Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/09pdf/08-769.pdf
Page Number: 12.0

8 

UNITED STATES v. STEVENS 

Opinion of the Court 

747 (1982), we noted that within these categories of unpro-
tected speech, “the evil to be restricted so overwhelmingly
outweighs  the  expressive  interests,  if  any,  at  stake,  that
no  process  of  case-by-case  adjudication  is  required,”  be-
cause  “the  balance  of  competing  interests  is  clearly
struck,”  id.,  at  763–764.  The  Government  derives  its 
proposed  test  from  these  descriptions  in  our  precedents. 
See Brief for United States 12–13. 

But  such  descriptions  are  just  that—descriptive.    They
do  not  set  forth  a  test  that  may  be  applied  as  a  general 
matter to permit the Government to imprison any speaker 
so long as his speech is deemed valueless or unnecessary, 
or so long as an ad hoc calculus of costs and benefits tilts 
in a statute’s favor. 

When  we  have  identified  categories  of  speech  as  fully 
outside the protection of the First Amendment, it has not 
been  on  the  basis  of  a  simple  cost-benefit  analysis.  In 
Ferber,  for  example,  we  classified  child  pornography  as
such  a  category,  458  U. S.,  at  763.    We  noted  that  the 
State of New York had a compelling interest in protecting 
children from abuse, and that  the value of using children
in  these  works  (as  opposed  to  simulated  conduct  or  adult 
actors)  was  de  minimis.  Id.,  at  756–757,  762.  But  our 
decision  did  not  rest  on  this  “balance  of  competing  inter-
ests”  alone.  Id.,  at  764.    We  made  clear  that  Ferber  pre-
sented  a  special  case:  The  market  for  child  pornography
was  “intrinsically  related”  to  the  underlying  abuse,  and 
was  therefore  “an  integral  part  of  the  production  of  such
materials, an activity illegal throughout the Nation.”  Id., 
at 759, 761.  As we noted, “ ‘[i]t rarely has been suggested
that  the  constitutional  freedom  for  speech  and  press  ex-
tends  its  immunity  to  speech  or  writing  used  as  an  inte-
gral  part  of  conduct  in  violation  of  a  valid  criminal  stat-
ute.’ ”  Id.,  at  761–762  (quoting  Giboney,  supra,  at  498). 
Ferber  thus  grounded  its  analysis  in  a  previously  recog-
nized,  long-established  category  of  unprotected  speech,