Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 396

529US1

Unit: $U42

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

321

Stevens, J., dissenting

place, and manner” regulations.3 See Renton, 475 U. S., at
46; American Mini Theatres, 427 U. S., at 63, and n. 18; id.,
at 82, n. 6. Because time, place, and manner regulations
must “leave open ample alternative channels for communica-
tion of the information,” Ward v. Rock Against Racism, 491
U. S. 781, 791 (1989), a total ban would necessarily fail that
test.4

And we so held in Schad v. Mount Ephraim, 452 U. S. 61
(1981). There, we addressed a zoning ordinance that did not
merely require the dispersal of adult theaters, but prohibited

3 The plurality contends, ante, at 295, that Ward v. Rock Against Rac-
ism, 491 U. S. 781 (1989), shows that we have used the secondary effects
rationale to justify more burdensome restrictions than those approved in
Renton and American Mini Theatres. That argument is unpersuasive
for two reasons. First, as in the two cases just mentioned, the regulation
in Ward was as a time, place, and manner restriction. See 491 U. S., at
791; id., at 804 (Marshall, J., dissenting). Second, as discussed below,
Ward is not a secondary effects case. See infra, at 325–326.

4 We also held in Renton that in enacting its adult theater zoning or-
dinance, the city of Renton was permitted to rely on a detailed study
conducted by the city of Seattle that examined the relationship between
(It was per-
zoning controls and the secondary effects of adult theaters.
mitted to rely as well on “the ‘detailed ﬁndings’ summarized” in an opinion
of the Washington Supreme Court to the same effect.)
475 U. S., at 51–52.
Renton, having identiﬁed the same problem in its own city as that experi-
enced in Seattle, quite logically drew on Seattle’s experience and adopted
a similar solution. But if Erie is relying on the Seattle study as well (as
the plurality suggests, ante, at 296–297), its use of that study is most
peculiar. After identifying a problem in its own city similar to that in
Seattle, Erie has implemented a solution (pasties and G-strings) bearing
no relationship to the efﬁcacious remedy identiﬁed by the Seattle study
(dispersal through zoning).

But the city of Erie, of course, has not in fact pointed to any study
by anyone suggesting that the adverse secondary effects of commercial
enterprises featuring erotic dancing depends in the slightest on the precise
costume worn by the performers—it merely assumes it to be so. See
infra, at 323–324.
If the city is permitted simply to assume that a slight
addition to the dancers’ costumes will sufﬁciently decrease secondary ef-
fects, then presumably the city can require more and more clothing as
long as any danger of adverse effects remains.