. v. Rhode Island, 517 U. S. 484, 501 (1996) (opinion of Stevens, J.); see also Central Hudson, supra, at 563; Virginia Bd. of Pharmacy v. Virginia Citizens Consumer *584Council, Inc., 425 U. S. 748, 772 (1976). And the Court has emphasized the need, in applying an “intermediate” test, to maintain the

“ ‘commonsense’ distinction between speech proposing a commercial transaction, which occurs in an area traditionally subject to government regulation, and other varieties of speech.” Ohralik v. Ohio State Bar Assn., 436 U. S. 447, 455-456 (1978) (quoting Virginia Bd. of Pharmacy, supra, at 771, n. 24; emphasis added).

The Court has also normally applied a yet more lenient approach to ordinary commercial or regulatory legislation that affects speech in less direct ways. In doing so, the Court has taken account of the need in this area of law to defer significantly to legislative judgment — as the Court has done in cases involving the Commerce Clause or the Due Process Clause. See Glickman, 521 U. S., at 475-476. “Our function” in such cases, Justice Brandéis said, “is only to determine the reasonableness of the legislature’s belief in the existence of evils and in the effectiveness of the remedy provided.” New State Ice Co. v. Liebmann, 285 U. S. 262, 286-287 (1932) (dissenting opinion); Williamson v. Lee Optical of Okla., Inc., 348 U. S. 483, 488 (1955) (“It is enough that there is an evil at hand for correction, and that it might be thought that the particular legislative measure was a rational way to correct it”); United States v. Carolene Products Co., 304 U. S. 144, 152 (1938) (“[RJegulatory legislation affecting ordinary commercial transactions is not to be pronounced unconstitutional” if it rests “upon some rational basis within the knowledge and experience of the legislators”).

To apply a strict First Amendment standard virtually as a matter of course when a court reviews ordinary economic regulatory programs (even if that program has a modest impact upon a firm’s ability to shape a commercial message) would work at cross-purposes with this more basic constitutional approach. Since ordinary regulatory programs can *585affect speech, particularly commercial speech, in myriad ways, to apply a “heightened” First Amendment standard of review whenever such a program burdens speech would transfer from legislatures to judges the primary power to weigh ends and to choose means, threatening to distort or undermine legitimate legislative objectives. See Glickman, supra, at 476 (“Doubts concerning the policy judgments that underlie” a program requiring fruitgrowers to pay for advertising they disagree with does not “justify reliance on the First Amendment as a basis for reviewing economic regulations”). Cf. Johanns v. Livestock Marketing Assn., 544 U. S. 550, 560-562 (2005) (applying less scrutiny when the compelled speech is made by the Government); United States v. United Foods, Inc., 533 U. S. 405, 411 (2001) (applying greater scrutiny where compelled speech was not “ancillary to a more comprehensive program restricting marketing autonomy”). To apply a “heightened” standard of review in such cases as a matter of course would risk what then-Justice Rehnquist, dissenting in Central Hudson, described as a

“retur[n] to the bygone era of Lochner v. New York, 198 U. S. 45 (1905), in which it was common practice for this Court to strike down economic regulations adopted by a State based on the Court’s own notions of the most appropriate means for the State to implement its considered policies.” 447 U. S., at 589.

B

There are several reasons why the Court should review Vermont’s law “under the standard appropriate for the review of economic regulation,” not “under a heightened standard appropriate for the review of First Amendment issues.” Glickman, 521 U. S., at 469. For one thing, Vermont’s statute neither forbids nor requires anyone to say anything, to engage in any form of symbolic speech, or to endorse any particular point of view, whether ideological or related to the sale *586of a product. Cf. id., at 469-470. (And I here assume that Central Hudson might otherwise apply. See Part III, infra.)

For another thing, the same First Amendment standards that apply to Vermont here would apply to similar regulatory actions taken by other States or by the Federal Government acting, for example, through Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulation. (And the Federal Government’s ability to pre-empt state laws that interfere with existing or contemplated federal forms of regulation is here irrelevant.)

Further, the statute’s requirements form part of a traditional, comprehensive regulatory regime. Cf. United Foods, supra, at 411. The pharmaceutical drug industry has been heavily regulated at least since 1906. See Pure Food and Drugs Act, 34 Stat. 768. Longstanding statutes and regulations require pharmaceutical companies to engage in complex drug testing to ensure that their drugs are both “safe” and “effective.” 21 U. S. C. §§ 355(b)(1), (d). Only then can the drugs be marketed, at which point drug companies are subject to the FDA’s exhaustive regulation of the content of drug labels and the manner in which drugs can be advertised and sold. § 352(f)(2); 21 CFR pts. 201-203 (2010).

Finally, Vermont’s statute is directed toward information that exists only by virtue of government regulation. Under federal law, certain drugs can be dispensed only by a pharmacist operating under the orders of a medical practitioner. 21 U. S. C. § 353(b). Vermont regulates the qualifications, the fitness, and the practices of pharmacists themselves, and requires pharmacies to maintain a “patient record system” that, among other things, tracks who prescribed which drugs. Vt. Stat. Ann., Tit. 26, §§ 2041(a), 2022(14) (Supp. 2010); Vt. Bd. of Pharmacy Admin. Rules (Pharmacy Rules) 9.1, 9.24(e) (2009). But for these regulations, pharmacies would have no way to know who had told customers to buy which drugs (as is the case when a doctor tells a patient to take a daily dose of aspirin).

*587Regulators will often find it necessary to create tailored restrictions on the use of information subject to their regulatory jurisdiction. A car dealership that obtains credit scores for customers who want car loans can be prohibited from using credit data to search for new customers. See 15 U. S. C. § 1681b (2006 ed. and Supp. III); cf. Trans Union Corp. v. FTC, 245 F. 3d 809, reh'g denied, 267 F. 3d 1138 (CADC 2001). Medical specialists who obtain medical records for their existing patients cannot purchase those records in order to identify new patients. See 45 CFR § 164.508(a)(3) (2010). Or, speaking hypothetically, a public utilities commission that directs local gas distributors to gather usage information for individual customers might permit the distributors to share the data with researchers (trying to lower energy costs) but forbid sales of the data to appliance manufacturers seeking to sell gas stoves.

Such regulatory actions are subject to judicial review, e. g., for compliance with applicable statutes. And they would normally be subject to review under the Administrative Procedure Act to make certain they are not “arbitrary, capricious, [or] an abuse of discretion.” 5 U. S. C. §706(2)(A) (2006 ed.). In an appropriate case, such review might be informed by First Amendment considerations. But regulatory actions of the kind present here have not previously been thought to raise serious additional constitutional concerns under the First Amendment. But cf. Trans Union LLC v. FTC, 536 U. S. 915 (2002) (Kennedy, J., dissenting from denial of certiorari) (questioning ban on use of consumer credit reports for target marketing). The ease with which one can point to actual or hypothetical examples with potentially adverse speech-related effects at least roughly comparable to those at issue here indicates the danger of applying a “heightened” or “intermediate” standard of First Amendment review where typical regulatory actions affect commercial speech (say, by withholding information that a *588commercial speaker might use to shape the content of a message).

Thus, it is not surprising that, until today, this Court has never found that the First Amendment prohibits the government from restricting the use of information gathered pursuant to a regulatory mandate — whether the information rests in government files or has remained in the hands of the private firms that gathered it. But cf. ante, at 566-570. Nor has this Court ever previously applied any form of “heightened” scrutiny in any even roughly similar case. See Los Angeles Police Dept. v. United Reporting Publishing Corp., 528 U. S. 32 (1999) (no heightened scrutiny); compare Cincinnati v. Discovery Network, Inc., 507 U. S. 410, 426 (1993) (“[Commercial speech can be subject to greater governmental regulation than noncommercial speech” because of the government’s “interest in preventing commercial harms”), with ante, at 565, 566, 573, 579 (suggesting that Discovery Network supports heightened scrutiny when regulations target commercial speech).

C

The Court (suggesting a standard yet stricter than Central Hudson) says that we must give content-based restrictions that burden speech “heightened” scrutiny. It adds that “[cjommercial speech is no exception.” Ante, at 566. And the Court then emphasizes that this is a case involving both “content-based” and “speaker-based” restrictions. See ante, at 563, 564, 565, 566, 568, 570, 571, 572, 574, 575, 577, 579, 580.

But neither of these categories — “content-based” nor “speaker-based” — has ever before justified greater scrutiny when regulatory activity affects commercial speech. See, e. g., Capital Broadcasting Co. v. Mitchell, 333 P. Supp. 582 (DC 1971) (three-judge court), summarily aff’d sub nom. Capital Broadcasting Co. v. Acting Attorney General, 405 U. S. 1000 (1972) (upholding ban on radio and television marketing of tobacco). And the absence of any such precedent is understandable.

*589Regulatory programs necessarily draw distinctions on the basis of content. Virginia Bd. of Pharmacy, 425 U. S., at 761, 762 (“If there is a kind of commercial speech that lacks all First Amendment protection,... it must be distinguished by its content”). Electricity regulators, for example, oversee company statements, pronouncements, and proposals, but only about electricity. See, e.g., Vt. Pub. Serv. Bd. Rules 3.100 (1983), 4.200 (1986), 5.200 (2004). The Federal Reserve Board regulates the content of statements, advertising, loan proposals, and interest rate disclosures, but, only when made by financial institutions. See 12 CFR pts. 226, 230 (2011). And the FDA oversees the form and content of labeling, advertising, and sales proposals of drugs, but not of furniture. See 21 CFR pts. 201-203. Given the ubiquity of content-based regulatory categories, why should the “content-based” nature of typical regulation require courts (other things being equal) to grant legislators and regulators less deference? Cf. Board of Trustees of State Univ. of N. Y. v. Fox, 492 U. S. 469, 481 (1989) (courts, in First Amendment area, should “provide the Legislative and Executive Branches needed leeway” when regulated industries are at issue).

Nor, in the context of a regulatory program, is it unusual for particular rules to be “speaker-based,” affecting only a class of entities, namely, the regulated firms. An energy regulator, for example, might require the manufacturers of home appliances to publicize ways to reduce energy consumption, while exempting producers of industrial equipment. See, e. g., 16 CFR pt. 305 (2011) (prescribing labeling requirements for certain home appliances); Nev. Admin. Code §§ 704.804, 704.808 (2010) (requiring utilities to provide consumers with information on conservation). Or a trade regulator might forbid a particular firm to make the true claim that its cosmetic product contains “cleansing grains that scrub away dirt and excess oil” unless it substantiates that claim with detailed backup testing, even though oppo*590nents of cosmetics use need not substantiate their claims. Morris, F. T. C. Orders Data To Back Ad Claims, N. Y. Times, Nov. 3, 1973, p. 32; Boys’ Life, Oct. 1973, p. 64; see 36 Fed. Reg. 12068 (1971). Or the FDA might control in detail just what a pharmaceutical firm can, and cannot, tell potential purchasers about its products. Such a firm, for example, could not suggest to a potential purchaser (say, a doctor) that he or she might put a pharmaceutical drug to an “off label” use, even if the manufacturer, in good faith and with considerable evidence, believes the drug will help. All the while, a third party (say, a researcher) is free to tell the doctor not to use the drug for that purpose. See 21 CFR pt. 99; cf. Buckman Co. v. Plaintiffs’ Legal Comm., 531 U. S. 341, 350-351 (2001) (discussing effect of similar regulations in respect to medical devices); see also Proposed Rule, Revised Effectiveness Determination; Sunscreen Drug Products for Over-the-Counter Human Use, 76 Fed. Reg. 35672 (2011) (proposing to prohibit marketing of sunscreens with sun protection factor of greater than 50 due to insufficient data “to indicate that there is additional clinical benefit”).

If the Court means to create constitutional barriers to regulatory rules that might affect the content of a commercial message, it has embarked upon an unprecedented task — a task that threatens significant judicial interference with widely accepted regulatory activity. Cf, e. g., 21 CFR pts. 201-203. Nor would it ease the task to limit its “heightened” scrutiny to regulations that only affect certain speakers. As the examples that I have set forth illustrate, many regulations affect only messages sent by a small class of regulated speakers, for example, electricity generators or natural gas pipelines.

The Court also uses the words “aimed” and “targeted” when describing the relation of the statute to drug manufacturers. Ante, at 564, 565, 567, 572, 578. But, for the reasons just set forth, to require “heightened” scrutiny on this *591basis is to require its application early and often when the State seeks to regulate industry. Any statutory initiative stems from a legislative agenda. See, e. g., Message to Congress, May 24,1937, H. R. Doc. No. 255, 75th Cong., 1st Sess., 4 (request from President Franklin Roosevelt for legislation to ease the plight of factory workers). Any administrative initiative stems from a regulatory agenda. See, e. g., Exec. Order No. 12866, 58 Fed. Reg. 51735 (1993) (specifying how to identify regulatory priorities and requiring agencies to prepare agendas). The related statutes, regulations, programs, and initiatives almost always reflect a point of view, for example, of the Congress and the administration that enacted them and ultimately the voters. And they often aim at, and target, particular firms that engage in practices about the merits of which the Government and the firms may disagree. Section 2 of the Sherman Act, 15 U. S. C. § 2, for example, which limits the truthful, nonmisleading speech of firms that, due to their market power, can affect the competitive landscape, is directly aimed at, and targeted at, monopolists.

In short, the case law in this area reflects the need to ensure that the First Amendment protects the “marketplace of ideas,” thereby facilitating the democratic creation of sound government policies without improperly hampering the ability of government to introduce an agenda, to implement its policies, and to favor them to the exclusion of contrary policies. To apply “heightened” scrutiny when the regulation of commercial activities (which often involve speech) is at issue is unnecessarily to undercut the latter constitutional goal. The majority’s view of this case presents that risk.

Moreover, given the sheer quantity of regulatory initiatives that touch upon commercial messages, the Court’s vision of its reviewing task threatens to return us to a happily bygone era when judges scrutinized legislation for its interference with economic liberty. History shows that the power was much abused and resulted in the constitutional-*592ization of economic theories preferred by individual jurists. See Lochner v. New York, 198 U. S. 45, 75-76 (1905) (Holmes, J., dissenting). By inviting courts to scrutinize whether a State’s legitimate regulatory interests can be achieved in less restrictive ways whenever they touch (even indirectly) upon commercial speech, today’s majority risks repeating the mistakes of the past in a manner not anticipated by our precedents. See Central Hudson, 447 U. S., at 589 (Rehnquist, J., dissenting); cf. Railroad Comm’n of Tex. v. Rowan & Nichols Oil Co., 310 U. S. 573, 580-581 (1940) (“A controversy like this always calls for fresh reminder that courts must not substitute their notions of expediency and fairness for those which have guided the agencies to whom the formulation and execution of policy have been entrusted”).

Nothing in Vermont’s statute undermines the ability of persons opposing the State’s policies to speak their mind or to pursue a different set of policy objectives through the democratic process. Whether Vermont’s regulatory statute “targets” drug companies (as opposed to affecting them unintentionally) must be beside the First Amendment point.

This does not mean that economic regulation having some effect on speech is always lawful. Courts typically review the lawfulness of statutes for rationality and of regulations (if federal) to make certain they are not “arbitrary, capricious, [or] an abuse of discretion.” 5 U. S. C. § 706(2)(A). And our valuable free-speech tradition may play an important role in such review. But courts do not normally view these matters as requiring “heightened” First Amendment scrutiny — and particularly not the unforgiving brand of “intermediate” scrutiny employed by the majority. Because the imposition of “heightened” scrutiny in such instances would significantly change the legislative/judicial balance, in a way that would significantly weaken the legislature’s authority to regulate commerce and industry, I would not apply a “heightened” First Amendment standard of review in this case.

*593pH HH I — I

Turning to the constitutional merits, I believe Vermont’s statute survives application of Central Hudson’s "intermediate” commercial speech standard as well as any more limited “economic regulation” test.

A

The statute threatens only modest harm to commercial speech. I agree that it withholds from pharmaceutical companies information that would help those entities create a more effective selling message. But I cannot agree with the majority that the harm also involves unjustified discrimination in that it permits “pharmacies” to “share prescriber-identifying information with anyone for any reason” (but marketing). Ante, at 572. Whatever the First Amendment relevance of such discrimination, there is no evidence that it exists in Vermont. The record contains no evidence that prescriber-identifying data is widely disseminated. See App. 248, 255. Cf. Burson v. Freeman, 504 U. S. 191, 207 (1992) (plurality opinion) (“States adopt laws to address the problems that confront them. The First Amendment does not require States to regulate for problems that do not exist”); Bates v. State Bar of Ariz., 433 U. S. 350, 380 (1977) (“[T]he justification for the application of overbreadth analysis applies weakly, if at all, in the ordinary commercial context”).

The absence of any such evidence likely reflects the presence of other legal rules that forbid widespread release of prescriber-identifying information. Vermont’s Pharmacy Rules, for example, define “unprofessional conduct” to include “[d]ivulging or revealing to unauthorized persons patient or practitioner information or the nature of professional pharmacy services rendered.” Rule 20.1(i) (emphasis added); see also Reply Brief for Petitioners 21. The statute reinforces this prohibition where pharmaceutical marketing is at issue. And the exceptions that it creates are narrow and concern common and often essential uses of prescription *594data. See Vt. Stat. Ann., Tit. 18, § 4631(e)(1) (pharmacy reimbursement, patient care management, health care research); § 4631(e)(2) (drug dispensing); § 4631(e)(3) (communications between prescriber and pharmacy); § 4631(e)(4) (information to patients); §§4631(e)(5)-(6) (as otherwise provided by state or federal law). Cf. Trans Union Corp., 245 F. 3d, at 819 (rejecting an underinclusiveness challenge because an exception to the Fair Credit Reporting Act concerned “ 'exactly the sort of thing the Act seeks to promote’ ” (quoting Trans Union Corp. v. FTC, 81 F. 3d 228, 234 (CADC 1996))).

Nor can the majority find record support for its claim that the statute helps “favored” speech and imposes a “burde[n]” upon “disfavored speech by disfavored speakers.” Ante, at 574. The Court apparently means that the statute (1) prevents pharmaceutical companies from creating individualized messages that would help them sell their drugs more effectively, but (2) permits “counterdetailing” programs, which often promote generic drugs, to create such messages using prescriber-identifying data. I am willing to assume, for argument’s sake, that this consequence would significantly increase the statute’s negative impact upon commercial speech. But cf. 21 CFR §§ 202.1(e)(1), (e)(5)(fi) (FDA’s “fair balance” requirement); App. 193 (no similar FDA requirement for nondrug manufacturers). The record before us, however, contains no evidentiary basis for the conclusion that any such individualized counterdetailing is widespread, or exists at all, in Vermont.

The majority points out, ante, at 560, that Act 80, of which § 4631 was a part, also created an “evidence-based prescription drug education program,” in which the Vermont Department of Health, the Department of Vermont Health Access, and the University of Vermont, among others, work together “to provide information and education on the therapeutic and cost-effective utilization of prescription drugs” to health professionals responsible for prescribing and dispensing *595prescription drugs, Vt. Stat. Ann., Tit. 18, § 4622(a)(1). See generally §§4621-4622. But that program does not make use of prescriber-identifying data. Reply Brief for Petitioners 11.

The majority cites testimony by two witnesses in support of its statement that “States themselves may supply the prescriber-identifying information used in [counterdetailing] programs.” Ante, at 560. One witness explained that academic detailers in Pennsylvania work with state health officials to identify physicians serving patients whose health care is likewise state provided. App. 375. The other, an IMS Health officer, observed that Vermont has its own multipayer database containing prescriber-identifying data, which could be used to talk to doctors about their prescription patterns and the lower costs associated with generics. Id., at 313. But nothing in the record indicates that any “counterdetailing” of this kind has ever taken place in fact in Vermont. State-sponsored health care professionals sometimes meet with small groups of doctors to discuss best practices and generic drugs generally. See University of Vermont, College of Medicine, Office of Primary Care, Vermont Academic Detailing Program (July 2010), http:// www.med.uvm.edu/ahec/downloads/VTAD_overview_2010. 07.08.pdf (all Internet materials as visited June 21, 2011, and available in Clerk of Court's case file). Nothing in Vermont's statute prohibits brand-name manufacturers from undertaking a similar effort.

The upshot is that the only commercial-speech-related harm that the record shows this statute to have brought about is the one I have previously described: the withholding of information collected through a regulatory program, thereby preventing companies from shaping a commercial message they believe maximally effective. The absence of precedent suggesting that this kind of harm is serious reinforces the conclusion that the harm here is modest at most.

*596B

The legitimate state interests that the statute serves are “substantial.” Central Hudson, 447 U. S., at 564. Vermont enacted its statute

“to advance the state’s interest in protecting the public health of Vermonters, protecting the privacy of pre-scribers and prescribing information, and to ensure costs are contained in the private health care sector, as well as for state purchasers of prescription drugs, through the promotion of less costly drugs and ensuring prescribers receive unbiased information.” § 4631(a).

These objectives are important. And the interests they embody all are “neutral” in respect to speech. Cf. ante, at 579.

The protection of public health falls within the traditional scope of a State’s police powers. Hillsborough County v. Automated Medical Laboratories, Inc., 471 U. S. 707, 719 (1985). The fact that the Court normally exempts the regulation of “misleading” and “deceptive” information even from the rigors of its “intermediate” commercial speech scrutiny testifies to the importance of securing “unbiased information,” see 44 Liquormart, 517 U. S., at 501 (opinion of Stevens, J.); Central Hudson, supra, at 563, as does the fact that the FDA sets forth as a federal regulatory goal the need to ensure a “fair balance” of information about marketed drugs, 21 CFR §§ 202.1(e)(1), (e)(5)(ii). As major payers in the health care system, health care spending is also of crucial state interest. And this Court has affirmed the importance of maintaining “privacy” as an important public policy goal— even in respect to information already disclosed to the public for particular purposes (but not others). See Department of Justice v. Reporters Comm. for Freedom of Press, 489 U. S. 749, 762-771 (1989); see also Solove, A Taxonomy of Privacy, 154 U. Pa. L. Rev. 477, 520-522 (2006); cf. NASA v. Nelson, 562 U. S. 134, 144-146 (2011) (discussing privacy interests in nondisclosure).

*597At the same time, the record evidence is sufficient to permit a legislature to conclude that the statute “directly advances” each of these objectives. The statute helps to focus sales discussions on an individual drug’s safety, effectiveness, and cost, perhaps compared to other drugs (including generics). These drug-related facts have everything to do with general information that drug manufacturers likely possess. They have little, if anything, to do with the name or prior prescription practices of the particular doctor to whom a detailer is speaking. Shaping a detailing message based on an individual doctor’s prior prescription habits may help sell more of a particular manufacturer’s particular drugs. But it does so by diverting attention from scientific research about a drug’s safety and effectiveness, as well as its cost. This diversion comes at the expense of public health and the State’s fiscal interests.

! Vermont compiled a substantial legislative record to corroborate this line of reasoning. See Testimony of Sean Flynn (Apr. 11, 2007), App. in No. 09-1913-cv(L) etc. (CA2), p. A-1156 (hereinafter CA2 App.) (use of data mining helps drug companies “to cover up information that is not in the best light of their drug and to highlight information that makes them look good”); Volker & Outterson, New Legislative Trends Threaten the Way Health Information Companies Operate, Pharmaceutical Pricing & Reimbursement 2007, id., at A-4235 (one former detailer considered prescriber-identifying data the “‘greatest tool in planning our approach to manipulating doctors’” (quoting Whitney, Big (Brother) Pharma: How Drug Reps Know Which Doctors To Target, New Republic, Aug. 29, 2006, http://www.tnr.cona/ article/84056/health-care-eli-lilly-pfizer-ama); Testimony of Paul Harrington (May 3, 2007), CA2 App. A-1437 (describing data-mining practices as “secret and manipulative activities by the marketers”); Testimony of Julie Brill (May 3,2007), id., at A-1445 (restrictions on data mining “ensur[e] that the FDA’s requirement of doctors receiving fair and balanced in*598formation actually occurs”); Written Statement of Jerry Avorn & Aaron Kesselheim, id., at A-4310 (citing studies that “indicate that more physician-specific detailing will lead to more prescriptions of brand-name agents, often with no additional patient benefit but at much higher cost to patients and to state-based insurance programs, which ■will continue to drive up the cost of health care”); id., at A-4311 (“Making it more difficult for manufacturers to tailor their marketing strategies to the prescribing histories of individual physicians would actually encourage detailers to present physicians with a more neutral description of the product”); see also Record in No. l:07-cv-00188-jgm (D Vt.), Doc. 414, pp. 53-57, 64 (hereinafter Doc. 414) (summarizing record evidence).

These conclusions required the legislature to make judgments about whether and how to ameliorate these problems. And it is the job of regulatory agencies and legislatures to make just these kinds of judgments. Vermont's attempts to ensure a “fair balance” of information is no different from the FDA’s similar requirement, see 21 CFR §§ 202.1(e)(1), (e)(5)(h). No one has yet suggested that substantial portions of federal drug regulation are unconstitutional. Why then should we treat Vermont’s law differently?

The record also adequately supports the State’s privacy objective. Regulatory rules in Vermont make clear that the confidentiality of an individual doctor’s prescribing practices remains the norm. See, e. g., Pharmacy Rule 8.7(c) (“Prescription and other patient health care information shall be secure from access by the public, and the information shall be kept confidential”); Pharmacy Rule 20.1(i) (forbidding disclosure of patient or prescriber information to “unauthorized persons” without consent). Exceptions to this norm are comparatively few. See, e. g., ibid, (identifying “authorized persons”); Vt. Stat. Ann., Tit. 18, § 4631(e); App. 248, 255 (indicating that prescriber-identifying data is not widely disseminated). There is no indication that the State of Ver*599mont, or others in the State, makes use of this information for counterdetailing efforts. See supra, at 594-595.

Pharmaceutical manufacturers and the data miners who sell information to those manufacturers would like to create (and did create) an additional exception, which means additional circulation of otherwise largely confidential information. Vermont’s statute closes that door. At the same time, the statute permits doctors who wish to permit use of their prescribing practices to do so. §§ 4631(c)-(d). For purposes of Central Hudson, this would seem sufficiently to show that the statute serves a meaningful interest in increasing the protection given to prescriber privacy. See Fox, 492 U. S., at 480 (in commercial speech area, First Amendment requires “a fit that is not necessarily perfect, but reasonable; that represents not necessarily the single best disposition but one whose scope is in proportion to the interest served” (internal quotation marks omitted)); see also United States v. Edge Broadcasting Co., 509 U. S. 418, 434 (1993) (The First Amendment does not “require that the Government make progress on every front before it can make progress on any front”); Burson, 504 U. S., at 207 (plurality opinion).

C

The majority cannot point to any adequately supported, similarly effective “more limited restriction.” Central Hudson, 447 U. S., at 564. It says that doctors “can, and often do, simply decline to meet with detailers.” Ante, at 575. This fact, while true, is beside the point. Closing the office door entirely has no similar tendency to lower costs (by focusing greater attention upon the comparative advantages and disadvantages of generic drug alternatives). And it would not protect the confidentiality of information already released to, say, data miners. In any event, physicians are unlikely to turn detailers away at the door, for those detail-ers, whether delivering a balanced or imbalanced message, are nonetheless providers of much useful information. See *600Manchanda & Honka, The Effects and Role of Direct-to-Physician Marketing in the Pharmaceutical Industry: An Integrative Review, 5 Yale J. Health Pol’y L. & Ethics 785, 793-797, 815-816 (2005); Ziegler, Lew, & Singer, The Accuracy of Drug Information From Pharmaceutical Sales Representatives, 273 JAMA 1296 (1995). Forcing doctors to choose between targeted detailing and no detailing at all could therefore jeopardize the State’s interest in promoting public health.

The majority also suggests that if the “statute provided that prescriber-identifying information could not be sold or disclosed except in narrow circumstances then the State might have a stronger position.” Ante, at 580; see also ante, at 572-573. But the disclosure-permitting exceptions here are quite narrow, and they serve useful, indeed essential purposes. See supra, at 593-594. Compare Vt. Stat. Ann., Tit. 18, § 4631(e), with note following 42 U. S. C. §1320d-2, p. 1190, and 45 CFR § 164.512 (uses and disclosures not requiring consent under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996). Regardless, this alternative is not “a more limited restriction,” Central Hudson, supra, at 564 (emphasis added), for it would impose a greater, not a lesser, burden upon the dissemination of information.

Respondents' alternatives are no more helpful. Respondents suggest that “Vermont can simply inform physicians that pharmaceutical companies . . . use prescription history information to communicate with doctors.” Brief for Respondent Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America 48. But how would that help serve the State’s basic purposes? It would not create the “fair balance” of information in pharmaceutical marketing that the State, like the FDA, seeks. Cf. Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union, 521 U. S. 844, 874 (1997) (alternative must be “at least as effective in achieving the legitimate purpose that the statute was enacted to serve”). Respondents also suggest policies requiring use of generic drugs or educating doctors *601about their benefits. Brief for Respondent Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America 54-55. Such programs have been in effect for some time in Vermont or other States, without indication that they have prevented the imbalanced sales tactics- at which Vermont’s statute takes aim. See, e. g., Written Statement of Jerry Avorn & Aaron Kesselheim, CA2 App. A-4310; Doc. 414, at 60-61. And in any event, such laws do not help protect prescriber privacy.

Vermont has thus developed a record that sufficiently shows that its statute meaningfully furthers substantial state interests. Neither the majority nor respondents suggests any equally effective “more limited” restriction. And the First Amendment harm that Vermont’s statute works is, at most, modest. I consequently conclude that, even if we apply an “intermediate" test such as that in Central H'udson, this statute is constitutional.

<1

What about the statute’s third restriction, providing that “[pharmaceutical manufacturers and pharmaceutical marketers” may not “use prescriber-identifiable information for marketing or promoting a prescription drug unless the pre-scriber consents”? Yt. Stat. Ann., Tit. 18, § 4631(d) (emphasis added). In principle, I should not reach this question. That is because respondent pharmaceutical manufacturers, marketers, and data miners seek a declaratory judgment and injunction prohibiting the enforcement of this statute. See 28 U. S. C. § 2201; App. 49-128. And they have neither shown nor claimed that they could obtain significant amounts of “prescriber-identifiable information” if the first two prohibitions are valid. If, as I believe, the first two statutory prohibitions (related to selling and disclosing the information) are valid, then the dispute about the validity of the third provision is not “ Teal and substantial’ ” or “ 'definite and concrete.’” MedImmune, Inc. v. Genentech, Inc., 549 *602U. S. 118, 127 (2007) (quoting Aetna Life Ins. Co. v. Haworth, 300 U. S. 227, 240-241 (1937)) (Article III does not permit courts to entertain such disputes).

The Court, however, strikes down all three provisions, and so I add that I disagree with the majority as to the constitutionality of the third restriction as well — basically for the reasons I have already set out. The prohibition against pharmaceutical firms using this prescriber-identifying information works no more than modest First Amendment harm; the prohibition is justified by the need to ensure unbiased sales presentations, prevent unnecessarily high drug costs, and protect the privacy of prescribing physicians. There is no obvious equally effective, more limited alternative.

V

In sum, I believe that the statute before us satisfies the “intermediate” standards this Court has applied to restrictions on commercial speech. A fortiori it satisfies less demanding standards that are more appropriately applied in this kind of commercial regulatory case — a case where the government seeks typical regulatory ends (lower drug prices, more balanced sales messages) through the use of ordinary regulatory means (limiting the commercial use of data gathered pursuant to a regulatory mandate). The speech-related consequences here are indirect, incidental, and entirely commercial. See supra, at 585-588.

The Court reaches its conclusion through the use of important First Amendment categories — “content-based,” “speaker-based,” and “neutral” — but without taking full account of the regulatory context, the nature of the speech effects, the values these First Amendment categories seek to promote, and prior precedent. See supra, at 581-585, 589-592, 597. At best the Court opens a Pandora’s Box of First Amendment challenges to many ordinary regulatory practices that may only incidentally affect a commercial message. See, e. g., supra, at 587-588, 589-590. At worst, it *603reawakens Lochner’s pre-New Deal threat of substituting judicial for democratic decisionmaking where ordinary economic regulation is at issue. See Central Hudson, 447 U. S., at 589 (Rehnquist, J., dissenting).

Regardless, whether we apply an ordinary commercial speech standard or a less demanding standard, I believe Vermont’s law is consistent with the First Amendment. And with respect, I dissent.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge BROWN.

Dissenting opinion filed by Circuit Judge ROGERS.

BROWN, Circuit Judge:

The Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act (“the Act”), Pub.L. No. 111-31, 123 Stat. 1776 (2009), directed the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to issue regulations requiring all cigarette packages manufactured or sold in the United States to bear one of nine new textual warnings, as well as “color graphics depicting the negative health consequences of smoking.” See id. § 201(a). Pursuant to this authority, the Food and Drug Administration (“FDA”) initiated a rulemaking proceeding through which it selected the nine images that would accompany the statutorily-prescribed warnings. Five tobacco companies (“the Companies”) challenged the rule, alleging that FDA’s proposed graphic warnings violated the First Amendment. See Compl. at 35-36.1 The district court granted the Companies’ motion for summary judgment on February 29, 2012.2 FDA appeals, and we affirm.

1. Background

The Act gives FDA the authority to regulate the manufacture and sale of tobacco products, including cigarettes. In addition to requiring cigarette packages and advertisements to bear one of nine new warning statements, the Act mandates that the new warning labels comprise the top 50 percent of the front and rear panels of cigarette packages and 20 percent of the area of each cigarette advertisement. Act § 201(a), 123 Stat. at 1842-45. The Act directs the Secretary to issue final regula*1209tions identifying the graphic component of the warnings by June 22, 2011, and provides that the revised health warnings will take effect by September 22, 2012. See 15 U.S.C. § 1333 note.

Pursuant to the statutory directive, FDA issued a Proposed Rule seeking comment on thirty-six potential images for the new graphic warning labels. Required Warnings for Cigarette Packages and Advertisements, 75 FecLReg. 69,524, 69,534 (Nov. 12, 2010) (hereinafter Proposed Rule). At the outset of the Proposed Rule, FDA asserted the government’s “substantial interest in reducing the number of Americans, particularly children and adolescents, who use cigarettes and other tobacco products in order to prevent the life-threatening health consequences associated with tobacco use.” Id. at 69,525. In ' accordance with the requirements of the Act, FDA proposed a dramatic expansion of the existing health warnings, which it justified based on scientific literature and a “strong worldwide consensus”3 regarding the relative effectiveness of graphic warnings compared to the text-only warnings the United States currently requires. Id. The agency explained that by “clearly and effectively conveying] the negative health consequences of smoking,” the new warnings would discourage nonsmokers, particularly minors, from “initiating cigarette use,” and encourage current smokers to quit. Id. at 69,526.

FDA promulgated the final set of nine images — one for each warning statement— by regulations issued on June 22, 2011. See Required Warnings for Cigarette Packages and Advertisements, 76 Fed. Reg. 36,628 (June 22, 2011) (hereinafter Final Rule). FDA also required each graphic image to bear the phone number of the National Cancer Institute’s “Network of Tobacco Cessation Quitlines,” which uses the telephone portal “1-800-QUIT-NOW.” Id. at 36,681.

FDA based its selection of the final images on an 18,000-person internet-based consumer study it commissioned. The study divided respondents into two groups: a control group that was shown the new text in the format of the current warnings (located on the side of cigarette packages), and a separate treatment group that was shown the proposed graphic warnings, which included the new text, the accompanying graphic image, and the 1-800-QUIT-NOW number. Id. at 36,638. Each group then answered questions designed to assess, among other things, whether the graphic warnings, relative to the text-only control, (1) increased viewers’ intention to quit or refrain from smoking; (2) increased viewers’ knowledge of the health risks of smoking or secondhand smoke; and (3) were “salient,” which FDA defined in part as causing viewers to feel “depressed,” “discouraged,” or “afraid.” Id.

In selecting these nine images, FDA reviewed and responded to over a thousand public comments, including joint comments submitted by plaintiffs-appellees RJ Reynolds, Lorillard, and Commonwealth Brands. See id. at 36,629. Several eom*1210ments — including comments from cancer researchers, nonprofits, and academics— criticized the single exposure study design, noting it prevented the government from assessing the long-term or actual effects of the proposed warnings. Two of these comments recommended FDA conduct longitudinal research or post-market surveillance to assess actual long-term effects. Id. at 36,639. FDA conceded the study did not permit it to reach “firm” conclusions about the “long-term, real-world effects” of the proposed warnings, but claimed the existing scientific literature “provides a substantial basis for our conclusion that the required warnings will effectively communicate the health risks of smoking, thereby encouraging smoking cessation and discouraging smoking initiation.” Id. Still other comments asserted that FDA’s research study failed to provide evidence that the proposed warnings would actually affect smoking rates, significantly affect consumers knowledge of the risks of smoking, or bring about actual behavior change. See id. at 36,640. But FDA disagreed, again relying on the “substantial research” showing the effectiveness of similar graphic health warnings in other countries. Id. (citing Proposed Rule at 69,531-34).4 Another comment asserted that the study’s selection bias constituted a serious methodological flaw. Namely, participants were recruited from an internet panel and offered the opportunity to participate in an FDA-sponsored research study. Id. at 36,643. FDA avoided the substance of this argument by conceding that its study “provides insight on the relative effectiveness of the various warnings under consideration,” not on the “absolute effects of the warnings in general.” Id.

Some comments also criticized the lack of statistical evidence supporting FDA’s belief that requiring cigarette packages to bear the graphic warnings would reduce smoking rates. See id. For example, the Companies noted that the Canadian data revealed no statistically significant decline in smoking rates for adolescents and adults after the introduction of similar graphic warnings, which implied that the warnings were ineffective and that FDA’s warnings would be ineffective as well. Id. FDA summarily disagreed, stating that the images it selected would satisfy its “primary goal, which is to effectively convey the negative health consequences of smoking on cigarette packages and in advertisements,” which can help “both to discourage nonsmokers ... from initiating cigarette use and to encourage current smokers to consider cessation.” Final Rule at 36,633. FDA also explained that the data from Canada did not indicate that the warnings had been ineffective, because other studies showed that the warnings had been “effective at providing ... smokers with health information, making *1211consumers think about the health effects of smoking, and increasing smokers’ motivations to quit smoking.” Id. at 36,634.

After FDA finalized the Rule, the Companies filed suit in the district court, claiming the cigarette warnings required under the Act and FDA’s implementing regulations violated the First Amendment. The district court granted the Companies’ motion for a preliminary injunction on November 7, 2011, and subsequently granted their motion for summary judgment. FDA appeals, and we review de novo the district court’s decision to grant summary judgment. Davis v. Pension Benefit Guar. Corp., 571 F.3d 1288, 1291 (D.C.Cir.2009).

II. Level of Scrutiny

The Companies do not dispute Congress’s authority to require health warnings on cigarette packages, nor do they challenge the substance of any of the nine textual statements mandated by the Act. The only question before us is whether FDA’s promulgation of the graphic warning labels — which incorporate the textual warnings, a corresponding graphic image, and the “1-800-QUIT-NOW” cessation hotline number — violates the First Amendment. We begin our analysis by determining the applicable level of scrutiny.

Both the right to speak and the right to refrain from speaking are “complementary components of the broader concept of individual freedom of mind” protected by the First Amendment. Wooley v. Maynard, 430 U.S. 705, 714, 97 S.Ct. 1428, 51 L.Ed.2d 752 (1977). Any attempt by the government either to compel individuals to express certain views, see id. at 714-15, 97 S.Ct. 1428, or to subsidize speech to which they object, see United States v. United Foods, Inc., 533 U.S. 405, 410-11, 121 S.Ct. 2334, 150 L.Ed.2d 438 (2001), is subject to strict scrutiny. The general rule “that the speaker has the right to tailor the speech[] applies not only to expressions of value, opinion, or endorsement, but equally to statements of fact the speaker would rather avoid.” Hurley v. Irish-Am. Gay, Lesbian & Bisexual Grp. of Bos., 515 U.S. 557, 573-74, 115 S.Ct. 2338, 132 L.Ed.2d 487 (1995). This holds true whether individuals, see W. Va. State Bd. of Educ. v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624, 642, 63 S.Ct. 1178, 87 L.Ed. 1628 (1943), or corporations, see Pac. Gas & Elec. Co. v. Pub. Utils. Comm’n, 475 U.S. 1, 16, 106 S.Ct. 903, 89 L.Ed.2d 1 (1986) (plurality opinion), are being compelled to speak.

This case contains elements of compulsion and forced subsidization. The Companies contend that, to the extent the graphic warnings go beyond the textual warnings to shame and repulse smokers and denigrate smoking as an antisocial act, the message is ideological and not informational. “[B]y effectively shouting well-understood information to consumers,” they explain, “FDA is communicating an ideological message, a point of view on how people should live their lives: that the risks from smoking outweigh the pleasure that smokers derive from it, and that smokers make bad personal decisions, and should stop smoking.” In effect, the graphic images are not warnings, but admonitions: “[D]on’t buy or use this product”5 No one doubts the government can *1212promote smoking cessation programs; can use shock, shame, and moral opprobrium to discourage people from becoming smokers; and can use its taxing and regulatory authority to make smoking economically prohibitive and socially onerous. And the government can certainly require that consumers be fully informed about the dangers of hazardous products. But this case raises novel questions about the scope of the government’s authority to force the manufacturer of a product to go beyond making purely factual and accurate commercial disclosures and undermine its own economic interest — in this case, by making “every single pack of cigarettes in the country [a] mini billboard” for the government’s anti-smoking message.6

Even assuming the Companies’ marketing efforts (packaging, branding, and other advertisements) can be properly classified as commercial speech, and thus subject to less robust First Amendment protections, a thorny question remains: how much leeway should this Court grant the government when it seeks to compel a product’s manufacturer to convey the state’s subjective — and perhaps even ideological — view that consumers should reject this otherwise legal, but disfavored, product? Neither the Act nor the agency’s regulation squarely addresses this question. However, for present purposes, we can assume, without deciding, that if such compulsion is constitutionally permissible, the state’s actions must still withstand the applicable level of scrutiny.

Courts have recognized a handful of “narrow and well-understood exceptions” to the general rule that content-based speech regulations — including compelled speech — are subject to strict scrutiny. See Turner Broad. Sys., Inc. v. FCC, 512 U.S. 622, 641, 114 S.Ct. 2445, 129 L.Ed.2d 497 (1994). There are two primary exceptions in the commercial speech context. First, “purely factual and uncontroversial” disclosures are permissible if they are “reasonably related to the State’s interest in preventing deception of consumers,” provided the requirements are not “unjustified or unduly burdensome.” Zauderer; 471 U.S. at 651, 105 S.Ct. 2265. Second, restrictions on commercial speech are subject to less stringent review than restrictions on other types of speech. For a statute burdening commercial speech to survive, the government must affirmatively prove that (1) its asserted interest is substantial, (2) the restriction directly and materially advances that interest, and (3) the restriction is narrowly tailored. See Cent. Hudson Gas & Elec. Corp. v. Pub. Serv. Comm’n, 447 U.S. 557, 566, 100 S.Ct. 2343, 65 L.Ed.2d 341 (1980). While this test is not quite as demanding as strict scrutiny, it is significantly more stringent than Zauderer’s standard, which is akin to rational-basis review.

The district court concluded the graphic warnings were “not the type of purely factual and uncontroversial” disclosures reviewable under the less stringent Zauderer standard. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. v. *1213FDA, 845 F.Supp.2d 266, 272-73 (D.D.C.2012) (hereinafter “Merits Opinion”). Applying strict scrutiny, the court held that FDA failed to satisfy its burden of demonstrating that the Rule is narrowly tailored to achieve a compelling government interest. See id. at 275-77. FDA argues that the district court erred in finding the Zauderer standard inapplicable. Alternatively, it contends that the district court erred by failing to apply the intermediate-level scrutiny generally afforded to commercial speech, and that the graphic warnings pass constitutional muster under Central Hudson. We address each argument in turn.

a. Applicability of the Zauderer Standard

In Zauderer, the Court applied a lower level of scrutiny to regulations requiring attorneys to fully disclose information about the actual cost and consequences of services. 471 U.S. at 651-52, 105 S.Ct. 2265. Noting that the First Amendment’s protection of commercial speech is premised on its informational value to consumers, the Court reasoned that an advertiser’s constitutional interest in not providing additional factual information was “minimal.” Id. at 651, 105 S.Ct. 2265. Although the Court acknowledged that “unjustified or unduly burdensome disclosure requirements might offend the First Amendment by chilling protected commercial speech,” it “h[e]ld that an advertiser’s rights are adequately protected as long as disclosure requirements are reasonably related to the State’s interest in preventing deception of consumers.” Id.; see also Milavetz, Gallop & Milavetz, P.A. v. United States, — U.S. -, 130 S.Ct. 1324, 1340, 176 L.Ed.2d 79 (2010) (applying the Zauderer standard to disclosure requirements “intended to combat the problem of inherently misleading commercial advertisements”).

The Supreme Court has never applied Zauderer to disclosure requirements not designed to correct misleading commercial speech. FDA argues that Zauderer’s lenient standard of scrutiny applies to regulations that serve a different governmental interest: disclosure of the health and safety risks associated with commercial products. See Appellant’s Br. at 26.

But by its own terms, Zauderer’s holding is limited to cases in which disclosure requirements are “reasonably related to the State’s interest in preventing deception of consumers.” 471 U.S. at 651, 105 S.Ct. 2265. Zauderer “carries no authority for a mandate unrelated to the interest in avoiding misleading or incomplete commercial messages.” Glickman v. Wileman Bros. & Elliott, Inc., 521 U.S. 457, 491, 117 S.Ct. 2130, 138 L.Ed.2d 585 (1997) (Souter, J., dissenting, joined by Rehnquist, C.J., and Scalia and Thomas, JJ.) (explaining why Zauderer was inapplicable in that case).7 In United States v. United Foods, for example, the Court declined to apply the Zauderer standard when evaluating a federal law requiring mushroom producers to pay an assessment to support generic advertising. The Court distinguished Zauderer because there was no suggestion “that the mandatory assessments imposed to require one group of private persons to pay for speech by others are somehow necessary to make voluntary advertisements non-misleading for consumers.” 533 U.S. at 416, 121 S.Ct. 2334. And as the Court explained in Pacific Gas, “[njothing in Zauderer suggests ... that *1214the State is equally free to require [entities] to carry the messages of third parties, where the messages themselves are biased against or are expressly contrary to the [entity’s] views.” 475 U.S. at 15 n. 12, 106 S.Ct. 903 (plurality opinion).

Ibanez v. Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation also suggests that Zauderer should be construed to apply only when the government affirmatively demonstrates that an advertisement threatens to deceive consumers. In that case, the state Board of Accountancy contended that an attorney’s use of her Certified Financial Planner designation in an advertisement was “potentially misleading,” and thus entitled the Board to require her to include a disclaimer. 512 U.S. 136, 146, 114 S.Ct. 2084, 129 L.Ed.2d 118 (1994). But the Court declined to apply Zauderer, finding that “given the state of this record,” the Board failed “to point to any harm that is potentially real, not purely hypothetical.” Id. Put simply, the government could not seek review under the lenient Zauderer standard absent a showing that the advertisement at issue would likely mislead consumers.

In fact, the Court’s only recent application of the Zauderer standard involved a disclosure requirement that “share[d] the essential features of the rule at issue in Zauderer.” Milavetz, 130 S.Ct. at 1340. In Milavetz, a law firm challenged a provision of the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005 (“BAPCPA”) that required professionals qualifying as debt relief agencies to “clearly and conspicuously disclose in any advertisement of bankruptcy assistance services ... that the services or benefits are with respect to bankruptcy relief under this title.” 11 U.S.C. § 528(a)(3). BAPCPA also required qualifying professionals to state that “[w]e are a debt relief agency. We help people file for bankruptcy relief under the Bankruptcy Code.” Id. § 528(a)(4). The Court upheld the statute’s disclosure requirement because, as in Zauderer, the law firm’s advertisements were “inherently misleading” — in this case, because they “promis[ed] ... debt relief without any reference to the possibility of filing for bankruptcy, which has inherent costs.” Milavetz, 130 S.Ct. at 1340. One Justice even cautioned against interpreting the Court’s holding as a “presumptive[ ] endorsement of] laws requiring the use of government-scripted disclaimers in commercial advertising,” noting that Zauderer does not stand for the proposition that government “can constitutionally compel the use of a scripted disclaimer in any circumstance in which its interest in preventing consumer deception might plausibly be at stake.” Id. at 1343-44 (Thomas, J., concurring in part and concurring in the judgment).

Zauderer, Ibanez, and Milavetz thus establish that a disclosure requirement is only appropriate if the government shows that, absent a warning, there is a self-evident — or at least “potentially real” — danger that an advertisement will mislead consumers. Ibanez, 512 U.S. at 146, 114 S.Ct. 2084. In this case, the proposed disclosure requirements would apply to both cigarette advertisements and cigarette packages. The Act bans any labeling or advertising representing that any tobacco product “presents a lower risk of tobacco-related disease or is less harmful than one or more other commercially marketed tobacco products,” “contains a reduced level of a substance or presents a reduced exposure to a substance,” or “does not contain or is free of a substance.” 21 U.S.C. § 387k. The Act also bans advertising or labeling using the descriptors “light,” “mild,” “low,” or similar descriptors. Id. In light of these restrictions, and in the absence of any congressional find*1215ings on the misleading nature of cigarette packaging itself, there is no justification under Zauderer for the graphic warnings.

The dissent’s argument that cigarette packages and other advertisements that fail to prominently display the negative health consequences of smoking are misleading, see Dissent at 1228-29, seems to blame the industry for playing by the government’s rules. The Companies have never argued that no disclosure requirements are warranted; they merely object to the form and content of the specific requirements proposed by the FDA. Indeed, it seems likely the FDA did not make any such claims because the industry has complied precisely with all of the government’s previous disclosure requirements, and continues to do so. Moreover, the Companies generally acknowledge the need for effective warnings and concede in their brief that they would be amenable to a number of new disclosure requirements, including putting the Act’s new text on the side of packages, the bottom front of packages and advertisements, or using less shocking graphics. Appellees’ Br. at 58.8

The amicus States suggest that the graphic warnings be evaluated in the context of the years of deception that preceded them.9 States’ Br. at 7. Citing Warner-Lambert Co. v. FTC, 562 F.2d 749 (D.C.Cir.1977) they claim this Court has found that even advertisements that do not appear deceptive in isolation can constitute “part of a continuing deception of the public” absent highly visible warnings. Id. at 769. But the States’ argument overlooks the broader context of that decision. Warner-Lambert involved a petition for review of an FTC order requiring the Warner-Lambert company to cease and desist from advertising that its product, Listerine mouthwash, prevents, cures, or alleviates the common cold. Id. at 752. As a remedial measure, the Commission required Warner-Lambert to include the following disclosure in every future advertisement for Listerine for a defined period: “Contrary to prior advertising, Listerine will not help prevent colds or sore throats or lessen their severity.” Id. at 753. In other words, the disclosure statement was required as part of a corrective order which the Commission found necessary to “dissipate the effects of respondent’s deceptive representations.” Id. at 769; see also Novartis Corp. v. FTC, 223 F.3d 783, 788-89 (D.C.Cir.2000) (upholding the Commission’s corrective order imposing disclosure requirements on drug manufacturer).

By contrast, FDA does not frame this rule as a remedial measure designed to counteract specific deceptive claims made by the Companies, nor did it offer a remedial justification for the graphic warnings during the rulemaking proceeding. While the Companies’ representations about *1216“light” or “low tar” cigarettes might have been misleading, see United States v. Philip Morris USA Inc., 566 F.3d 1095, 1124-26 (D.C.Cir.2009), the Act now prohibits such statements. See 21 U.S.C. § 387k. Unlike in Warner-Lambert, FDA has not shown that the graphic warnings were designed to correct any false or misleading claims made by cigarette manufacturers in the past.10 Nor did it show that absent disclosure, consumers would likely be deceived by the Companies’ packaging in the future. Rather, FDA framed the warnings as general disclosures about the negative health effects of smoking. The warnings thus represent an ongoing effort to discourage consumers from buying the Companies’ products, rather than, as in Warner-Lambert, a measure designed to combat specific deceptive claims.

Moreover, the graphic warnings do not constitute the type of “purely factual and uncontroversial” information, Zauderer, 471 U.S. at 651, 105 S.Ct. 2265, or “accurate statements,” Milavetz, 130 S.Ct. at 1340, to which the Zau&erer standard may be applied. The disclosures approved in Zauderer and Milavetz were clear statements that were both indisputably accurate and not subject to misinterpretation by consumers. See Zauderer, 471 U.S. at 633, 105 S.Ct. 2265 (describing the disciplinary rule that required “that any advertisement that mentions contingent-fee rates must disclos[e] whether percentages are computed before or after deduction of court costs and expenses”); Milavetz, 130 S.Ct. at 1330 (describing BAPCPA disclosure requirements, including, inter alia, a statement that “[w]e are a debt relief agency. We help people file for relief under the Bankruptcy Code.”).

The FDA’s images are a much different animal. FDA concedes that the images are not meant to be interpreted literally, but rather to symbolize the textual warning statements, which provide “additional context for what is shown.” Final Rule at 36,655. But many of the images chosen by FDA could be misinterpreted by consumers. For example, the image of a man smoking through a tracheotomy hole might be misinterpreted as suggesting that such a procedure is a common consequence of smoking — a more logical interpretation than FDA’s contention that it symbolizes “the addictive nature of cigarettes,” which requires significant extrapolation on the part of the consumers. Id. at 36,649. Moreover, the graphic warnings are not “purely” factual because — as FDA tacitly admits — they are primarily intended to evoke an emotional response, or, at most, shock the viewer into retaining the information in the text warning. See Appellant’s Br. at 33 (citing research showing that “pictures are easier to remember than words”); id. at 38 (citing FDA’s finding that a substantial body of scientific literature shows that emotional responses, such as worry and disgust, “reliably predict the likelihood that consumers will understand and appreciate the substance of the warnings”).

In fact, many of the images do not convey any warning information at all, much less make an “accurate statement” about cigarettes. For example, the images of a woman crying, a small child, and the man wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with the words “I QUIT” do not offer any information about the health effects of smoking. And the “1-800-QUIT-NOW” number, when presented without any explanation about the services provided on the hotline, hardly sounds like an unbiased source of information. These inflammatory images and the provocatively-named hotline ean*1217not rationally be viewed as pure attempts to convey information to consumers. They are unabashed attempts to evoke emotion (and perhaps embarrassment) and browbeat consumers into quitting. See Final Rule at 36,697 (“[R]isk information is most readily conveyed by warnings that elicit ... strong emotional and cognitive reactions .... ”). While none of these images are patently false, they certainly do not impart purely factual, accurate, or uncontroversial information to consumers. Consequently, the images fall outside the ambit of Zauderer.

b. Applicability of Central Hudson

Because this case does not fall within the narrow enclave carved out by Zauderer, we must next determine which level of scrutiny — strict or intermediate— is appropriate. The district court held that compelled speech that falls outside the Zauderer framework is subject to strict scrutiny. See Merits Op. at 274-75. See also Disc. Tobacco City & Lottery, Inc. v. United States, 674 F.3d 509, 554 (6th Cir.2012) (deciding between applying strict scrutiny or Zauderer to compelled commercial speech); Entm’t Software Ass’n v. Blagojevich, 469 F.3d 641, 652 (7th Cir.2006) (same). The government argues that we should view the graphic warnings as restrictions on commercial speech, which are analyzed under the less rigorous standard established by Central Hudson. Despite the contrary views of other circuits, our governing precedent makes clear that Central Hudson is the appropriate standard.

This Court recently evaluated the constitutionality of compelled commercial speech in United States v. Philip Morris, where it reviewed a district court order requiring the defendant tobacco manufacturers to publish corrective statements on their websites, in newspapers, and on major television networks. 566 F.3d at 1142-43. This Court began by noting that “[b]e-cause commercial speech receives a lower level of protection under the First Amendment, burdens imposed on it receive a lower level of scrutiny from the courts.” Id. After acknowledging that “the standard for assessing burdens on commercial speech has varied,” the Court concluded that “the Supreme Court’s bottom line is clear: the government must affirmatively demonstrate its means are narrowly tailored to achieve a substantial government goal.” Id. at 1143. See also Novartis Corp., 223 F.3d at 789 (evaluating a corrective remedy involving corrective statements under Central Hudson). Because this case also involves a compelled commercial disclosure, we follow the lead of Philip Morris and apply the intermediate standard set forth in Central Hudson.

III. Evaluating the Graphic Warnings Under Intermediate Scrutiny

Under Central Hudson, the government must first show that its asserted interest is “substantial.” 447 U.S. at 566, 100 S.Ct. 2343.11 If so, the Court must determine “whether the regulation directly advances the governmental interest asserted, and whether it is not more extensive than is necessary to serve that interest.” Id. The party seeking to uphold a restriction on commercial speech bears the burden of justifying it. Edenfield v. Fane, 507 U.S. 761, 770-71, 113 S.Ct. 1792, 123 L.Ed.2d 543 (1993). Because this case involves a challenge to final agency action, *1218the Administrative Procedure Act governs our review of the record. See 5 U.S.C. § 706(2)(B) (providing that the APA applies to allegations that agency action is “contrary to constitutional right, power, privilege, or immunity”). The APA requires us to “hold unlawful and set aside agency action, findings, and conclusions found to be ... unsupported by substantial evidence.” 5 U.S.C. § 706(2).

Unlike rational-basis review, the Central Hudson standard does not permit this Court to “supplant the precise interests put forward by [FDA] with other suppositions.” Edenfield, 507 U.S. at 768, 113 S.Ct. 1792. We thus begin by identifying FDA’s asserted interests.

A review of the statute and the administrative record makes clear that the graphic warnings are intended to encourage current smokers to quit and dissuade other consumers from ever buying cigarettes. One of the Act’s many stated purposes is “promot[ing] cessation to reduce disease risk and the social costs associated with tobacco-related diseases.” Act § 3.9. The only explicitly asserted interest in either the Proposed or Final Rule is an interest in reducing smoking rates. The Proposed Rule states in its preamble that the government has a “substantial interest in re-during the number of Americans, particularly children and adolescents, who use cigarettes and other tobacco products.” Proposed Rule at 69,525. And the preamble to the Final Rule reiterates the same interest. Final Rule at 36,629.12 Although counsel attempted to disclaim this interest at oral argument, the administrative record shows otherwise: the primary objective of the Rule was “both to discourage nonsmokers from initiating cigarette use and to encourage current smokers to consider quitting.” Id. at 36,630.

Assuming FDA’s interest in reducing smoking rates is substantial,13 we next evaluate whether FDA has offered substantial evidence showing that the graphic warning requirements “directly advance[] the governmental interest asserted,” Cent. Hudson, 447 U.S. at 566, 100 S.Ct. 2343, to a “material degree,” Fl. Bar v. Went For It, Inc., 515 U.S. 618, 626, 115 S.Ct. 2371, 132 L.Ed.2d 541 (1995). The government bears the burden of justifying its attempt to restrict commercial speech, Edenfield, 507 U.S. at 770, 113 S.Ct. 1792, and its burden is not light. A restriction that “provides only ineffective or remote support for the government’s purposes,” id. at 770, 113 S.Ct. 1792, is not *1219sufficient, and the government cannot satisfy its burden “by mere speculation or conjecture.” Rubin v. Coors Brewing Co., 514 U.S. 476, 487, 115 S.Ct. 1585, 131 L.Ed.2d 532 (1995). The requirement that a restriction directly advance the asserted interest is “critical,” because without it, the government “could [interfere with] commercial speech in the service of other objectives that could not themselves justify a burden on commercial expression.” Id.

FDA has not provided a shred of evidence — much less the “substantial evidence” required by the APA — showing that the graphic warnings will “directly advance” its interest in reducing the number of Americans who smoke. FDA makes much of the “international consensus” surrounding the effectiveness of large graphic warnings, but offers no evidence showing that such warnings have directly caused a material decrease in smoking rates in any of the countries that now require them. While studies of Canadian and Australian youth smokers showed that the warnings on cigarette packs caused a substantial number of survey participants to think — or think more — about quitting smoking, Proposed Rule at 69,532, and FDA might be correct that intentions are a “necessary precursor” to behavior change, Final Rule at 36,642, it is mere speculation to suggest that respondents who report increased thoughts about quitting smoking will actually follow through on their intentions. And at no point did these studies attempt to evaluate whether the increased thoughts about smoking cessation led participants to actually quit. Another Australian study reported increased quit attempts by survey participants after that country enacted large graphic warnings, but found “no association with short-term quit success.” Proposed Rule at 69,532. Some Canadian and Australian studies indicated that large graphic warnings might induce individual smokers to reduce consumption, or to help persons who have already quit smoking remain abstinent. See id. But again, the study did not purport to show that the implementation of large graphic warnings has actually led to a reduction in smoking rates.

FDA’s reliance on this questionable social science is unsurprising when we consider the raw data regarding smoking rates in countries that have enacted graphic warnings. FDA claims that Canadian national survey data suggest that graphic warnings may reduce smoking rates. But the strength of the evidence is underwhelming, making FDA’s claim somewhat misleading. In the year prior to the introduction of graphic warnings, the Canadian national survey showed that 24 percent of Canadians aged 15 or older smoked cigarettes. In 2001, the year the warnings were introduced, the national smoking rate dropped to 22 percent, and it further dropped to 21 percent in 2002. Id. at 69,532. But the raw numbers don’t tell the whole tale. FDA concedes it cannot directly attribute any decrease in the Canadian smoking rate to the graphic warnings because the Canadian government implemented other smoking control initiatives, including an increase in the cigarette tax and new restrictions on public smoking, during the same period. Id. Although FDA maintains the data “are suggestive” that large graphic warnings “may” reduce smoking consumption, id., it cannot satisfy its First Amendment burden with “mere speculation and conjecture.” Rubin, 514 U.S. at 487, 115 S.Ct. 1585.

FDA’s Regulatory Impact Analysis (“RIA”)14 essentially concedes the agency *1220lacks any evidence showing that the graphic warnings are likely to reduce smoking rates. One way in which the RIA analyzed the expected benefits of the Rule was by comparing the impact of similar warnings introduced in Canada in 2000. See Final Rule at 36,719-20. It (1) analyzed the change in smoking trends in Canada before and after 2000; (2) assumed any difference in the post-2000 change between Canada and the United States was solely attributable to the introduction of graphic warnings; and (3) assumed similar warnings would have an identical impact on U.S. smoking rates. See id. at 36,755. Describing its approach as “rudimentary,” FDA acknowledged that apart from differences in cigarette taxes, the RIA “d[id] not account for potential confounding variables,” id. at 36,720-21, such as the introduction of more stringent smoking bans and advertising restrictions in Canada during the relevant time period, or the fact that Canadian cigarette prices are generally higher than U.S. prices. Plaintiffs’ Comment Letter on Proposed Rule (Jan. 11, 2010) and Statement of Robert S. Maness.

Logic dictates that these procedural shortcuts would, if anything, lead to an overly optimistic prediction of the efficacy of the proposed graphic warnings. Not so. The RIA estimated the new warnings would reduce U.S. smoking rates by a mere 0.088%, Final Rule at 36,721, a number the FDA concedes is “in general not statistically distinguishable from zero.” Id. at 36,776. Indeed, because it had access to “very small data sets,” FDA could not even reject the statistical possibility that the Rule would have no impact on U.S. smoking rates. Id.

FDA has thus presented us with only two studies that directly evaluate the impact of graphic warnings on actual smoking rates, and neither set of data shows that the graphic warnings will “directly” advance its interest in reducing smoking rates “to a material degree.” Rubin, 514 U.S. at 487, 115 S.Ct. 1585. And one of the principal- researchers on whom FDA relies recently surveyed the relevant literature and conceded that “[t]here is no way to attribute ... declines [in smoking] to the new health warnings.” David Hammond, Health Warnings Messages on Tobacco Products: A Review, 20 Tobacco Control 327, 331 (2011), available at http:// tobaccocontrol.bmj.com/content/20/5/327. full.pdf In light of the number of foreign jurisdictions that have enacted large graphic warning labels, the dearth of data reflecting decreased smoking rates in these countries is somewhat surprising, and strongly implies that such warnings are not very effective at promoting cessation and discouraging initiation. While APA review of final agency action is deferential, it surely does not require us to accept a flawed interpretation of Canadian survey data or the agency’s own projected 0.088% decrease in the U.S. smoking rate as “substantial evidence” that its warnings will advance its stated interest.

FDA attempts to downplay the significance of the RIA by explaining that it “must be included in all federal rule-making to improve the internal management of the Federal Government,” and that it “was not intended to second-guess Congress’s judgment regarding the value of new health warnings.” Pet. Reply Br. at 15-16.15 FDA attempts to rehabilitate *1221its findings by noting the analysis made only the “unremarkable point” that it is “difficult [to] determine with statistical precision the relative causal impact of the relevant contributing factors,” particularly given the very small data sets to which FDA had access. Id. at 16. But FDA cannot get around the First Amendment by pleading incompetence or futility. Because FDA bears the burden of justifying its proposed restraint on speech, it cannot claim — rather perversely — that its own analysis was irrelevant because it lacked precision and was based on insufficient data. Central Hudson requires FDA to find and present data supporting its claims prior to imposing a burden on commercial speech.

Alternatively, FDA asserts an interest in “effectively communicating health information” regarding the negative effects of cigarettes. Appellant’s Br. at 28. But as FDA concedes, this purported “interest” describes only the means by which FDA is attempting to reduce smoking rates: “[t]he goal of effectively communicating the risks of cigarette smoking is, of course, related to the viewer’s decision to quit, or never to start, smoking.” Id. at 47. The government’s attempt to reformulate its interest as purely informational is unconvincing, as an interest in “effective” communication is too vague to stand on its own. Indeed, the government’s chosen buzzwords, which it reiterates through the rulemaking, prompt an obvious question: “effective” in what sense? Allowing FDA to define “effectiveness” however it sees fit would not only render Central Hudson’s “substantial interest” requirement a complete nullity, but it would also eviscerate the requirement that any restriction “directly advance” that interest. See 447 U.S. at 566, 100 S.Ct. 2343. In this case, both the statute and the Rule offer a barometer for assessing the effectiveness of the graphic warnings — the degree to which they encourage current smokers to quit and dissuade would-be smokers from taking up the habit. See Final Rule at 36,630, 36,707-08. As such, FDA’s interest in “effectively communicating” the health risks of smoking is merely a description of the means by which it plans to accomplish its goal of reducing smoking rates, and not an independent interest capable of sustaining the Rule.16

IY. Conclusion

In the Proposed Rule, FDA lamented that their previous efforts to combat the tobacco companies’ advertising campaigns have been like bringing a butter knife to a gun fight. According to the FTC, tobacco companies spent approximately $12.49 billion on advertising and promotion in 2006 alone, employing marketing and advertising experts to incorporate current trends and target their messages toward certain demographics. Proposed Rule at 69,531. The graphic warnings represent FDA’s attempt to level the playing field, not only by limiting the Companies’ ability to advertise, but also by forcing the Companies to bear the cost of disseminating an anti-smoking message. But as the Supreme *1222Court recently reminded us, “[t]hat the [government] finds expression too persuasive does not permit it to quiet the speech or to burden its messengers.” Sorrell v. IMS Health Inc., — U.S.-, 131 S.Ct. 2653, 2671, 180 L.Ed.2d 544 (2011). The First Amendment requires the government not only to state a substantial interest justifying a regulation on commercial speech, but also to show that its regulation directly advances that goal. FDA failed to present any data — much less the substantial evidence required under the APA— showing that enacting their proposed graphic warnings will accomplish the agency’s stated objective of reducing smoking rates. The Rule thus cannot pass muster under Central Hudson. The APA directs that we “shall ... set aside [the] agency action ... found to be contrary to constitutional right.” 5 U.S.C. § 706(2). We therefore vacate the graphic warning requirements and remand to the agency. In so doing, we also vacate the permanent injunction issued by the district court, in furtherance of our obligation to “set aside” the unlawful regulation. See, e.g., N. Air Cargo v. United States Postal Serv., 674 F.3d 852, 861 (D.C.Cir.2012) (“It was quite anomalous [for the district court] to issue an injunction. When a district court reverses agency action and determines that the agency acted unlawfully, ordinarily the appropriate course is to identify a legal error and then remand to the agency, because the role of the district court in such situations is to act as an appellate tribunal.”).

ROGERS, Circuit Judge,

dissenting:

The threshold question in this government appeal is whether the district court applied the correct level of scrutiny in addressing the tobacco companies’ First Amendment challenge to the requirement that they disclose the negative health consequences of smoking on cigarette packages and other advertisements.1 The speech at issue — proposing the sale of cigarettes — is indisputably commercial speech. Consequently, contrary to the district court’s application of strict scrutiny, the question is whether, under the traditional standards adopted by the Supreme Court, the government’s warning label requirement is subject to the “less exacting scrutiny” of Zauderer v. Office of Disciplinary Counsel of the Supreme Court of Ohio, 471 U.S. 626, 650-51, 105 S.Ct. 2265, 85 L.Ed.2d 652 (1985), or to intermediate scrutiny under Central Hudson Gas & Electric Corp. v. Public Service Commission of New York, 447 U.S. 557, 566, 100 S.Ct. 2343, 65 L.Ed.2d 341 (1980). In affirming the grant of summary judgment to the tobacco companies, the court applies the wrong level of scrutiny, disregarding the tobacco companies’ history of deceptive advertising and the government’s stated “primary goal, which is to effectively convey the negative health consequences of smoking on cigarette packages and in advertisements,” Required Warnings for Cigarette Packages and Advertisements, 76 Fed.Reg. 36,628, 36,633 (June 22, 2011) (“Final Rule”).

Because the warning labels present factually accurate information and address misleading commercial speech, as defined in Supreme Court precedent, Zauderer scrutiny applies, and the government need *1223show only that the warning label requirement is reasonably related to its stated and substantial interest in effectively conveying this information to consumers. See Milavetz, Gallop & Milavetz, P.A. v. United States, — U.S. -, 130 S.Ct. 1324, 1339-40, 176 L.Ed.2d 79 (2010); Zauderer, 471 U.S. at 650-51, 105 S.Ct. 2265; Spirit Airlines, Inc. v. U.S. Dep’t of Transp., 687 F.3d 403, 412 (D.C.Cir.2012). Even treating Zauderer’s “less exacting scrutiny” as limited to disclosure requirements serving a governmental interest in preventing consumer deception, the voluminous findings of our own courts, cited and supplemented by Congress in the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act (“Tobacco Control Act” or “Act”), Pub.L. No. Ill— 31, 123 Stat. 1776 (2009), and the Federal Drug Administration (“FDA”) in the Final Rule, are more than adequate to substantiate that interest.

Regardless of which level of scrutiny applies, the court errs in failing to examine both of the government’s stated interests. In the rulemaking, the FDA articulated complementary, but distinct, interests in effectively conveying information about the negative health consequences of smoking to consumers and in decreasing smoking rates. See, e.g., Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,633. The court dismisses the former interest as “too vague,” Maj. Op. at 1221, thereby sidestepping much of the substantial evidence supporting the warning label requirement. Yet this court has “recognize[d] that the government’s interest in preventing consumer fraud/confusion may well take on added importance in the context of a product ... that can affect the public’s health.” Pearson v. Shalala, 164 F.3d 650, 656 (D.C.Cir.1999). Tobacco products necessarily affect the public health, and to a significant degree. Unlike other consumer products, “tobacco products are ‘dangerous to health’ when used in the manner prescribed.” FDA v. Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp., 529 U.S. 120, 135, 120 S.Ct. 1291, 146 L.Ed.2d 121 (2000). They are also highly addictive. Consequently, “tobacco use, particularly among children and adolescents, poses perhaps the single most significant threat to public health in the United States.” Id. at 161, 120 S.Ct. 1291. Thus, the government’s informational interest “take[s] on added importance,” Pearson, 164 F.3d at 656, and merits independent consideration. Upon consideration of this interest, the government appears to have met its burden under Central Hudson as well as Zauderer, except with regard to the additional inclusion of the “1-800-QUIT-NOW” number in each label.

Accordingly, because the district court erred in applying strict scrutiny to the commercial disclosures at issue, and because those disclosures, except as discussed below, appear to survive either level of scrutiny under traditional commercial speech precedent, I would reverse the grant of summary judgment, and I respectfully dissent.

I.

The context of the challenged warning label requirement can be summarized briefly. First, it is beyond dispute that the textual statements in the warning labels required under the Tobacco Control Act convey factually accurate information. Tobacco use is the leading preventable cause of death in the United States. It causes or contributes to at least sixteen kinds of cancer, as well as heart and cerebrovascular disease, chronic bronchitis, and emphysema, thereby “killing] more than 400,000 Americans every year — more deaths than from AIDS, alcohol, car accidents, murders, suicides, drugs, and fires, combined.” President’s Cancer Panel, Promoting Healthy Lifestyles 61 (2007) *1224(hereinafter “PCP Report”); see id. at 61-62. The nicotine contained in tobacco is “one of the most addictive substances used by humans.” Institute of Medicine, Ending the Tobacco Problem: A Blueprint for the Nation 5 (2007) (hereinafter “IOM Report”). Despite increasing public awareness that smoking is dangerous to one’s health, most people still lack “a complete understanding of the many serious diseases caused by smoking, the true nature of addiction, or what it would be like to experience either those diseases or addiction itself.” United States v. Philip Morris USA, Inc., 449 F.Supp.2d 1, 578 (D.D.C.2006). Adolescents in particular tend “to underestimate or be uninformed about the difficulty of stopping smoking,” IOM Report at E-8; as a result, “they are less likely to believe that the risk of addiction and related health consequences apply to them,” id. at E-13. Over eighty percent of adult smokers became addicted to tobacco at or below the age of eighteen; of these smokers, half will die prematurely from a tobacco-related disease. PCP Report at 64. In view of these facts, the Supreme Court has recognized that “tobacco use, particularly among children and adolescents, poses perhaps the single most significant threat to public health in the United States.” Brown & Williamson, 529 U.S. at 161, 120 S.Ct. 1291.

Second, it is also beyond dispute that the tobacco companies have engaged in a decades-long campaign to deceive consumers about these facts. Despite knowledge of “the negative health consequences of smoking, the addictiveness and manipulation of nicotine, [and] the harmfulness of secondhand smoke,” tobacco company executives “made, caused to be made, and approved public statements contrary to this knowledge.” United States v. Philip Morris USA Inc., 566 F.3d 1095, 1121 (D.C.Cir.2009). Specifically, they “publicly denied and distorted the truth about the addictive nature of their products, suppressed research revealing the addictiveness of nicotine, and denied their efforts to control nicotine levels and delivery,” all while “engineer[ing] their products around creating and sustaining [nicotine] addiction.” Id. at 1107. The tobacco company executives “knew of the[ ] falsity” of their statements “at the time” and “made the statements with the intent to deceive.” Id. at 1124.

Beginning in 1965, the government undertook to warn consumers of the health risks associated with smoking by requiring the inclusion of a health warning on the side of cigarette packages. See Federal Cigarette Labeling and Advertising Act of 1965, Pub.L. No. 89-92, 79 Stat. 282 (1965). Congress last revised the content and format of these warning labels in 1984. See Comprehensive Smoking Education Act of 1984, Pub.L. No. 98-474, 98 Stat. 2200 (1984). Since then, “evidence regarding the ineffectiveness of the prescribed warnings has continued to accumulate,” supporting the conclusion that these warnings “are unnoticed and stale, and they fail to convey relevant information in an effective way.” IOM Report at 291.

In view of this background, in 2009 Congress enacted the Tobacco Control Act. Congress found that “[a] consensus exists within the scientific and medical communities that tobacco products are inherently dangerous and cause cancer, heart disease, and other serious adverse health effects,” and that “[n]icotine is an addictive drug.” Tobacco Control Act § 2(2), (3), 123 Stat. at 1777 (codified at 21 U.S.C. § 387 Note (2011)). Additionally, Congress found that in 2005 the tobacco companies “spent more than $13 [billion] to attract new users, retain current users, increase current consumption, and generate favorable long-term attitudes toward smoking and tobacco use,” id. § 2(16), “often misleadingly *1225portray[ing] the use of tobacco as socially acceptable and healthful to minors,” id. § 2(17). Based on these and other findings, Congress required, as relevant, the rotating display of one of nine textual warnings,2 accompanied by “color graphics depicting the negative health consequences of smoking” to be selected by the Secretary of Health and Human Services, on cigarette packages and other advertisements. Tobacco Control Act § 201(a), 123 Stat. at 1842-45 (codified at 15 U.S.C. § 1333 Note (2011))(hereinafter “Section 201”). These requirements become effective fifteen months from the issuance of the implementing regulations. See id. § 201(b).

In the Final Rule, the FDA, acting on behalf of the Secretary,3 stated that its “primary goal” in selecting the graphic images pursuant to Section 201 was “to effectively convey the negative health consequences of smoking on cigarette packages and in advertisements.” Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,633; see also id. at 36,641. The FDA also explained that “this effective communication can help both to discourage nonsmokers, including minor children, from initiating cigarette use and to encourage current smokers to consider cessation to greatly reduce the serious risks that smoking poses to their health.” See id.; see also id. at 36,640. In selecting nine of the thirty-six graphic images presented in the proposed rule, see Required Warnings for Cigarette Packages and Advertisements, 75 Fed.Reg. 69,524 (proposed Nov. 12, 2010) (“Proposed Rule”), the FDA relied on the results of a consumer study conducted, in part, “to quantitatively evaluate the [relative] efficacy of the proposed required warnings in communicating the health harms of smoking to adults ..., young adults ..., and youth” (“FDA study”). Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,635; see id. at 36,637-39. In particular, the FDA focused on the salience measures reported for each of the thirty-six graphic images considered in the study; these measures included “[e]motional reactions, cognitive reactions, and [reactions as to] whether the warning was difficult to look at.” Id. at 36,696. Echoing the Institute of Medicine in justifying its reliance on these measures, the use of which “is well-established in the scientific literature,” id. at 36,696-97, the FDA explained that “the literature suggests that risk information is most readily communicated by messages that arouse emotional reactions, and that smokers who report greater negative emotional reactions in response to cigarette warnings are significantly more likely to have read and thought about the warnings____” Id. at 36,639; see IOM Report at C-3. After considering the results of the FDA study “and a number of other factors,” the FDA “concluded that the nine selected required warnings effectively communicate the negative health consequences of smoking.” Id. at 36,637.

II.

“Because the degree of protection afforded by the First Amendment depends *1226on whether the activity sought to be regulated constitutes commercial or noncommercial speech, we must first determine the proper classification of the [speech] at issue here.” Bolger v. Youngs Drug Prods. Corp., 463 U.S. 60, 65, 103 S.Ct. 2875, 77 L.Ed.2d 469 (1983) (emphasis added). Recognizing “the ‘eommonsense’ distinction between speech proposing a commercial transaction, which occurs in an area traditionally subject to government regulation, and other varieties of speech,” the Supreme Court has repeatedly instructed that the “Constitution ... accords a lesser protection to commercial speech than to other constitutionally guaranteed expression,” Central Hudson, 447 U.S. at 562-63, 100 S.Ct. 2343 (citations and internal quotation marks omitted).4 The Court has reasserted this “eommonsense” distinction in the context of compelled speech, differentiating between attempts to “prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein” and attempts “only to prescribe what shall be orthodox in commercial advertising.” Zauderer, 471 U.S. at 651, 105 S.Ct. 2265 (citations and internal quotation marks omitted).5

Indeed, in view of “material differences between disclosure requirements and outright prohibitions on speech,” id. at 650, 105 S.Ct. 2265, the Supreme Court has taken this distinction a step further. Whereas in the context of noncommercial speech, “compulsion to speak may be as *1227violative of the First Amendment as prohibitions on speech” and thus trigger the same level of scrutiny, id., in the context of commercial speech, compulsion to speak may be less violative of the First Amendment than prohibitions on speech and thus trigger a loiver level of scrutiny, see id. at 650-51, 105 S.Ct. 2265. “Because the extension of First Amendment protection to commercial speech is justified principally by the value to consumers of the information such speech provides,” the Court explained, “disclosure requirements trench much more narrowly on an advertiser’s interests than do flat prohibitions on speech....” Id. at 651, 105 S.Ct. 2265 (citations omitted); see id. at 651 n. 14, 105 S.Ct. 2265; Va. Bd. of Pharmacy v. Va. Citizens Consumer Council, Inc., 425 U.S. 748, 770, 96 S.Ct. 1817, 48 L.Ed.2d 346 (1976). Consequently, while “unjustified or unduly burdensome disclosure requirements might offend the First Amendment by chilling protected commercial speech[,] ... an advertiser’s rights are adequately protected as long as disclosure requirements are reasonably related to the State’s interest in preventing deception of consumers.” Zauderer, 471 U.S. at 651, 105 5.Ct. 2265; see Milavetz, 130 S.Ct. at 1339-40.6

As the Supreme Court explained in Milavetz, where the challenged requirements are “directed at misleading commercial speech,” and where they “impose a disclosure requirement rather than an affirmative limitation on speech, ... the less exacting scrutiny described in Zauderer governs [a court’s] review.” 130 S.Ct. at 1339; see Spirit Airlines, 687 F.3d at 412. The warning label requirement meets both of these criteria.

First, the government need show only that the targeted commercial speech presents the “possibility of deception” or a “tendency to mislead.” Milavetz, 130 S.Ct. at 1340 (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). If the speech is actually misleading, it enjoys no First Amendment protection. See Thompson v. W. States Med. Ctr., 535 U.S. 357, 367, 122 S.Ct. 1497, 152 L.Ed.2d 563 (2002); Central Hudson, 447 U.S. at 566, 100 S.Ct. 2343. Where “the likelihood of deception” is “hardly a speculative one,” the government need not produce “evidence that [the] advertisements are misleading,” as the court may rely instead on experience and common sense. Spirit Airlines, 687 F.3d at 413 (alteration in original) (quoting Milavetz, 130 S.Ct. at 1340) (internal quotation marks omitted). In Milavetz, the Supreme Court concluded that a law firm’s advertisements were “inherently misleading” because they “promisefd] ... debt relief without any reference to the possibility of filing for bankruptcy, which has inherent costs.” Milavetz, 130 S.Ct. at 1340. Thus, absent any additional evidence, the Court considered the omission of a reference to a possible outcome with “inherent costs” to be sufficiently misleading as to warrant review under Zauderer. Even advertisements that display all the costs of a service may remain misleading. In Spir*1228it Airlines, this court addressed a Department of Transportation (“DOT”) rule requiring that the most prominent number displayed in airfare advertisements be the total price, inclusive of taxes. Spirit Airlines, 687 F.3d at 408-09. Notwithstanding the airlines’ compliance with preexisting regulations requiring advertisements to display the entire ticket cost as well as the amount of any tax, the court accepted DOT’S determination, based on common sense and experience, “that it was deceitful and misleading when the most prominent price listed by an airline is anything other than the total, final price of air travel.” Id. at 413. Accordingly, the court proceeded to review the rule under Zauderer. See id. at 413-14.

Even absent any affirmatively misleading statements, see Maj. Op. at 1214-15, cigarette packages and other advertisements that fail to display the final costs of smoking in a prominent manner are at least as misleading as the airline advertisements in Spirit Airlines. Existing warnings, last revised in 1984, appear on one side panel and occupy only four percent of cigarette packages. See Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,678. Common sense, experience, and substantial scientific evidence support the conclusion that these warnings are ineffective. “For example,” in 2007 the Institute of Medicine “concluded that U.S. package warnings are both ‘unnoticed and stale.’ ” Proposed Rule, 75 Reg. at 69,530 (quoting IOM Report at 291); see generally id. The government has thus provided more than sufficient evidence that cigarette packages and other advertisements remain likely to mislead consumers notwithstanding the existing warnings. See Discount Tobacco City & Lottery v. United States, 674 F.3d 509, 562-63 (6th Cir.2012). Yet it goes even further, demonstrating that these warnings actually “have failed to convey appropriately crucial information such as the nature and extent of the health risks associated with smoking cigarettes.” Final Rule, 76 Fed. Reg. at 36,632; see Proposed Rule, 75 Fed.Reg. at 69,530-31 (citing studies); see also Discount Tobacco, 674 F.3d at 563-64. Even though “most smokers understand that smoking poses certain statistical risks to their health,” studies noted by the FDA show that “many fail to appreciate the severity and magnitude of those risks.” Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,632. Moreover, “many smokers underestimate their personal risks.” Id. (noting, for example, studies in which only a minority of smokers believed they were at increased risk for cancer and heart disease). Many people are also unaware of the effects of secondhand smoke on others. See id. at 36,633. And adolescents in particular fail to appreciate the highly addictive nature of cigarettes. See id.; see also Philip Morris, 449 F.Supp.2d at 578.

Furthermore, even if (contrary to Supreme Court and this court’s precedent) these findings were inadequate to establish a “tendency to mislead,” this court has recognized that certain advertisements, “although not misleading if taken alone,” can “become[] misleading” when “considered in light of past advertisements.” Warner-Lambert Co. v. FTC, 562 F.2d 749, 760 (D.C.Cir.1977); see id. at n. 57.7 *1229In other words, a “tendency to mislead” may arise through efforts to “capitalize on ... prior deceptions by continuing to advertise in a manner that builds on consumers’ existing misperceptions.” Philip Morris, 566 F.3d at 1144-45 (citing Warner-Lambert, 562 F.2d at 769). This court has already acknowledged the tendency of cigarette marketing to mislead consumers based on the companies’ decades of deception regarding each of the risks identified in the warning labels. See Philip Morris, 566 F.3d at 1144; supra Part I.8 Consistent with that decision, Congress found that “[tjobaceo product advertising often misleadingly portrays the use of tobacco as socially acceptable and healthful to minors.” Tobacco Control Act § 2(17), 21 U.S.C. § 387 Note. These findings are more than “adequate to establish that the likelihood of deception in this case ‘is hardly a speculative one.’ ” Milavetz, 130 S.Ct. at 1340; see Discount Tobacco, 674 F.3d at 562.

Second, the warning label requirement does not impose “an affirmative limitation on speech,” Milavetz, 130 S.Ct. at 1339; rather, the warning labels disclose information about the negative health consequences of smoking. (The one exception is discussed infra.) Unlike other provisions of the Tobacco Control Act, Section 201 does not restrict the information conveyed to consumers, but requires additional information to be conveyed with the aid of graphic images. Although the tobacco companies object that the warnings “monopolize all the prominent space on cigarette packages, and thereby make it impossible for manufacturers to communicate their own messages and their own viewpoints prominently in packaging,” Joint Comments of R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., Lorillard Tobacco Co. & Commonwealth Brands, Inc. 9 (Jan. 11, 2010) (J.A. 216) (emphasis added), their objection rings hollow in the absence of any evidence of difficulty in conveying their desired messages notwithstanding a decade of experience under a similar warning label requirement in Canada. See Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,633, 36,698; Appellants’ Br. at Add. 6-12; cf. Ibanez v. Fla. Dep’t Bus. & Prof'l Regulation, 512 U.S. 136, 146-47, 114 S.Ct. 2084, 129 L.Ed.2d 118 (1994). Consequently, they fail to show that the warning label requirement is “an affirmative limitation on speech.” Milavetz, 130 S.Ct. at 1339; see Spirit Airlines, 687 F.3d at 413-14. To the extent the warning labels disclose factually accurate information about the cigarettes being advertised, then, Zauderer offers the appropriate level of scrutiny.

The tobacco companies do not challenge the factual accuracy of the textual statements included in the warning labels. See Appellees’ Br. at 54-55. Nor could they reasonably do so, given the scientific consensus “that tobacco products are inherently dangerous and cause cancer, heart disease, and other serious adverse health *1230effects.” Tobacco Control Act § 2(2), 21 U.S.C. § 387 Note; see Final Rule, 76 FecLReg. at 36,641; Proposed Rule, 75 Fed.Reg. at 69,527-29. The question for purposes of the First Amendment analysis, then, is whether the graphic images selected by the FDA to accompany the factually accurate textual statements render the warnings nonfactual or controversial. To answer this question, the court must— although the court does not, see Maj. Op. at 1216-17 — view the images in connection with the textual warnings they accompany. See, e.g., S. Air Transp., Inc. v. Am. Broad. Cos., Inc., 877 F.2d 1010, 1015 (D.C.Cir.1989).

Contrary to the tobacco companies’ suggestion, see Appellees’ Br. at 24, the use of graphic images, even if digitally enhanced, illustrated, or symbolic, does not necessarily make the warnings nonfactual. The Supreme Court recognized in Zauderer that “[t]he use of illustrations or pictures in advertisements serves important communicative functions: it attracts the attention of the audience to the advertiser’s message, and it may also serve to impart information directly.” Zauderer, 471 U.S. at 647, 105 S.Ct. 2265; see N.Y. Times Co. v. NASA, 920 F.2d 1002, 1005 (D.C.Cir.1990); see, e.g., 16 C.F.R. § 1500.14 (2011) (requiring skull-and-crossbones warnings on poisonous products). In the Final Rule, the FDA concluded that “the effects shown” in the images “are, in fact, accurate depictions of the effects of sickness and disease caused by smoking,” Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,696, and the tobacco companies do not suggest otherwise. That such images are not invariably comforting to look at does not necessarily make them inaccurate. As the FDA went on to explain the obvious fact, “the severe, life-threatening and sometimes disfiguring health effects of smoking conveyed in the required warnings are disturbing and the images [it] ... selected appropriately reflect this fact.” Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,696.

The tobacco companies further object that the graphic images were chosen not to convey information, but to evoke negative emotions and thereby discourage smoking. See Appellees’ Br. at 26-27. The FDA explained, however, that “considerable scientific evidence shows that health warnings that elicit strong emotional and cognitive reactions,” as reflected in their salience measures, “are better processed and more effectively communicate information about the negative health consequences of smoking.” Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,642; see id. at 36,639, 41, 46; IOM Report at C-3. Thus, the FDA’s reliance on salience measures was in the service of — not inconsistent with — the warnings’ informational purpose. Moreover, factually accurate, emotive, and persuasive are not mutually exclusive descriptions; the emotive quality of the selected images does not necessarily undermine the warnings’ factual accuracy.9 Comprehend*1231ing the facts about the actual harms resulting from smoking is likely to provoke emotional reactions and also to discourage the use of cigarettes. See Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,647. The tobacco companies’ argument leads to the counterintuitive conclusion that the more concerning the negative health effects of a particular product, the more constrained the government is in mandating disclosures of those facts. Unsurprisingly, the tobacco companies point neither to any case law in support of this argument nor to any legally significant distinction between fact and emotion. See Appellees’ Br. at 24-25. Rather, the greater the harms to public health, the greater the government’s interest in informing consumers of those harms. See Pearson, 164 F.3d at 656. This interest is especially great in view of the tobacco companies’ extensive advertising that Congress found was “often misleading! ]” and designed to attract adolescents and new users, retain and expand consumption, and “generate favorable long-term attitudes toward smoking and tobacco use.” Tobacco Control Act § 2(16X18), 21 U.S.C. § 387 Note.

Aside from their general objections to the inclusion of graphic images for the above reasons, the tobacco companies specifically object to five of the nine selected images. They maintain that the images of a man smoking through a tracheotomy hole in his throat and a man with chest staples on an autopsy table convey misleading messages about the consequences of smoking, and that the images of a man wearing a t-shirt reading “I QUIT,” a baby enveloped in smoke, and a woman crying convey no information about the consequences of smoking whatsoever. See Appellees’ Br. at 25-26. All of these objections pertain to the images divorced from their accompanying text and thus fail to address the relevant question — whether the images render the overall message conveyed by the warning labels nonfactual. Viewed with the text they accompany, none of these images has that effect.

The image accompanying the textual warning “Cigarettes are addictive” depicts a man smoking through a tracheotomy opening in his throat. Viewed with the accompanying text, this image conveys the tenacity of nicotine addiction: even after under undergoing surgery for cancer, one might be unable to abstain from smoking. Indeed, government counsel represented that this situation is not so extreme or unusual as the court and the tobacco companies suggest. Compare Oral Arg. Tr. at 57 (stating that fifty percent of neck and head cancer patients continue to smoke) with Maj. Op. at 1216-17; Appellees’ Br. at 25. This representation finds support from the President’s Cancer Panel. “Smoking among cancer survivors (including individuals diagnosed with, being treated for, and surviving cancer),” the Panel reported, “is an underappreciated and understudied problem.” PCP Report at 70. “[Sjmoking prevalence in this population is approximately equivalent to people with no history of cancer,” despite “mounting evidence confirm[ing] the adverse effects of continued smoking on cancer treatment outcomes regardless of treatment modality.” Id.10 This image thus serves to un*1232derline the factual, and now uncontroversial, statement that cigarettes are highly addictive.

Similarly, the image of a man with staples in his chest lying on an autopsy table works with, not against, the textual warning “Smoking can kill you.” Assuming “autopsies are not a common consequence of smoking,” Appellees’ Br. at 25, neither are coffins or gravestones; yet the status evoked by images of an autopsy-scarred man, a coffin, or a gravestone — death—is a common consequence of smoking. See Proposed Rule, 75 Fed.Reg. at 69,526; PCP Report at 61, 64. The FDA might have opted for an image of a decaying cadaver or of a pile of ashes to portray the likely physical consequences of smoking, but it was not limited to such images in its representation of those consequences. An autopsy scar is merely one way of communicating that the man in the image is dead; viewed in connection with the textual warning, the image conveys the message that smoking can result in death.

The images of a baby enveloped in smoke and a woman crying both depict the significant harms of secondhand smoke. These images accompany the textual warnings “Tobacco smoke can harm your children” and “Tobacco smoke causes fatal lung disease in nonsmokers,” respectively. Regarding the former image, commenters noted that it would “clearly inform parents that when they smoke in the presence of their children, their children will also be inhaling toxins.” Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,650. The latter image, as the FDA explained, highlights the “emotional suffering” dimension of fatal lung disease and other “negative health consequences caused by secondhand smoke exposure.” Id. at 36,656. Those negative health consequences are significant. Secondhand smoke “has been established as a cause of approximately 3,000 lung cancer deaths each year among nonsmokers in the United States”; it also “is a significant contributor to cardiac, respiratory, and other diseases in individuals exposed to it.” PCP Report at 95; see id. at 95-96. As a result, secondhand smoke exposure “claims the lives of approximately 38,000 nonsmokers annually.” Id. at 95. Addressing potential purchasers of cigarettes, these two warning labels convey the message that smoking poses risks not only to them, but also to their family members and others.

Initially more problematic is the image of a man wearing a t-shirt that reads “I QUIT,” which the tobacco companies maintain “provides no information about smoking risks (or even the benefits of quitting).” Appellees’ Br. at 26. But the tobacco companies overstate the objection, for the image does address the benefits of quitting. As the FDA viewed this image, in connection with the textual warning “Quitting smoking now greatly reduces serious risks to your health,” it conveys the message “I quit, and I am alive and healthy.” This message comports with the evidence showing that “[sjmoking cessation decreases the risk of the health consequences of smoking.” Proposed Rule, 75 Fed.Reg. at 69,529. “For example, persons who quit smoking before age 50 have one-half the risk of dying in the next 15 years compared with continuing smokers.” Id. Nothing in this image, or any other image selected by the FDA, renders nonfactual or controversial the textual warning it accompanies. The warning labels thus qualify as factually accurate, uncontroversial disclosures.

*1233Because the warning labels are “directed at misleading commercial speech,” and because they “impose a disclosure requirement rather than an affirmative limitation on speech, ... the less exacting scrutiny described in Zauderer” should have governed the district court’s review. Milavetz, 130 S.Ct. at 1339. While mindful that “unjustified or unduly burdensome disclosure requirements might offend the First Amendment by chilling protected commercial speech,” the district court should have determined whether the warning label requirement was “reasonably related” to the government’s interest in effectively conveying the negative health consequences of smoking to consumers. Zauderer, 471 U.S. at 651, 105 S.Ct. 2265; see Milavetz, 130 S.Ct. at 1339-40.

Under this “less exacting scrutiny,” the warning label requirement appears to pass muster. The government need only justify the requirement on the basis of substantial evidence on the record. See Nat’l Cable & Telecomms. Ass’n v. FCC, 555 F.3d 996, 1002 (D.C.Cir.2009). In view of the scientific literature supporting the FDA’s reliance on the salience measures reported in its study, see Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,638, 36,642, 36,649-57, the warning label requirement is reasonably related to the government’s interest in effectively communicating information about the negative health consequences of smoking. And in view of extensive scientific literature, see Proposed Rule, 75 Fed.Reg. at 69,531 (citing IOM Report at C-3-4), international experience, see id. at 69,531-32, domestic experience, see Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,632, and common sense, the size and placement of the warning labels is also reasonably related to that interest. Although some graphic images may evoke emotional reactions, it is undisputed that smoking can cause the health consequences they depict. Given the magnitude of the government interest in informing consumers of these consequences (especially against the tobacco companies’ history of consumer deception), the expert judgment exercised by the FDA in selecting the graphic images, and the absence of any evidence that similar restrictions elsewhere have hindered the tobacco companies’ ability to get their own message to ■consumers, the burden on the tobacco companies’ First Amendment rights appears neither undue nor unjustified. The warning label requirement thus appears constitutional. See Zauderer, 471 U.S. at 651, 105 S.Ct.-2265; cf. Discount Tobacco, 674 F.3d at 569.

Attempting to distinguish Zauderer, the court adopts the view that the warning label requirement involves “elements of compulsion and forced subsidization.” Maj. Op. at 1211. Commercial disclosure requirements can involve involuntary statements and compliance costs. See, e.g., Milavetz, 130 S.Ct. at 1340-41; Meese v. Keene, 481 U.S. 465, 467, 481-82, 107 S.Ct. 1862, 95 L.Ed.2d 415 (1987). Nonetheless, the Supreme Court has reviewed such requirements under a different level of scrutiny than noncommercial compelled speech, cf. Pac. Gas & Elec. Co. v. Pub. Utils. Comm’n of Cal., 475 U.S. 1, 8-9, 106 S.Ct. 903, 89 L.Ed.2d 1 (1986), and under a different set of considerations than compelled subsidies of private speech, cf. United States v. United Foods, Inc., 533 U.S. 405, 121 S.Ct. 2334, 150 L.Ed.2d 438 (2001). Contrary to the court’s conclusion that “this case raises novel questions about the scope of the government’s authority,” Maj. Op. at 1212, given the congressional findings and regulatory record supporting the government’s interest in effectively informing consumers of the negative, indeed potentially lethal, consequences of smoking, the warning label requirement falls within the scope of the Supreme Court’s *1234traditional First Amendment treatment of commercial disclosures.

Unlike the graphic images envisioned in Section 201, however, the additional inclusion of the telephone number “1-800-QUIT-NOW” on each warning label does not directly disclose factual information about the health consequences of smoking. The FDA imposed this requirement, pursuant to separate statutory authority, 21 U.S.C. § 387f(d), see Final Rule, 76 Fed. Reg. at 36,681, in order “to provide a place where smokers and other members of the public can obtain smoking cessation information from staff trained specifically to help smokers quit by delivering unbiased and evidence-based information, advice, and support,” Proposed Rule, 75 Fed.Reg. at 69,540. In the FDA’s view, inclusion of the number would also enhance the effectiveness of the warning labels. See Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,681. To the extent the purpose is directed toward reducing smoking rates, the constitutionality of the number’s mandatory inclusion in the warning labels requires examination under a different standard than Zauderer, to which I now turn.

III.

Where Zauderer scrutiny is inapplicable to a commercial speech regulation, “the Supreme Court’s bottom line is clear: the government must affirmatively demonstrate its means are ‘narrowly tailored’ to achieve a substantial government goal.” Philip Morris, 566 F.3d at 1143 (quoting Bd. of Trs. v. Fox, 492 U.S. 469, 480, 109 S.Ct. 3028, 106 L.Ed.2d 388 (1989)); see Milavetz, 130 S.Ct. at 1339. In applying this level of intermediate scrutiny, the court must determine (1) whether the speech “concernís] lawful activity and [is] not ... misleading,” such that it enjoys First Amendment protection; (2) whether the government asserts a substantial interest; (3) “whether the regulation directly advances” that interest; and (4) whether the regulation “is not more extensive than is necessary to serve that interest.” Central Hudson, 447 U.S. at 566, 100 S.Ct. 2343. With regard to the third prong of this test, the Supreme Court has clarified that, although the government “must demonstrate that the harms it recites are real and that its restriction will in fact alleviate them to a material degree,” it may do so “by reference to studies and, anecdotes pertaining to different locales altogether, or even ... based solely on history, consensus, and simple common sense.” Lorillard Tobacco Co. v. Reilly, 533 U.S. 525, 555, 121 S.Ct. 2404, 150 L.Ed.2d 532 (2001) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). And with regard to the fourth prong, “[t]he government does not have to show that it has adopted the least restrictive means for bringing about its regulatory objective; it does not have to demonstrate a perfect means — ends fit; and it does not have to satisfy a court that it has chosen the best conceivable option.” Nat’l Cable, 555 F.3d at 1002. “The only condition is that the regulation be proportionate to the interests sought to be advanced,” id. — that there be “a reasonable fit between the means and ends of the regulatory scheme,” Lorillard, 533 U.S. at 561, 121 S.Ct. 2404; see id. at 556, 121 S.Ct. 2404.

Even assuming that the graphic images, by depicting the actual negative consequences of cigarette smoking and thereby evoking emotional reactions, “go beyond ... purely factual and accurate commercial disclosures,” Maj. Op. at 1212, there would still appear, with one exception, no basis to conclude that the warning label requirement violates the tobacco companies’ First Amendment rights. The court reaches the opposite conclusion by dismissing one of the two government interests stated in the rulemaking. Its analysis is *1235directed to a red herring of its own creation. Although there are statements in the rulemaking record regarding the government’s interest in reducing smoking rates, see, e.g., Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,629; Proposed Rule, 75 Fed.Reg. at 69.525, nothing in that record, much less the White House press briefing cited by the court, see Maj. Op. at 1212 n. 6, suggests these statements were intended to override the clearly stated interest in effectively communicating information about the negative health consequences of smoking to consumers. (Nor does the Institute of Medicine’s characterization of the objectives of tobacco regulation, see Maj. Op. at 1218 n. 12, detract from the FDA’s own statement of the government’s “primary” interest.) To the contrary, in the rulemaking the FDA stated repeatedly that, “[cjonsistent with the Tobacco Control Act, the purpose of these required warnings is to communicate effectively and graphically the very real, scientifically established adverse health consequences of smoking.” Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,641; see id. at 36,630, 36,633-42, 36,646-47, 36,696-97, 36,699; Proposed Rule, 75 Fed.Reg. at 69.526, 69,531-35. Even under Central Hudson intermediate scrutiny, the court should have fully examined both of the government’s stated interests.

The government’s informational interest in effectively conveying the negative health consequences of smoking clearly qualifies as “substantial” under the second prong of Central Hudson. “The Supreme Court has said ‘there is no question that [the government’s] interest in ensuring the accuracy of commercial information in the marketplace is substantial,’ ” Pearson, 164 F.3d at 656 (quoting Edenfield v. Fane, 507 U.S. 761, 769, 113 S.Ct. 1792, 123 L.Ed.2d 543 (1993)) (alteration in original), “and that the government has a substantial interest in ‘promoting the health, safety, and welfare of its citizens,’ ” id. (quoting Rubin v. Coors Brewing Co., 514 U.S. 476, 485, 115 S.Ct. 1585, 131 L.Ed.2d 532 (1995)). This court has previously “recognize[d] that the government’s interest in preventing consumer fraud/confusion may well take on added importance in the context of a product ... that can affect the public’s health.” Id. And “tobacco use, particularly among children and adolescents, poses perhaps the single most significant threat to public health in the United States.” Brown & Williamson, 529 U.S. at 161, 120 S.Ct. 1291. Congress agreed. See Tobacco Control Act § 2(29), 21 U.S.C. § 387 Note. The government interest in effectively conveying the negative health consequences of smoking takes on even greater importance in view of the highly addictive nature of tobacco and the fact that “the most serious harmful consequences of smoking are cumulative, and occur in the distant future.” Philip Morris, 449 F.Supp.2d at 577.

The warning label requirement appears to meet the third and fourth prongs of Central Hudson as well. The rulemaking record includes substantial evidence from international experience, see Proposed Rule, 75 Fed.Reg. at 69,531-32, and the FDA Study, see Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,637-42, supporting the government’s reasoned determination that the warnings would “directly advance” its informational interest, not least by “ensuring] that the health risk message[s] [are] actually seen by consumers in the first instance.” Commonwealth Brands, Inc. v. United States, 678 F.Supp.2d 512, 530 (W.D.Ky.2010), aff'd in relevant part, Discount Tobacco, 674 F.3d at 569. “The harms [the government] recites are real” — caused in part by the “often misleading” advertising that smoking is part of a healthy lifestyle without consequences — and there is substantial evidence to support the government’s conclusion that the warning label requirement *1236“will in fact alleviate [those harms] to a material degree.” Lorillard, 533 U.S. at 555,121 S.Ct. 2404. “[H]istory, consensus, and ‘simple common sense,’ ” id. (quoting Florida Bar v. Went For It, Inc., 515 U.S. 618, 628, 115 S.Ct. 2371, 132 L.Ed.2d 541 (1995)), demonstrate as well that warning label requirement meets the fourth prong of the Central Hudson test. The failures of previous government efforts to convey the relevant information through small, textual warnings on the side of cigarette packages, see Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,631-32; Proposed Rule, 75 Fed.Reg. at 69,530-31, similar to the alternatives the tobacco companies now suggest, see Appellees’ Br. at 58-59, are sufficient to show that the warning labels, with graphic images, are “not more extensive than necessary to serve” the government’s substantial interest in effectively conveying that information to consumers.

The one exception is the “1-800-QUIT-NOW” telephone number. As mentioned, it is not designed directly to inform consumers of the health .consequences of smoking, but to assist smokers in their cessation efforts. See Final Rule, 76 Fed. Reg. at 36,681. Under Central Hudson intermediate scrutiny, the government’s interest in reducing smoking rates is doubtless substantial. See, e.g., Lorillard, 533 U.S. at 564, 121 S.Ct. 2404; Brown & Williamson, 529 U.S. at 161, 120 S.Ct. 1291. There also is substantial evidence to support the FDA’s determination that the display of the “1-800-QUIT-NOW” number will directly advance this interest. The biological and psychological effects of nicotine “can make smoking cessation extremely difficult,” PCP Report at 62; “about 40 percent of smokers try to quit” each year, but “95 percent of those who try to quit on their own relapse,” Final Rule, 76 Fed.Reg. at 36,681. In comparison to minimal or no counseling interventions, quitlines have been found to “significantly increase abstinence rates.” Id. at 36,687 (citing U.S. Dep’t Health & Human Servs., Public Health Serv., Treating Tobacco Use and Dependence: 2008 Update 91 (May 2008)); see also IOM Report at C-7. International experience referenced in the rulemaking, see Final Rule, 76 Fed. Reg. at 36,682, further supports the common sense proposition that informing smokers of cessation resources is likely to increase rates of successful quit attempts.

But the additional inclusion of the “1-800-QUIT-NOW” number on the warning labels does not meet the fourth prong of Central Hudson. The number is prominently presented in imperative terms, directing consumers to “QUIT NOW.” That command directly contradicts the tobacco companies’ desired message at the point of sale, thereby imposing a significant burden on their protected commercial speech. “In previous cases addressing [the] final prong of the Central Hudson test,” the Supreme Court has “made clear that if the Government could achieve its interests in a manner that does not restrict speech, or that restricts less speech, the Government must do so.” Thompson, 535 U.S. at 371, 122 S.Ct. 1497. Unlike the warning label requirement imposed pursuant to Section 201 in response to the demonstrated failures of previously attempted, less burdensome warning requirements, the inclusion of the “1-800-QUIT-NOW” number follows upon no apparent consideration of the effectiveness of alternative means of connecting smokers to cessation resources, such as a package insert.11 Absent an explanation why such alternatives would *1237be inadequate, the government has failed to show the requisite “reasonable fit,” Lorillard, 533 U.S. at 561, 121 S.Ct. 2404. See Thompson, 535 U.S. at 373, 122 S.Ct. 1497.12

IV.

Finally, it bears noting that the court’s understanding of the precedent governing the appropriate level of scrutiny, as well as its dismissal of a well established and substantial government interest, is inconsistent with the Supreme Court’s “principal” justification for “extending] ... First Amendment protection to commercial speech” — “the value to consumers of the information such speech provides.” Zauderer, 471 U.S. at 651, 105 S.Ct. 2265. The Supreme Court has reiterated this justification in the tobacco context. Addressing “substantial” restrictions on tobacco advertising imposed by Massachusetts, the Court identified as the “countervailing First Amendment interests” the tobacco companies’ “interest in conveying truthful information about their products to adults” and adults’ “corresponding interest in receiving truthful information about tobacco products.” Lorillard, 533 U.S. at 564, 121 S.Ct. 2404. In view of this justification, the Court has treated disclosure requirements “as constitutionally preferable to outright suppression.” Pearson, 164 F.3d at 657 (citing recent cases). Here, the government has required the tobacco companies not only to state, but also to show, the significant negative health consequences of using their product as intended. The court identifies no principled distinction, for purposes of determining the applicable level of scrutiny, between the stating and the showing of such information. In view of the record evidence — as well as experience and common sense — supporting the communicative power of graphic images accompanying textual warnings, no such distinction appears to exist.

Given the evidence demonstrating the tenacity of nicotine addiction, the young age at which the vast majority of smokers begin smoking cigarettes, these smokers’ “incomplete understanding of the addictive nature of tobacco use that is related, in part, to their inaccurate assessment of smoking risks and their belief that they can quit at any time and therefore avoid addiction,” IOM Report at 89, and the significant negative health consequences of smoking, the government has an interest of paramount importance in effectively conveying information about the health risks of smoking to adolescent would-be smokers and other consumers. The tobacco companies’ decades of deception regarding these risks, especially the risk of addiction, buttress this interest. Contrary to their arguments, nothing in the Supreme Court’s commercial speech precedent would restrict the government to conveying these risks in ways that have already proved ineffective or would prohibit the government from employing the communication tools tobacco companies have wielded to great effect over the years.

For these reasons, the district court erred in applying strict scrutiny in sustaining the tobacco companies’ as-applied First Amendment challenge to the Tobacco Control Act and the Final Rule, and in issuing a permanent injunction. Because the warning label requirement (absent the “1-800-QUIT-NOW” number) appears to survive the First Amendment challenge *1238under either Zauderer or Central Hudson, I would reverse. It would remain for the district court on remand to address the tobacco companies’ challenges under the Administrative Procedure Act, see supra note 1.