AP GOVERNMENT

Miller v. CaliforniA1972 Subjects: Obscenity, State: First Amendment

Facts of the Case Miller, after conducting a mass mailing campaign to advertise the sale of "adult" material, was convicted of violating a California statute prohibiting the distribution of obscene material. Some unwilling recipients of Miller's brochures complained to the police, initiating the legal proceedings. Question Presented Is the sale and distribution of obscene materials by mail protected under the First Amendment's freedom of speech guarantee? Conclusion In a 5-to-4 decision, the Court held that obscene materials did not enjoy First Amendment protection. The Court modified the test for obscenity established in Roth v. United States and Memoirs v. Massachusetts, holding that "[t]he basic guidelines for thetrier of fact must be: (a) whether 'the average person, applying contemporary community standards' would find that the work,taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest. . . (b) whether the work depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, sexualconduct specifically defined by the applicable state law; and (c) whether the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic,political, or scientific value." The Court rejected the "utterly without redeeming social value" test of the Memoirs decision

Roth v. United States 1957 Subjects: First Amendment: Obscenity, Federal

Facts of the Case Roth operated a book-selling business in New York and was convicted of mailing obscene circulars and an obscene book in violation of a federal obscenity statute. Roth's case was combined with Alberts v. California, in which a California obscenity law waschallenged by Alberts after his similar conviction for selling lewd and obscene books in addition to composing and publishingobscene advertisements for his Products Question Presented Did either the federal or California's obscenity restrictions, prohibiting the sale or transfer of obscene materials through themail, impinge upon the freedom of expression as guaranteed by the First Amendment Conclusion In a 6-to-3 decision written by Justice William J. Brennan, Jr., the Court held that obscenity was not "within the area ofconstitutionally protected speech or press." The Court noted that the First Amendment was not intended to protect everyutterance or form of expression, such as materials that were "utterly without redeeming social importance." The Court held thatthe test to determine obscenity was "whether to the average person, applying contemporary community standards, the dominanttheme of the material taken as a whole appeals to prurient interest." The Court held that such a definition of obscenity gavesufficient fair warning and satisfied the demands of Due Process. Brennan later reversed his position on this issue in Miller v.California (1972)

New York Times v. Sullivan 1964 Subjects: First Amendment: Libel, Defamation

Facts of the Case Decided together with Abernathy v. Sullivan, this case concerns a full-page ad in the New York Times which alleged that the arrest of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. for perjury in Alabama was part of a campaign to destroy King's efforts to integrate public facilities and encourage blacks to vote. L. B. Sullivan, the Montgomery city commissioner, filed a libel action against the newspaper and four black ministers who were listed as endorsers of the ad, claiming that the allegations against the Montgomery police defamed him personally. Under Alabama law, Sullivan did not have to prove that he had been harmed; and a defense claiming that the ad was truthful was unavailable since the ad contained factual errors. Sullivan won a $500,000 judgment. Question Presented Did Alabama's libel law, by not requiring Sullivan to prove that an advertisement personally harmed him and dismissing the same as untruthful due to factual errors, unconstitutionally infringe on the First Amendment's freedom of speech and freedom of press protections? Conclusion

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