Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 374

529US1

Unit: $U42

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Cite as: 529 U. S. 277 (2000)

299

Opinion of O’Connor, J.

who knowingly and willfully destroy or mutilate them.” 391
U. S., at 378–380. There was no study documenting in-
stances of draft card mutilation or the actual effect of such
mutilation on the Government’s asserted efﬁciency interests.
But the Court permitted Congress to take ofﬁcial notice, as
it were, that draft card destruction would jeopardize the sys-
tem. The fact that this sort of leeway is appropriate in a
case involving conduct says nothing whatsoever about its ap-
propriateness in a case involving actual regulation of First
Amendment expression. As we have said, so long as the
regulation is unrelated to the suppression of expression,
“[t]he government generally has a freer hand in restricting
expressive conduct than it has in restricting the written or
spoken word.” Texas v. Johnson, 491 U. S., at 406. See,
e. g., United States v. O’Brien, supra, at 377; United States
v. Albertini, 472 U. S. 675, 689 (1985) (ﬁnding sufﬁcient the
Government’s assertion that those who had previously been
barred from entering the military installation pose a threat
to the security of that installation); Clark v. Community for
Creative Non-Violence, 468 U. S., at 299 (ﬁnding sufﬁcient
the Government’s assertion that camping overnight in the
park poses a threat to park property).

Justice Souter, however, would require Erie to develop
a speciﬁc evidentiary record supporting its ordinance. Post,
at 317 (opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part).
Justice Souter agrees that Erie’s interest in combating the
negative secondary effects associated with nude dancing es-
tablishments is a legitimate government interest unrelated
to the suppression of expression, and he agrees that the
ordinance should therefore be evaluated under O’Brien.
O’Brien, of course, required no evidentiary showing at all
that the threatened harm was real. But that case is differ-
ent, Justice Souter contends, because in O’Brien “there
could be no doubt” that a regulation prohibiting the destruc-
tion of draft cards would alleviate the harmful secondary ef-