Reno V Aclu

RENO V ACLU Reno, Attorney General of the United States, et al. v. American Civil Liberties Union et.al June 26, 1997 Supreme Court of the United States

Norfadhilah Mohd Ali

• Feb 8, 1996, immediately after the President signed the CDA, 20 plaintiffs filed suit against AG of USA challenging the constitutionality of s223 (a) and 223(d) • Judges comment: • The provisions sweeps more broadly than necessary because of the vague terms • Defenses were not technologically and economically feasible to users • Should be applied only to commercial pornographers • It is not defined to exclude work of serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value.

The Government’s argument • Ginsberg v. New York – prohibit selling to minors under 17 yr material that was considered obscene • Pacifica – an afternoon broadcast of a recording of a 12 minute monologue entitled filthy words to live audience. • Renton – zoning ordinance that kept adult movie theatres out of residential neighborhoods.

• Challenges against the Communications Decency Act 1996 (an attempt to create “adult zones” in the internet. • The challenges: • -it is a crime to knowingly transmit an obscene or indecent message or image to a person the sender knows is under 18 years old • -It criminalizes the display of patently offensive messages or images on any manner available to minors

• Case laws made it clear that “zoning” law is valid only if adults are still able to obtain the regulated speech – First Amendment • Affirmative defenses are provided for those who take “good faith,…effective…actions: to restrict access to minors to the prohibited communications, or those who restrict access by requiring certain info – credit card or adult identification number.

Description of internet by the court • The history of internet. • Has a wide variety of communication and information retrieval methods: transmission of data and retrieve of information – navigating the Web • Cyberspace allows speakers and listeners to mask their identities. • It is impossible to exclude persons from accessing certain messages on the basis of their identity. • Now there is a move zone cyberspace through the use of ‘gateway’ technology. – internet users enter information about themselves. Using screening soft wares but it is not available to all Web speakers.

Sexually explicit material • It can be light or heavy – from modestly titillating to the hardest core. • Once a provider posts its content on the internet, it cannot prevent the content from entering any community. • Although such material is widely available, users seldom encounter such content accidnetally. Thus odds are slim that a user would enter a sexually explicit site by accident.

• Unlike the radio or television, the recepit of information on the internet requires a series of affirmative steps.

• Although the eventual zoning is promising but the court has evaluate the constitutionality of CDA as it applies to the Internet as it exists today. • The CDA is therefore akin to a law that makes it a crime for a bookstore owner to sell pornographic magazines to anyone once a minor enters his store.

Held: • CDA is vague – undefined terms : “indecent” and “patently offensive” – how to measure them? Miller v California:specifically defined by applicable state law. CDA seems to extend to “excretory activities” and “organs” • What if the messages are with artistic or educational value? • The CDA abridge the freedom of speech protected by the First Amendment