Miller v. California

social value known as “worthless speech” (Tedford & Herbeck, 2013, p. 189). Known as Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, this case established what was determined “fighting words, but also stated that language that is obscene and profane can be regarded as worthless speech. Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire was a result of a Jehovah’s Witness distributing literature on a New Hampshire street and calling organized religion a “racket.” The Witness was then arrested and proceeded to verbally assault the arresting city marshal. His words and actions created an immediate breach of the peace, and were aimed at inflicting injury, which would determine what would define “fighting words” (Tedford & Herbeck, 2013, p. 189). It was fifteen years later that “worthless speech” would again be defined in Roth v. United States.…

“One man’s vulgarity is another’s lyric”-Justice John Marshall Harlan What is value? This question swept the court room in 1987 during the case of Pope v. Illinois. Pope and Morrison, the Petitioners in the case, had been charged with the illegal sale of obscene magazines. They argued that the State of Illinois Obscenity Statute- under which they had been convicted- was unconstitutional because it had allowed the “value” of the magazines to be judged by community standards. In response,…

Supreme Court has struggled to create a satisfying definition of what obscenity entails and how to differentiate pornography from obscene material. The case of Roth v United States in 1957 marks the first time the Court established a definition of obscenity which did not rely on the 1868 “Hicklin” English common law (Hatch, 2012; 354 U.S. 476). The Court provided a way to test potentially obscene material, which relied on the “average person” applying “contemporary community standards” to assess…

Case: Miller v California 413 U.S. 15 (1973) Decision: 5-4, delivered by Chief Justice Burger Facts: Marvin Miller mass mailed a brochure advertising four illustrated adult books and an adult film. These brochures contained images of men and women during sexual activity and nude. One of these advertisements was sent to a restaurant in Newport Beach, California, where it was opened by the restaurant’s manager and his mother. They in turn contacted the policing and Miller was sued by the state of…

Minneapolis v. ACLU (2015) Opinion of the Court: Bradley May 2013 saw the arrival of an exhibit to the Minneapolis Institute of Art. The exhibit contents featured were A)photos of nude men and women depicted in a variety of poses, B) photos of adults engaged in various sexual activities, and C) pictures of several nude men standing very close to one another. Finally, there were several pictures that resembled recent advertisements by a famous clothes designer. This last set of photos portrayed…

club. (3) Many other occurrences as well as this one have happened in the past. Extremely famous musicians such as Jimi Hendrix, John Lennon, Yoko Ono and the Velvet Underground have had their albums pulled from record stores in the past for being too controversial (Newton). This is even still happening today; in 2010, MIA’s song, “Born Free,” was banned from Youtube.com (Newton). While people may not be able to avoid profanity and obscenities on public media, they do have the choice to watch a…

The Miller test contains three points courts must consider when deciding on obscene material: “the average person…would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to prurient interests; the work depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct defined by state law; and the work lacks serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value” (Trager et al., p.506). The first ruling of the court in Kearns case deals with is it being patently offensive under Ohio law. In order…

Art On Trial After reading all the three articles cases I think that the judges and the people make mistakes because they judge all the pieces of art as pornography and nudes. On the first case it was difficult task for the prosecutor to determine obscenity. In my opinion, it is not fair that the museum would have faced up to $10,000 in fines and Mr. Barrie would have faced up to a year in jail and up to $2,000 in fines. Although, as the cases said, “The Five of the seven photographs depicted…

In the case of Miller vs California, Miller is charged because he began sending obscene material to a restaurant owner in which they were sensitive to the specific material that they received. The material they were receiving was sexually sensitive and they felt as if they should be protected by the law from receiving this type of material. It is also said that being able to send whatever one would like no matter the content is also protected by the right of Freedom of speech. This is why…

In the case of Miller vs California, Miller is charged because he began sending obscene material to a restaurant owner in which they were sensitive to the specific material that they received. To determine what obscene material really is, took two court cases to give a meaning what people or a community perceived some material as obscene. The biggest argument about portrayed obscene material is, what is covered by the First Amendment. The first amendment protects our right of free speech and…