Miller v. California

Appellant
Marvin Miller
Appellee
State of California
Appellant's Claim
That the state of California's definition of obscenity conflicted with that set forth by the U.S. Supreme Court, and that the Appellant's conviction in California State Court should be overturned.
Chief Lawyer for Appellant
Burton Marks
Chief Lawyer for Appellee
Michael R. Capizzi
Justices for the Court
Harry A. Blackmun, Warren E. Burger (writing for the Court), Lewis F. Powell,Jr., William H. Rehnquist, Byron R. White
Justices Dissenting
William J. Brennan, Jr., William O. Douglas, Thurgood Marshall, Potter Stewart
Place
Washington, D.C.
Date of Decision
21 June 1973
Decision
The Supreme Court vacated and remanded the case, effectively affirming the lower courts' verdict.
Significance
Established a new definition of obscenity, replacing a standard of lewd materials "utterly without redeeming social value" with one of materials judged tobe obscene by "the average person, applying contemporary community standards."
The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution states that "Congress shall makeno law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech or the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances." This seemingly straightforward text lends itself to a variety of interpretations and its exact meaning has been the subject of many Supreme Court decisions, particularly with regard to freedom of speech. Freedomof speech has been found to have certain limits in carefully constrained circumstances, for instance that corporations may not make untruthful claims about their products, but its limits when applied to individual expression are much harder to define. The publication and distribution of sexually explicit materials has also been limited by Court action.
Marvin Miller was convicted in a California State court of knowingly distributing obscene matter, a misdemeanor under state law. During Miller's trial, the presiding judge instructed the jury to determine whether or not the materials in question were obscene by applying "contemporary community standards inCalifornia."
Miller appealed the case on the grounds that the instructions to the jury didnot reflect the standard for judging materials to be obscene put forth in Memoirs v. Massachusetts, a case decided by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1966. In that decision the Court ruled that, to be obscene in the eyes of the law, materials must: be taken as a whole appeal to a lewd interest in sex; bepatently offensive by affronting contemporary community standards; and be "utterly without redeeming social value." The case reaffirmed a long-standing determination that obscene materials are not to be afforded First Amendment protection. Miller's attorneys maintained that since freedom of speech issues are by definition constitutional, only a national standard could be applied when determining the obscenity of materials. The Appellate Department, SuperiorCourt of California, County of Orange, affirmed the lower court's ruling, andMiller appealed the case to the Supreme Court where arguments were heard on18-19 January and 7 November 1972.
The Court vacated and remanded, in effect upholding the lower courts' verdicts. Chief Justice Burger delivered the opinion of the Court, with Justices Brennan, Douglas, Marshall, and Stewart dissenting. The majority concluded thatthe standard for defining obscenity set forth in Memoirs v. Massachusetts was too rigorous, given the difficulty in deciding that anything is utterly without "redeeming social value." The Court therefore determined toreinstate a somewhat modified version of the previous standard for judging the obscenity of materials as set forth in Roth v. United States, a case decided in 1957. The new standard for judging materials to be obscene was set forth as follows:

(a) whether "the average person, applying contemporary community standards" would find that work, taken as a whole, appeals to prurient interest, (b) whether the work depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by the applicable state law . . . (3) the test of "utterly without redeeming social value" articulated in Memoirs, supra, is rejected as a constitutional standard, (4) the jurymay measure the essentially factual issues of prurient appeal and patent offensiveness by the standard that prevails in the forum community, and need notemploy a "national standard."

Miller v. California marked a retreat by the Court from its broad interpretation of First Amendment protection of free speech that had been articulated in Roth v. United States. In a sign of things to come, the Courtreverted to an older, more conservative standard for determining the obscenity of materials while also transferring responsibility from national bodies tocommunities.
Related Cases

• Roth v. United States, 354 U.S. 476 (1957).
  
• Memoirs v. Massachusetts, 383 U.S. 413 (1966).

The Miller Standard for Obscenity
Chief Justice Warren Burger, writing for the majority in Miller, established a three-part standard for obscenity. According to the Miller standard,a judge should ask him or herself three questions. First of all, would "theaverage person," using standards common to the time and place find that a given movie, book, or other work appeals to sexual desires? Second, does the movie, book, or other work use clearly offensive means to show or describe sexual conduct in a way specifically prohibited by state law? And third, does themovie, book, or other work, "taken as a whole, [lack] literary, artistic, political, or scientific value"?
Elsewhere in his majority opinion, Burger declared flatly that the First Amendment does not protect obscene material as a form of free speech; to be protected, it must be shown to serve some purpose other than appealing to sexual interests. In this he reaffirmed the Court's holding in Roth v. United States (1957), and built on the three-part obscenity test established by Justice William J. Brennan in Memoirs v. Massachusetts (1966), a set of questions revolving around whether "(a) the dominant theme of the material taken as a whole appeals to a prurient interest in sex; (b) the material is patently offensive because it affronts contemporary community standards relating to the description or representation of sexual matters; and (c) the material is utterly without redeeming social value."
Sources
Levy, Leonard W. . Encyclopedia of the American Constitution. New York: Macmillan, 1986.