Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 353

529US1

Unit: $U42

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278

ERIE v. PAP’S A. M.

Syllabus

law, and could again decide to operate a nude dancing establishment in
Erie. Moreover, Pap’s failed, despite its obligation to the Court, to
mention the potential mootness issue in its brief in opposition, which
was ﬁled after Kandyland was closed and the property sold. See Board
of License Comm’rs of Tiverton v. Pastore, 469 U. S. 238, 240.
In any
event, this is not a run of the mill voluntary cessation case. Here it is
the plaintiff who, having prevailed below, seeks to have the case de-
clared moot. And it is the defendant city that seeks to invoke the fed-
eral judicial power to obtain this Court’s review of the decision. Cf.
ASARCO Inc. v. Kadish, 490 U. S. 605, 617–618. The city has an ongo-
ing injury because it is barred from enforcing the ordinance’s public
nudity provisions.
If the ordinance is found constitutional, then Erie
can enforce it, and the availability of such relief is sufﬁcient to prevent
the case from being moot. See Church of Scientology of Cal. v. United
States, 506 U. S. 9, 13. And Pap’s still has a concrete stake in the case’s
outcome because, to the extent it has an interest in resuming operations,
it has an interest in preserving the judgment below. This Court’s inter-
est in preventing litigants from attempting to manipulate its jurisdiction
to insulate a favorable decision from review further counsels against a
ﬁnding of mootness. See, e. g., United States v. W. T. Grant Co., 345
U. S. 629, 632. Pp. 287–289.

Justice O’Connor, joined by The Chief Justice, Justice Ken-

nedy, and Justice Breyer, concluded in Parts III and IV that:

1. Government restrictions on public nudity such as Erie’s ordinance
should be evaluated under the framework set forth in United States v.
O’Brien, 391 U. S. 367, for content-neutral restrictions on symbolic
speech. Although being “in a state of nudity” is not an inherently ex-
pressive condition, nude dancing of the type at issue here is expressive
conduct that falls within the outer ambit of the First Amendment’s pro-
tection. See, e. g., Barnes, supra, at 565–566 (plurality opinion). What
level of scrutiny applies is determined by whether the ordinance is re-
lated to the suppression of expression. E. g., Texas v. Johnson, 491
U. S. 397, 403.
If the governmental purpose in enacting the ordinance
is unrelated to such suppression, the ordinance need only satisfy the
“less stringent,” intermediate O’Brien standard. E. g., Johnson, supra,
at 403.
If the governmental interest is related to the expression’s con-
tent, however, the ordinance falls outside O’Brien and must be justiﬁed
under the more demanding, strict scrutiny standard. Johnson, supra,
at 403. An almost identical public nudity ban was held not to violate
the First Amendment in Barnes, although no ﬁve Members of the Court
agreed on a single rationale for that conclusion. The ordinance here,
like the statute in Barnes, is on its face a general prohibition on public
It does not target
nudity. By its terms, it regulates conduct alone.