In what's being called a resounding victory for free speech, the U.S. Supreme Court in an 8-1 ruling overturned the conviction of a Virginia man who was sentenced to three years in prison for creating several videos that included scenes of dog fighting. Robert Stevens was found guilty under a federal statute that prohibits the creation, sale or possession of "a depictor of animal cruelty" with "the intention of placing the depiction in interstate or foreign commerce for commercial gain." The court, however, struck down the law, saying it "created a criminal prohibition of alarming breadth."
Prosecutors argued that the law, passed in 1999, included an exemption for works that have "serious" value, was a necessary tool to prevent the sale of so-called "crush" videos, fetish films that feature small animals being crushed by women's feet. In an opinion authored by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., however, the Court rejected that proposition, saying that "[a]s a free-floating test for First Amendment coverage, that idea is startling and dangerous." Samuel Alito was the lone dissenter, noting that the government could legitimately balance free speech against purported "societal costs."
Publishers and booksellers, including the Association of American Publishers, Inc., the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression, the Association of American University Presses, and the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, joined with the Media Coalition, a First Amendment watchdog group, in opposing the law. Chris Finan, president of ABFFE, called the statute "the biggest threat to free speech in a generation" because of its sweeping power to allow government to determine the social value of speech.
Stevens' dogfighting video was sold by a number of online retailers, including Amazon and Barnes & Noble.com. His conviction was overturned by the Third Circuit which found the statute unconstitutional, and the Supreme Court heard the case last October.
"As the Court today recognized, giving the government ‘freewheeling authority' to judge the social worth of words and images is a dangerous proposition," said David Horowitz, executive director of Media Coalition. "This landmark ruling affirms that First Amendment protections are not subject to balancing tests or limited to speech with so-called serious value."
