REVISED MARCH 10, 2008

IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 06-51067

RELIABLE CONSULTANTS, INC., doing business as Dreamer’s and Le

Rouge Boutique

Plaintiff - Appellant

PHE, INC., doing business as Adam and Eve, Inc. 

Intervenor - Plaintiff - Appellant

v.

RONNIE EARLE, in his official capacity only, Travis County District

Attorney

Defendant - Appellee

STATE OF TEXAS

Intervenor - Defendant - Appellee

Appeals from the United States District Court 

for the Western District of Texas

Before REAVLEY, BARKSDALE, and PRADO, Circuit Judges.

REAVLEY, Circuit Judge:

United States Court of Appeals

Fifth Circuit

F I L E D

February 12, 2008

Charles R. Fulbruge III

Clerk
06-51067

1 Tex. Penal Code Ann. §§ 43.21–.23 (Vernon 1973). 

2 Tex. Penal Code Ann. § 43.21 (Vernon 1979) (defining “obscene material” in relation

to the three-part “obscenity” test set forth in Miller v. California, 413 U.S. 15, 23–25, 93 S. Ct.

2607, 2614–16 (1973)). 

3

Id. §§ 43.21(a)(5), (6). 

4

Id. § 43.21(a)(7).

5 Yorko v. State, 690 S.W.2d 260, 263 (Tex. Crim. App. 1985). 

2

This case assesses the constitutionality of a Texas statute making it a

crime to promote or sell sexual devices. The district court upheld the statute’s

constitutionality and granted the State’s motion to dismiss for failure to state a

claim. We reverse the judgment and hold that the statute has provisions that

violate the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

I. The Statute

The forerunner of Texas’s obscenity statute was enacted in 1973 and had

the modest goal of prohibiting “obscene material.”1 Six years later, the

legislature redefined “obscene material” so that it would track the Supreme

Court’s definition of obscenity detailed in Miller v. California.

2 That same year,

the legislature also expanded the scope of the statute so that it would prohibit

the “promotion” and “wholesale promotion” of “obscene devices,” which includes

selling, giving, lending, distributing, or advertising for them.3 The legislature

chose to broadly define “obscene device,” not using the Miller test, but as any

device “designed or marketed as useful primarily for the stimulation of human

genital organs.”4In 1985, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals held that the

statute did not violate an individual’s rightto privacy, concluding thatthere was

no constitutional right to “stimulate . . . another’s genitals with an object

designed or marketed as useful primarily for that purpose.”5 Later, in 1993, a

narrow affirmative defense was added to protect those who promoted “obscene

devices” for “a bona fide medical, psychiatric, judicial, legislative, or law
06-51067

6 Tex. Penal Code Ann. § 43.23(g) (Vernon 1993). 

7 Tex. Penal Code Ann. §§ 12.35(a), 43.23(a)–(d). The full text of the statute is provided

in the appendix. All subsequent citations to the statute are to the current version. 

8 Miss. Code Ann. § 97-29-105.

9 Ala. Code § 13A-12-200.2.

10 Va. Code Ann. § 18.2-373.

11 PHE, Inc. v. State, 877 So. 2d 1244, 1248–50 (Miss. 2004). 

12 Williams v. Morgan, 478 F.3d 1316 (11th Cir. 2007), cert. denied, Williams v. King,

128 S. Ct. 77 (2007). The Williams case had previously been before the Eleventh Circuit,

where the court held that the obscene-device ban did not burden a fundamental right. See

Williams v. Attorney General, 378 F.3d 1232, 1233 (11th Cir. 2004) (remanding the case to the

district court). 

3

enforcement purpose.”6 Violating the statute can result in punishment of up to

two years in jail.7

In essence, the statute criminalizes the selling, advertising, giving, or

lending of a device designed or marketed for sexual stimulation unless the

defendant can prove that the device was sold, advertised, given, or lent for a

statutorily-approved purpose. The statute, however, does not prohibit the use

or possession of sexual devices for any purpose. 

Besides Texas, only three states have a similar obscene-devices statute:

Mississippi,8 Alabama,9 and Virginia.10 The Mississippi supreme court has

upheld its state’s statute against First and Fourteenth Amendment challenges.11

Neither the Alabama nor Virginia supreme court has entertained a challenge to

its state’s statute, but the Eleventh Circuit has rejected a Fourteenth

Amendment challenge to Alabama’s statute.12 On the other hand, while the

legislatures of Louisiana, Kansas, and Colorado had enacted obscene-devices

statutes, each of their respective state supreme courts struck down its law on
06-51067

13 See State v. Brenan, 772 So. 2d 64, 72–76 (La. 2000) (holding that the state’s obscenedevices statute fails rational-basis review under the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S.

Constitution); State v. Hughes, 792 P.2d 1023, 1031–32 (Kan. 1990) (holding that the state’s

obscene-devices statute unconstitutionally burdens an individual’s Fourteenth Amendment

right to privacy); People ex. rel. Tooley v. Seven Thirty-Five East Colfax, Inc., 697 P.2d 348,

369–70 (Colo. 1985) (same).

14 This That and the Other Gift and Tobacco, Inc. v. Cobb County, 439 F.3d 1275, 1278

(11th Cir. 2006).

4

Fourteenth Amendment grounds.13 Likewise, while the Georgia legislature had

passed an obscene-device statute,the Eleventh Circuit recently struck it down.14

II. This Proceeding

Reliable Consultants, Inc. d/b/a Dreamer’s and Le Rouge Boutique

operates four retail stores in Texas that carry a stock of sexual devices. The

sexual devices are for off-premise, private use. PHE, Inc. d/b/a Adam & Eve, Inc.

is also engaged in the retail distribution of sexual devices. It operates no public

facilities in Texas, but rather sells sexual devices by internet and mail, and it

distributes sexual devices ordered in Texas by mail and common carrier.

Reliable and PHE desire to increase their sale of, and advertising for, sexual

devices in Texas, and they fear prosecution under the statute if they do so. 

Reliable filed this declaratory action to challenge the constitutionality and

enjoin the enforcement of the statutory provisions criminalizing the promotion

of sexual devices. The complaint alleged that these provisions violate the

substantive liberty rights protected by the Fourteenth Amendment and the

commercial speech rights protected by the First Amendment. Later, PHE

intervened as a plaintiff and sought similar relief.

Reliable and PHE contend that many people in Texas, both married and

unmarried, use sexual devices as an aspect of their sexual experiences. For

some couples in which one partner may be physically unable to engage in

intercourse, or in which a contagious disease, such as HIV, precludes

intercourse,these devices may be one ofthe only ways to engage in a safe, sexual
06-51067

15 Brenan, 772 So. 2d at 75. Similarly, in Hughes, the Kansas supreme court noted that

recommending the use of sexual devices is “common in the treatment of anorgasmic women,”

“who may be particularly susceptible to pelvic inflammatory diseases, psychological problems,

and difficulty in marital relationships.” 792 P.2d at 1025. 

16 A recent commentator points out that sexual devices, such as vibrators, were

originally designed for medical purposes and they continue to be prescribed as such. Danielle

J. Lindemann, Pathology Full Circle: A History of Anti-Vibrator Legislation in the United

States, 15 COLUM. J. GENDER & L. 326, 327–30, 336–41 (2006). In the early to mid-twentieth

century their use for sexual pleasure became well known, and in the 1960s advertising for such

devices began to emphasize their sexual benefits. Id. at 329–30.

17 Kaltenbach v. Richards, 464 F.3d 524, 526 (5th Cir. 2006).

18 Martin K. Eby Constr. Co. v. Dallas Area Rapid Transit, 369 F.3d 464, 467 (5th Cir.

2004) (internal citations and quotation marks omitted).

19 Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, --- U.S. ----, 127 S. Ct. 1955, 1974 (2007).

5

relationship. Others use sexual devices to treat a variety of therapeutic needs,

such as erectile dysfunction. Courts scrutinizing sexual-device bans in other

states have explained that an “extensive review of the medical necessity for

sexual devices” shows that “it is common for trained experts in the field of

human sexual behavior to use sexual aids in the treatment of their male and

female patients’ sexual problems.”15 Still other individuals use sexual devices

for non-therapeutic personal reasons, such as a desire to refrain from premarital

intercourse.16

The district court held, inter alia, that the statute does not violate the

Fourteenth Amendment because there is no constitutionally protected right to

publicly promote obscene devices. Plaintiffs appeal the judgment granting the

motion to dismiss. We review the district court’s dismissal for failure to state a

claim de novo.

17 The “court accepts all well-pleaded facts as true, viewing them

in the light most favorable to the plaintiff.”18 To survive a Rule 12(b)(6) motion

to dismiss, the plaintiff must plead “enough facts to state a claim to relief that

is plausible on its face.”19
06-51067

20 539 U.S. 558, 123 S. Ct. 2472 (2003).

21 381 U.S. 479, 481, 85 S. Ct. 1678, 1679 (1965).

22 See, e.g., Carey v. Population Servs. Int’l, 431 U.S. 678, 683–91, 97 S. Ct. 2010,

2015–19 (1977) (holding that contraceptive sellers had standing to assert the constitutional

rights of their users and striking down restrictions on the distribution and advertising of

contraceptives); Washington v. Glucksberg, 521 U.S. 702, 723, 117 S. Ct. 2258, 2269 (1997)

(scrutinizing a ban on providing suicide assistance as a burden on the right to receive suicide

assistance). 

6

With those standards in mind, we hold that the statute violates the

Fourteenth Amendment.

III. The Fourteenth Amendment

The Plaintiffs’ claim is predicated upon the individual right under the

Fourteenth Amendment to engage in private intimate conduct in the home

without governmentintrusion. Because the asserted governmental interests for

the law do not meet the applicable constitutional standard announced in

Lawrence v. Texas,

20 the statute cannot be constitutionally enforced.

The State argues that Plaintiffs, who distribute sexual devices for profit,

cannot assert the individual rights of their customers. This argument fails

under the Supreme Court precedent holding that (1) bans on commercial

transactions involving a product can unconstitutionally burden individual

substantive due process rights and (2) lawsuits making this claim may be

brought by providers of the product. In the landmark 1965 case of Griswold v.

Connecticut, which invalidated a ban on the use of contraceptives, the Court

recognized that the plaintiff pharmacists “have standing to raise the

constitutional rights of the married people with whom they had a professional

relationship.”21 Other Supreme Court cases hold that businesses can assert the

rights of their customers and that restricting the ability to purchase an item is

tantamount to restricting that item’s use.22 In line with these cases, the statute
06-51067

23 The State narrowly describes the right as the court did in Williams v. Attorney

General of Alabama, 378 F.3d 1232 (11th Cir. 2004). Id. at 1235–38 (describing the right as

the right to use sex toys). But this would concoct a right contrary to the holding in Lawrence

and evade the Court’s ruling. See id. at 1257 (Barkett, J., dissenting)(criticizing the majority’s

narrow framing of the right as inconsistent with Lawrence).

24 478 U.S. 186, 106 S. Ct. 2841 (1986).

25 Lawrence, 539 U.S. at 567, 123 S. Ct. at 2478. 

7

must be scrutinized for impermissible burdens on the constitutional rights of

those who wish to use sexual devices. 

To determine the constitutional standard applicable to this claim, we must

address what right is at stake. Plaintiffs claim that the right at stake is the

individual’s substantive due process right to engage in private intimate conduct

free from government intrusion. The State proposes a different right for the

Plaintiffs: “the right to stimulate one’s genitals for non-medical purposes

unrelated to procreation or outside of an interpersonal relationship.”23 The

Court in Lawrence—where it overruled its decision in Bowers v. Hardwick24 and

struck down Texas’s sodomy ban—guides our decision:

To say that the issue in Bowers was simply the right to engage in

certain sexual conduct demeans the claim the individual put

forward, just as it would demean a married couple were it to be said

marriage is simply about the right to have sexual intercourse. The

laws involved in Bowers and here are, to be sure, statutes that

purport to do no more than prohibit a particular sexual act. Their

penalties and purposes, though, have more far-reaching

consequences, touching upon the most private human conduct,

sexual behavior, and in the most private of places, the home.25

The right the Court recognized was not simply a right to engage in the

sexual act itself, but instead a right to be free from governmental intrusion

regarding “the most private human contact, sexual behavior.” That Lawrence

recognized this as a constitutional right is the only way to make sense of the fact

that the Court explicitly chose to answer the following question in the
06-51067

26 Id. at 564, 123 S. Ct. at 2476 (emphasis added). 

27 Id. at 579–85, 123 S. Ct. at 2484–88 (O’Connor, J., concurring).

28 Id. at 574–75, 123 S. Ct. at 2481–82. 

8

affirmative: “We granted certiorari . . . [to resolve whether] petitioners’ criminal

convictions for adult consensual sexual intimacy in the home violate their vital

interests in liberty and privacy protected by the Due Process Clause of the

Fourteenth Amendment.”26

The State also argues that Lawrence does not apply because the Court

there was concerned with how the statute targeted a specific class of people.

Justice O’Connor concurred in the majority’s decision in Lawrence because she

would have struck down the law on equal protection, not substantive due

process, grounds.27 But the Court explicitly rested its holding on substantive due

process, not equal protection.28 As discussed, the Court concluded that the

sodomy law violated the substantive due process right to engage in consensual

intimate conduct in the home free from government intrusion. Once Lawrence

is properly understood to explain the contours of the substantive due process

right to sexual intimacy, the case plainly applies.

Because of Lawrence, the issue before us is whether the Texas statute

impermissibly burdens the individual’s substantive due process right to engage

in private intimate conduct of his or her choosing. Contrary to the district

court’s conclusion, we hold that the Texas law burdens this constitutional right.

An individual who wants to legally use a safe sexual device during private

intimate moments alone or with another is unable to legally purchase a device

in Texas, which heavily burdens a constitutional right. This conclusion is

consistent with the decisions in Carey and Griswold, where the Court held that

restricting commercialtransactions unconstitutionally burdened the exercise of

individual rights. Indeed, under this statute it is even illegal to “lend” or “give”
06-51067

29 Texas Penal Code Section 43.21(a)(5) defines “promote” to include to “give” or “lend.”

And the statute at Section 43.23(c) makes it a crime to “promote” sexual devices. 

30 Williams, 378 F.3d at 1234–39.

31 Lawrence, 539 U.S. at 578, 123 S. Ct. at 1283 (quoting with approval Bowers v.

Hardwick, 478 U.S. 186, 216, 106 S. Ct. 2841, 2857 (Stevens, J., dissenting)).

32 Lawrence did not categorize the right to sexual privacy as a fundamental right, and

we do not purport to do so here. Instead, we simply follow the precise instructions from

Lawrence and hold that the statute violates the rightto sexual privacy, however it is otherwise

described.

9

a sexual device to another person.29 This further restricts the exercise of the

constitutional right to engage in private intimate conduct in the home free from

government intrusion. It also undercuts any argument that the statute only

affects public conduct. 

The dissent relegates the burden on this right to rational basis review.

The State says we have two alternatives: (1) strict scrutiny if Lawrence

established this right as a fundamental right or (2) rational basis review if

Lawrence did not. There has been debate about this and the Eleventh Circuit

concluded that Lawrence did not establish a fundamental right.30

The Supreme Court did not address the classification, nor do we need to

do so, because the Court expressly held that “individual decisions by married

persons, concerning the intimacies of their physical relationship, even when not

intended to produce offspring, are a form of ‘liberty’ protected by the Due Process

Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Moreover, this protection extends to

intimate choices by unmarried as well as married persons.”31 The Court also

carefully delineated the types of governmental interests that are constitutionally

insufficientto sustain a law that infringes on this substantive due process right.

Therefore, our responsibility as an inferior federal court is mandatory and

straightforward. We must apply Lawrence to the Texas statute.32
06-51067

33 The Eleventh Circuit disagreed in Williams v. Morgan, 478 F.3d 1316 (11th Cir.

2007), cert. denied, Williams v. King, 128 S. Ct. 77 (2007). There, the court held that

Alabama’s interestin “public morality” was a constitutional justification for the state’s obscene

devices statute. Id. at 1321–24. That fails to recognize the Lawrence holding that public

morality cannot justify a law that regulates an individual’s private sexual conduct and does

not relate to prostitution, the potential for injury or coercion, or public conduct.

34 See Respondent’s Brief, Lawrence, 539 U.S. 558 (No. 02-102), 2003 WL 470184, at

*48 (internal footnote omitted) (“The prohibition of homosexual conduct in [the anti-sodomy

statute] represents the reasoned judgment of the Texas Legislature that such conduct is

immoral and should be deterred . . . . [L]ong-established principles of federalism dictate that

the Court defer to the Texas Legislature’s judgment and to the collective good sense of the

people of the State of Texas, in their effort to enforce public morality and promote family

values through the promulgation of penal statutes such as [the anti-sodomy statute].”). 

35 Lawrence, 539 U.S. at 577–78, 123 S. Ct. at 2483–84 (quoting Bowers, 478 U.S. at

216, 106 S. Ct. At 2841 (Stevens, J., dissenting)).

10

The State’s primary justifications for the statute are “morality based.” The

asserted interests include “discouraging prurient interests in autonomous sex

and the pursuit of sexual gratification unrelated to procreation and prohibiting

the commercial sale of sex.”

These interests in “public morality” cannot constitutionally sustain the

statute after Lawrence.

33 To uphold the statute would be to ignore the holding

in Lawrence and allow the government to burden consensual private intimate

conduct simply by deeming it morally offensive. In Lawrence, Texas’s only

argument was that the anti-sodomy law reflected the moral judgment of the

legislature.34 The Court expressly rejected the State’s rationale by adopting

Justice Stevens’ view in Bowers as “controlling” and quoting Justice Stevens’

statement that“‘the factthatthe governing majority in a State has traditionally

viewed a particular practice as immoral is not a sufficient reason for upholding

a law prohibiting the practice.’”35 Thus, if in Lawrence public morality was an

insufficient justification for a law that restricted “adult consensual intimacy in
06-51067

36 See id. at 564, 123 S. Ct. at 2476. The State offers cases for the general proposition

that protecting morality is a legitimate governmental interest. See, e.g., Paris Adult Theatre

I v. Slaton, 413 U.S. 49, 61, 93 S. Ct. 2628, 2637 (1973). Our holding in no way overtly

expresses or implies that public morality can never be a constitutional justification for a law.

We merely hold that after Lawrence it is not a constitutional justification for this statute. 

37 See, e.g., FCC v. Pacifica Found., 438 U.S. 726, 98 S. Ct. 3026 (1978).

38 See Denver Area Educ. Telecomms. Consortium, Inc. v. FCC, 518 U.S. 727, 759, 116

S. Ct. 2374, 2393 (1996) (holding, in the First Amendment context, that “[n]o provision, we

concede, short of an absolute ban, can offer certain protection against assault by a determined

child[;] generally, [however,] this fact alone [does not] justify reduc[ing] the adult population

. . . to . . . only what is fit for children” (internal quotation marks and citations omitted)). 

39 Carey, 431 U.S. at 700–02, 97 S. Ct. at 2024–25; see Bolger v. Youngs Drug Prods.

Corp., 463 U.S. 60, 71–72, 103 S. Ct. 2875, 2883 (1983). 

11

the home,” then public morality also cannot serve as a rational basis for Texas’s

statute, which also regulates private sexual intimacy.36

Perhaps recognizing that public morality is an insufficientjustification for

the statute after Lawrence, the State asserts that an interest the statute serves

is the “protection of minors and unwilling adults from exposure to sexual devices

and their advertisement.” It is undeniable that the government has a

compelling interest in protecting children from improper sexual expression.37

However, the State’s generalized concern for children does not justify such a

heavy-handed restriction on the exercise of a constitutionally protected

individual right.38 Ultimately, because we can divine no rational connection

between the statute and the protection of children, and because the State offers

none, we cannot sustain the law under this justification. 

The alleged governmental interest in protecting “unwilling adults” from

exposure to sexual devices is even less convincing. The Court has consistently

refused to burden individual rights out of concern for the protection of“unwilling

recipients.”39 Furthermore, this asserted interest bears no rational relation to

the restriction on sales of sexual devices because an adult cannot buy a sexual
06-51067

40 To guide future courts, the Court in Lawrence delineated what the right is not about:

“The present case does not involve minors. It does not involve persons who might be injured

or coerced or who are situated in relationships where consent might not easily be refused. It

does not involve public conduct or prostitution.” 539 U.S. at 578, 123 S. Ct. at 2484. Instead,

the right at issue in Lawrence dealt with two adults engaging in consensual sexual conduct.

Id. 

12

device without making the affirmative decision to visit a store and make the

purchase. 

The State argues that if this statute, which proscribes the distribution of

sexual devices, is struck down, it is equivalent to extending substantive due

process protection to the “commercial sale of sex.” Not so. The sale of a device

that an individual may choose to use during intimate conduct with a partner in

the home is not the “sale of sex” (prostitution). Following the State’s logic, the

sale of contraceptives would be equivalent to the sale of sex because

contraceptives are intended to be used for the pursuit of sexual gratification

unrelated to procreation. This argument cannot be accepted as a justification

to limit the sale of contraceptives. The comparison highlights why the focus of

our analysis is on the burden the statute puts on the individual’s right to make

private decisions about consensual intimate conduct. Furthermore, there are

justifications for criminalizing prostitution other than public morality, including

promoting public safety and preventing injury and coercion.40

Just as in Lawrence, the State here wants to use its laws to enforce a

public moral code by restricting private intimate conduct. The case is not about

public sex. It is not about controlling commerce in sex. It is about controlling

what people do in the privacy of their own homes because the State is morally

opposed to a certain type of consensual private intimate conduct. This is an

insufficient justification for the statute after Lawrence. 
06-51067

41 See State v. Brenan, 772 So. 2d 64, 74 (La. 2000) (holding that “[t]he legislature

cannot make a device automatically obscene merely through the use of labels”); State v.

Hughes, 792 P.2d 1023, 1031 (Kan. 1990) (“The legislature may not declare a device obscene

merely because it relates to human sexual activity.”). 

13

It follows that the Texas statute cannot define sexual devices themselves

as obscene and prohibit their sale.41 Nothing here said or held protects the

public display of materialthat is obscene as defined by the Supreme Court—i.e.,

the language in Section 43.21(a)(1) of this statute, excluding the words in the

provision defining as obscene any device designed or marketed for sexual

stimulation. Whatever one might think or believe about the use of these devices,

government interference with their personal and private use violates the

Constitution.

Appellants urge us to sustain their First Amendment claim to protect the

advertisement of these devices. We decline to explore this claim because if it is

necessary, it may be premature. Advertisements of the devices could be

prohibited if they are obscene—meaning obscene as defined by the Supreme

Court or by the bulk of Section 43.21(a)(1). But the State may not prohibit the

promotion or sale of a bed, even one specially designed or marketed for sexual

purposes, by merely defining it as obscene. We have held here that the State

may not burden the use of these devices by prohibiting their sale. If other issues

need to be pursued, the parties are free to do so on remand in proceedings

consistent with this decision.

Judgment REVERSED and the case REMANDED.
06-51067

14

APPENDIX

Texas Penal Code

§ 43.21. Definitions

(a) In this subchapter:

(1) “Obscene” means material or a performance that:

(A) the average person, applying contemporary community standards,

would find that taken as a whole appeals to the prurient interest in sex;

(B) depicts or describes:

(i) patently offensive representations or descriptions of ultimate sexual

acts, normal or perverted, actual or simulated, including sexual

intercourse, sodomy, and sexual bestiality; or

(ii) patently offensive representations or descriptions of masturbation,

excretory functions, sadism, masochism, lewd exhibition of the genitals,

the male or female genitals in a state of sexual stimulation or arousal,

covered male genitals in a discernibly turgid state or a device designed

and marketed as useful primarily for stimulation of the human genital

organs; and

(C) taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, and scientific

value.

(2) “Material” means anything tangible that is capable of being used or

adapted to arouse interest, whether through the medium of reading,

observation, sound, or in any other manner, but does not include an actual

three dimensional obscene device.

(3) “Performance” means a play, motion picture, dance, or other exhibition

performed before an audience.

(4) “Patently offensive” means so offensive on its face as to affront current

community standards of decency.
06-51067

15

(5) “Promote” means to manufacture, issue, sell, give, provide, lend, mail,

deliver,transfer,transmit, publish, distribute, circulate, disseminate, present,

exhibit, or advertise, or to offer or agree to do the same.

(6) “Wholesale promote” means to manufacture, issue, sell, provide, mail,

deliver, transfer, transmit, publish, distribute, circulate, disseminate, or to

offer or agree to do the same for purpose of resale.

(7) “Obscene device” means a device including a dildo or artificial vagina,

designed or marketed as useful primarily for the stimulation of human genital

organs.

(b) If any of the depictions or descriptions of sexual conduct described in this

section are declared by a court of competent jurisdiction to be unlawfully

included herein, this declaration shall not invalidate this section as to other

patently offensive sexual conduct included herein.

. . . .

§ 43.23. Obscenity

(a) A person commits an offense if, knowing its content and character, he

wholesale promotes or possesses with intent to wholesale promote any obscene

material or obscene device.

(b) Except as provided by Subsection (h), an offense under Subsection (a) is a

state jail felony.

(c) A person commits an offense if, knowing its content and character, he:

(1) promotes or possesses with intent to promote any obscene material or

obscene device; or

(2) produces, presents, or directs an obscene performance or participates in a

portion thereof that is obscene or that contributes to its obscenity.
06-51067

16

(d) Except as provided by Subsection (h), an offense under Subsection (c) is a

Class A misdemeanor.

(e) A person who promotes or wholesale promotes obscene material or an obscene

device or possesses the same with intent to promote or wholesale promote it in

the course of his business is presumed to do so with knowledge of its content and

character.

(f) A person who possesses six or more obscene devices or identical or similar

obscene articles is presumed to possess them with intent to promote the same.

(g) It is an affirmative defense to prosecution under this section that the person

who possesses or promotes material or a device proscribed by this section does

so for a bona fide medical, psychiatric, judicial, legislative, or law enforcement

purpose.

(h) The punishment for an offense under Subsection (a) is increased to the

punishment for a felony of the third degree and the punishment for an offense

under Subsection (c) is increased to the punishment for a state jail felony if it is

shown on the trial of the offense that obscene material that is the subject of the

offense visually depicts activities described by Section 43.21(a)(1)(B) engaged in

by:

(1) a child younger than 18 years of age at the time the image of the child was

made;

(2) an image that to a reasonable person would be virtually indistinguishable

from the image of a child younger than 18 years of age; or

(3) an image created, adapted, or modified to be the image of an identifiable

child.

(i) In this section, “identifiable child” means a person, recognizable as an actual

person by the person's face, likeness, or other distinguishing characteristic, such

as a unique birthmark or other recognizable feature:

(1) who was younger than 18 years of age at the time the visual depiction was

created, adapted, or modified; or
06-51067

17

(2) whose image as a person younger than 18 years of age was used in

creating, adapting, or modifying the visual depiction.

(j) An attorney representing the state who seeks an increase in punishment

under Subsection (h)(3) is not required to prove the actual identity of an

identifiable child.
06-51067

18

RHESA HAWKINS BARKSDALE, Circuit Judge, concurring in part and

dissenting in part:

Concerning federalism and comity, few federal-court actions are more

friction-producing than holding a state statute unconstitutional. To make

matters worse, it is indeed rare to do so while, as here, reviewing a Federal Rule

of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) dismissal of challenges to the statute.

Notwithstanding the best of intentions, the esteemed majority goes astray in

both regards for the Fourteenth Amendment substantive-due-process claim. 

For the Texas statute at issue, I concur in vacating the dismissal of the

First Amendment commercial-speech claim (advertising) and remanding it for

further proceedings, if any. On the other hand, the invalidation of the statute

is legally incorrectfor the Fourteenth Amendment substantive-due-process claim

(sale). The dismissal of that claim should be affirmed. Accordingly, regarding

that claim, I must respectfully dissent.

I.

The statute prohibits, inter alia, the sale or other promotion, such as

advertising, of “obscene devices”: those “designed or marketed as useful

primarily for the stimulation of human genital organs”. TEX.PENAL CODE ANN.

§ 43.21(a)(7); id. § 43.23; see also id. § 43.21(a)(1)(B)(ii). Such devices include,

but are not limited to, “a dildo or artificial vagina”. Id. at § 43.21(a)(7). The

statute provides an affirmative defense for persons who “ possess[] or promote[]

[obscene devices] . . . for a bona fide medical, psychiatric, judicial, legislative, or

law enforcement purpose”. Id. at § 43.23(f). 

Plaintiffs’ complaints claim the statute unconstitutionally restricts

commercial speech (advertising) under the First Amendment, as incorporated

by the Fourteenth Amendment. The complaints also claim the “sale” portion of

the statute violates substantive due process under the Fourteenth Amendment
06-51067

19

because itimpinges upon the rightto engage in private intimate conduct without

governmental intrusion. See Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003). (Reliable

Consultants, Inc. also presents an additional substantive-due-process claim

under a parallel provision in the Texas Constitution. That state-law claim is

subsumed within the following discussion of the federal constitutional claim.)

The complaints, however, do not include plaintiffs’ advertisements, if any,

or describe with any specificity the sexual devices they seek to sell. The

complaints were dismissed for failure to state a claim under Rule 12(b)(6). 

II.

For starters, and contrary to the majority’s position, Maj. Opn. at 12-13,

the proscribed conduct is not private sexual conduct. Instead, for obscene

devices, the statute proscribes only the sale or other promotion (such as

advertising) of those devices, including, but not limited to, a dildo or artificial

vagina.

For our de novo review of a Rule 12(b)(6) dismissal, we, needless to say,

“accept all factual allegations in the [complaint] as true and examine whether

the allegations state a claim sufficient to avoid dismissal”. E.g., Grisham v.

United States, 103 F.3d 24, 25 (5th Cir. 1997) (citation omitted). To avoid such

dismissal, the complaint must provide “enough facts to state a claim to relief

that is plausible on its face”. Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 127 S. Ct. 1955, 1974

(2007). “Factual allegations [in the complaint] must be enough to raise a right

to relief above the speculative level, on the assumption that all the allegations

in the complaint are true (even if doubtful in fact).” Id. at 1965 (quotation

marks, citations, and footnote omitted). In other words, with some exceptions,

our review is limited to the complaint, including any attachments. See Hogan

v. City of Houston, 819 F.2d 604, 604 (5th Cir. 1987); Fin. Acquisition Partners

LP v. Blackwell, 440 F.3d 278, 286 (5th Cir. 2006) (allowing review of documents

in the public record) (citation omitted).
06-51067

20

A.

As the majority properly holds,the commercial-speech claim (advertising)

may be premature. Maj. Opn. at 13. This is especially true for an as-applied

challenge, which may be the only basis for seeking to have the statute held

unconstitutional for that claim. See Board of Trustees of SUNY v. Fox, 492 U.S.

469, 482-83 (1989) (quoting Ohralik v. Ohio State Bar Ass’n, 436 U.S. 447, 462

n.20 (1978)); see also Richard H. Fallon, As-Applied and Facial Challenges and

Third-Party Standing, 113 HARV. L. REV. 1321, 1344 (2000) (discussing asapplied challenges as the only basis for attacking statute on commercial speech

grounds). 

For example, as noted supra, the complaints neither include nor describe

the advertising, if any, plaintiffs seek to utilize. On the other hand, pursuant to

Rule 8, only notice pleadings are required. On that basis, plaintiffs have

perhaps stated a claim sufficient to withstand a Rule 12(b)(6) dismissal.

As the majority holds, that issue should not be decided today. No

authority need be cited for another bedrock principle underlying federalism and

comity: federal courts, if possible, should avoid ruling on constitutional issues.

“The delicate power of pronouncing [a statute] unconstitutional is not to be

exercised with reference to hypothetical cases thus imagined”. United States v.

Raines, 362 U.S. 17, 22 (1960). Remanding the commercial-speech claim avoids

the “premature interpretation[] of [a] statute[] in [an] area[] where [its]

constitutional application [is] cloudy”. Id. 

Accordingly, I concur in the majority’s vacating the dismissal of the

commercial-speech claim and remanding it for further proceedings, if any.

B.

My disagreement with the majority’s analysis of the Fourteenth

Amendment substantive-due-process claim is fundamental. In my view, the

district court correctly ruled plaintiffs fail to state such a claim. 
06-51067

21

The majority avoids determining what level of scrutiny to apply to the

substantive-due-process claim, stating only:

The Supreme Court did not address the classification [of the level of

scrutiny], nor do we need to do so, because the Court expressly held

that “individual decisions by married persons, concerning the

intimacies of their physical relationship, even when not intended to

produce offspring, are a form of ‘liberty’ protected by the Due

Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Moreover, this

protection extends to intimate choices by unmarried as well as

married persons.”

Maj. Opn. at 9 (quoting Lawrence, 539 U.S. at 578). I believe, however, that the

level of scrutiny to be employed is of critical importance to our review. 

For the reasons stated by the Eleventh Circuit in its analysis of a statute

materially identical to the one in issue, I conclude Lawrence declined to employ

a fundamental-rights analysis, choosing instead to apply rational-basis review.

See Williams v. Attorney Gen. of Ala., 378 F.3d 1232, 1236 (11th Cir. 2004)

(citation omitted); see also Lawrence, 539 U.S. at 578 (“The Texas statute

furthers no legitimate state interest which can justify its intrusion into the

personal and private life of the individual.” (emphasis added)); Lawrence, 539

U.S. at 594 (Scalia, J. dissenting) (“Not once does [the Court] describe

homosexual sodomy as a ‘fundamental right’ or a ‘fundamental liberty interest,’

nor does it subject the Texas statute to strict scrutiny. Instead, having failed to

establish that the right to homosexual sodomy is ‘deeply rooted in this Nation’s

history and tradition,’the Court concludes that the application of Texas’s statute

to petitioners’ conduct fails the rational-basis test.”). 

Furthermore, as also held by the Eleventh Circuit, I agree that, “[t]o the

extent Lawrence rejects public morality as a legitimate government interest, it

invalidates only those laws that target conduct that is both private and

non-commercial”. Williams v. Morgan, 478 F.3d 1316, 1322 (11th Cir.)

(emphasis added), cert. denied, Williams v. King, 128 S. Ct. 77 (2007). The Texas
06-51067

22

statute regulates, inter alia, the sale of what it defines as obscene devices.

Obviously, such conduct is both public and commercial. 

Therefore, I would hold: pursuant to the rational-basis standard of review,

plaintiffs fail to state a substantive-due-process claim under the Fourteenth

Amendment.

III.

For the foregoing reasons, I concur in vacating the dismissal of the First

Amendment commercial-speech claim (advertising); the dismissal, however, of

the Fourteenth Amendment substantive-due-process claim (sale) should be

upheld. Therefore, I must respectfully dissent from my BROTHERS’

invalidation of the statute on that basis.