BANTAM BOOKS, INC., et al. v. SULLIVAN et al.
Supreme Court Cases
372 U.S. 58 (1963)
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Whether a statute under which an individual can require a mailer to stop all future mailings that the person "believes to be erotically arousing or sexually provocative" violates the mailer's rights of free speech and due process.
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Whether the First Amendment prohibits criminal sanction for private possession of material deemed legally obscene.
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Whether judge issuing warrant to seize allegedly obscene motion pictures acted using the proper constitutional safeguards when issuing such warrant.
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Whether a New York statute prohibiting the sale of "magazines which would appeal to the lust of persons under the age of eighteen years" is unconstitutionally vague and violates the First Amendment.
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Did the portion of New York Penal Law that made it unlawful to knowingly sell minors nude photos and magazines that contain such photos violate the 1st and 14th Amendments?
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Whether the conviction of a New York newsstand clerk for selling two "obscene" paperback books violated First Amendment free speech guarantees.
REDMOND et ux. v. UNITED STATES
Decided:
MISHKIN v. NEW YORK
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Whether the conviction under New York law of a book distributor for possessing and publishing "obscene" books of sadism and masochism violated his freedom of speech.
GINZBURG et al. v. UNITED STATES
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Whether three publications that dealt openly with sexual matter were legally obscene under the Roth v. United States (1957) test and without First Amendment protection.
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Whether the book Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure, commonly called Fanny Hill, is legally obscene.
FREEDMAN v. MARYLAND
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Does a Maryland law that requires that all films be submitted to a board of censors before being exhibited violate the First Amendment?
JACOBELLIS v. OHIO
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Whether the conviction of a manager of a movie theater for "possessing and exhibiting an allegedly obscene film" violated the free speech guarantee of the First Amendment.
TRALINS v. GERSTEIN, STATE ATTORNEY
Decided:
NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF COLORED PEOPLE v. BUTTON, ATTORNEY GENERAL OF VIRGINIA, et al.
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Whether a Virginia barratry statute which banned the improper solicitation of any legal or professional business unconstitutionally burdened the First Amendment freedom of association rights of the petitioner and petitioners clients.
MANUAL ENTERPRISES, INC., et al. v. DAY, POSTMASTER GENERAL
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Whether an injunction against the mailing of several "obscene" magazines featuring photos of nude male models violated the First Amendment.
TIMES FILM CORP. v. CITY OF CHICAGO et al.
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Whether a Chicago ordinance requiring submission of films for examination by city officials as prerequisite to granting of permit for public exhibition of such films violates the First Amendment.
SMITH v. CALIFORNIA
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Whether a Los Angeles city ordinance punishing the sales of books later determined to be obscene even if the bookseller did not know the contents of the book violated due process and free speech guarantees.
KINGSLEY INTERNATIONAL PICTURES CORP. v. REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK
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Whether a New York law denying licenses to show movies which "alluringly portrays adultery as proper behavior" is viewpont discrimination and violates the First Amendment.
KINGSLEY BOOKS, INC., et al. v. BROWN, CORPORATION COUNSEL
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Whether an injunction on sale of obscene booklets and destruction of such booklets amounted to prior restraint by the State, violating the First and Fourteenth Amendments.
ROTH v. UNITED STATES
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"The dispositive question is whether obscenity is utterance within the area of protected speech and press."
BUTLER v. MICHIGAN
Decided:
Whether a Michigan statute punishing sales of books "tending to the corruption of the morals of youth" is so vague as to violate the Fourteenth Amendment's due process clause.
SUPERIOR FILMS, INC. v. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION OF OHIO, DIVISION OF FILM CENSORSHIP, HISSONG, SUPERINTENDENT
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Whether an Ohio statute forbidding the commercial showing of any motion picture film without a license constitutes a prior restraint and is unconstitutional under the First Amendment.
UNITED STATES v. ALPERS
Decided:
WINTERS v. NEW YORK
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Whether a New York statute prohibiting publications of violent materials "principally made up of criminal news, police reports, or accounts of criminal deeds, or pictures, or stories of deeds of bloodshed, lust or crime," is overly vague and violates the freedom of speech guaranteed by the First Amendment.
NEAR v. MINNESOTA EX REL. OLSON, COUNTY ATTORNEY
Decided:
Whether a Minnesota statute that allowed "abatement"—an injunction against future publication—of printed material deemed to be a public nuisance constituted an unconstitutional prior restraint in violation of the First and Fourteenth Amendments.
MUTUAL FILM CORPORATION v. INDUSTRIAL COMMISSION OF OHIO
Decided:
Do the constitutional protections of freedom of expression, including those of the Ohio Constitution, extend to motion pictures?