“Wacko” Hurley argued that the council had a First Amendment right to refuse to allow GLIB to take part in the parade because it disapproved of its message. Over the next several years, the parties went to court numerous times. When GLIB attempted to register for the parade, its application was rejected by the parade’s organizer, the South Boston Allied War Veterans Council, which said it had insufficient knowledge of the group and claimed concern over security. Patrick’s Day parade, in part to show its members’ pride in their dual identity as Irish Americans and gay Americans. The Irish-American Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Group of Boston (GLIB), formed in 1992, had wanted to participate in the traditional annual South Boston St. 557 (1995), the Supreme Court established that the First Amendment free speech rights of private groups to define the parameters of their expressive conduct during a parade trumped the provisions of a state anti-discrimination law. Irish-American Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Group of Boston, 515 U.S. (AP Photo/Steven Senne, used with permission from the Associated Press) Boston's mayors had boycotted the event since 1995, when the South Boston Allied War Veterans Council took its fight to exclude gay groups all the way to the U.S. Patrick's Day Parade in Boston's South Boston neighborhood in 2015. Boston Mayor Marty Walsh, center right, greets spectators while marching in the St.