Obsenity and the law

A detailed Summary of Obsenity and the law

The First Amendment protects our freedom of speech, however there are a few exceptions. Obscenity is one of these exceptions and is a form of unprotected speech. The Supreme Court has repeatedly held the view that obscenity is not a First Amendment right, however the definition of obscenity is vague and has caused many debates. To determine if a crime has been committed the law needs to be clear on the difference between which is right and wrong.

The law governing obscenity developed at the state and local level and has been the subject of a variety of judicial tests. One of the earliest tests was the Hicklin rule, which resulted from a case in England in 1868. An important aspect of the Hicklin rule was that a work could be obscene if an isolated passage coul

2. Whether the work depicts in a patently offensive way sexual conduct specifically defined as obscene in the law

In Miller v California the Supreme Court established three tests to determine if material is obscene, and therefore unprotected by the First Amendment. A judge a jury must use these standards to determine if material is obscene:

3. Whether the work, taken as a whole, lacks "serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value"1

The Miller decision did not make it easier for law enforcement to get a conviction. To be determined obscene material must satisfy all three of these tests. With these three tests the court confirmed again that only hard-core pornography was not protected by the first amendment.

The Roth standard proved

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Approximate Word count = 518
Approximate Pages = 2 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: Politics

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