Here, the ACLU represented the plaintiffs, consisting of residents of the City and County of San Francisco, including Drucilla S. Ramey, who challenged both the legality and the enforcement of San Francisco ordinance (section 20 of the San Francisco Municipal Police Code, enacted in 1977) which "forbids persons to obstruct sidewalks and other public places or stand in doorways without a property owner's consent." The plaintiffs also challenge what they call "a persistent pattern of bad faith enforcement" by San Francisco police officers, represented by defendant Charles R. Gain, Chief of Police, "whose acts are encouraged and condoned by higher officials." Through the enforcement of this ordinance, police officers practice "harassment and punishment of suspects without due process of law." They ordinance came to be known as "sit-lie," and has come to be associated with the harassment of the homeless. "Substantial numbers of persons are arrested...under the guise of section 20 for conduct and status which is entirely innocent and beyond the power of defendants lawfully to inhibit, restrain, or control," as the Complaint for Injunctive and Declaratory Relief notes. Section 20 violations, in 1979, cost $250.

The plaintiffs charge the ordinance with being unconsitutional under the First, Sixth, and Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Presumably, this lawsuit was not successful, as this ordinance was still in effect in 2013, when infractions peaked at 1,011.