The motivation for any particular action by a public official is not relevant in the judicial arena. A bad motive behind an otherwise sound piece of legislation cannot be used to assail the legislation. A good motive behind a clearly invalid piece of legislation does not save the legislation either.

Case in point: The motive of goodness behind Diane Linn's actions on the gay marriage issue was totally irrelevant. The court looked to the scope of authority of the public official and matched that against the action itself.

See -
Portland Communique: Lobby, Lobby, Who's In The Lobby?

No one is asking Sam Adams to list the particular groups of folks who support him on each and every decision he makes. The cross section of interested parties for anything that comes before the City Council and that of Sam Adams's ears could be quite varied or there could be no cross section at all and Sam Adams just has a personal view that is not held or expressed by any lobbyist at all, it would be just his personal view.

Asking individuals to list their affiliations (even if only where they are officially authorized to speak) is just as absurd as asking each public official to list to whom they are beholden to for their support for official act x y or z.

Loose associations, as in unincorporated associations, whether it be for purposes of action alerts versus for making a group appearance before the City Council is not a distinction that can survive vigorous challenge before a court. You see, the motives of folks, for purposes of determining the validity of some public action are irrelevant in court and likewise -- by extension -- the motives and affiliations of the presenters of opinion that precede some official action are also irrelevant to the act itself.

Thus, public official knowledge of the motives and affiliations of presenters is just an idle curiosity of the public official. The public official cannot do anything about it, they can neither exclude or include someone from the list of folks that sign up to testify at the start of a session nor can the public official meet out civil penalties for failure to register their motivations or affiliations. A court, upon reviewing the validity of public official acts specific manipulating the allowed speaker list or for assessing civil or criminal penalties must invariably ask why do you, the elected public official, need to know more about the presenters than we do when we review your action? Shall we (a theoretical judge or court) say that your lobbyist law clearly violates unfettered free speech rights but that it is quite OK because we think you have good intentions, and so do we?

Mr. Sam Adams is neither more nor less a mouthpiece for someone else than is any lobbyist. If Sam wants to list his support base and then, by implication, list his political enemies (by not listing them) then he can hardly be considered to be acting in the "public interest" can he? Is the lobbyist law, by the same reasoning, a device to make each presenter someone who is is not representing the "public interest" and thus somehow suspect . . at least more suspect in their motivations than is Mr. Sam Adams? It seems that I might have to turn to Sigmund Freud to describe this kind of transference of his own guilt upon us all, all the while not making the law applicable to himself. (The debate by public officials about lobbying and motivations is like one long drawn out Freudian slip.)