# Talk:Arcara v. Cloud Books, Inc.

This review is transcluded from Talk:Arcara v. Cloud Books, Inc./GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.
Nominator: Adumbrativus (talk · contribs) 22:48, 31 December 2024 (UTC)
Reviewer: Extraordinary Writ (talk · contribs) 01:55, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
Happy to take a look. I'll have more later, but a few things to get you started:

It's probably worth mentioning what the Court of Appeals did on remand ("stood its ground, snubbed its nose at the highest court in the land, and found a safeguard in its own constitution", to put it colorfully)
Yes, I added a section for this (less colorfully). Adumbrativus (talk) 11:33, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
the court held that the First Amendment did not apply – I'm not quite as nitpicky as the justice quoted here, but maybe there's a better way of phrasing it?
I rephrased it to "no First Amendment scrutiny applied". I'm open to other phrasings. I'm hoping to imply, while not sounding too verbose or technical, that they were saying the First Amendment was not violated but also not even implicated, going beyond, say, an "on balance there's no conflict" type of opinion. Adumbrativus (talk) 11:33, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
Yep, that's fine. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 08:51, 15 January 2025 (UTC)
Consider linking to the text of the lower-court decisions in the infobox and/or references.
Added. Adumbrativus (talk) 11:33, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
Arcara gets quite a bit of attention in this 2018 article by Dan Coenen; I've just glanced at it, but it might be worth a look. I also thought it was interesting that Lawrence Tribe "agree[d] completely" with Burger, although that may or may not be worth mentioning.
Added a citation to Coenen's article. There's plenty more analysis in that article (particularly more "exceptions" that he lists, other than the ones discussed already) although I'm not sure how much to mention. I also think it's amusing that Tribe picked this example, although so far it didn't make the cut for me. The general point about the nature of interpretation seems too high level. Otherwise just noting that Tribe agrees with Burger isn't obviously significant, or at least not without more context on Tribe's reputation. Adumbrativus (talk) 11:33, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
Agreed. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 08:51, 15 January 2025 (UTC)
Maybe tell us a bit more about the dissent? The argument that there were less restrictive alternatives ("An obvious method of eliminating such acts is to arrest the patron committing them.") might be worth mentioning, for instance.
I expanded the section a little, and also the new section on the subsequent Court of Appeals opinion makes overlapping points. Adumbrativus (talk) 11:33, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
Extraordinary Writ (talk) 01:55, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

so the O'Brien test was not relevant and the statute did not single out First Amendment protected activities – probably worth adding another "according to the majority" or two; it starts to look like it's in wikivoice after a while.
Reworded. Adumbrativus (talk) 11:06, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
Another precedent Clark v. Community for Creative Non-Violence (1984), about sleeping in a park to protest the situation of the homeless, was similar to O'Brien. – this is a bit clunky and could probably be rephrased. At minimum "precedent" needs a comma after it.
Reworded. Adumbrativus (talk) 11:06, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
In law professor Michael C. Dorf's analysis... – it seems a bit out of place to quote Dorf's general observation about First Amendment doctrine rather than anything Arcara-specific. Something to think about, although I'm honestly not sure what I would do instead.
Hopefully the context is a little better now – I tried introducing the paragraph more clearly and rearranging the paragraphs. Adumbrativus (talk) 11:06, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
Campbell argued that Arcara was a "stealth overruling" of some earlier decisions – "stealth overruling" is a phrase with a specific and non-obvious meaning (artificially distinguishing a precedent instead of following its logic), and readers are just going to think it's about the outcome in Albertini rather than the reasoning. Maybe quote/paraphrase the much clearer "failed to mention their significant departure from earlier reasoning" part instead.
Done. Adumbrativus (talk) 11:06, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
In the concurrence section, it might be worth mentioning O'Connor's newscaster example, which gets plenty of attention in the sources.
Added – good observation. Adumbrativus (talk) 11:33, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
prior restraint on selling books and other materials – if you're going to mention prior restraint here, I think you also have to say that the majority opinion (footnote 2) rejected that argument.
I'm reluctant to mention it. It was part of the lower courts' analysis, but the Supreme Court evidently didn't think much of it, leaving it to the footnote, and commentators on the case generally don't seem to bring it up either. I understand the concern about it being a gun that wasn't used. I could be willing not to mention it in the first place. Adumbrativus (talk) 11:06, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
That's fair: it does come up briefly again in Alexander, but that's about it. I would probably just remove it (partly for Chekhov reasons and partly to avoid suggesting it's still an open question), but it's your call. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 08:51, 15 January 2025 (UTC)
Ok, I removed the mention. Adumbrativus (talk) 01:56, 16 January 2025 (UTC)
The application of Arcara in Alexander v. United States (see Coenen, 487–489) might be worth mentioning somewhere, maybe at the end of the first "analysis" paragraph. (I'll be interested to see if we get another opinion citing Arcara this month!)
Added a mention there. Adumbrativus (talk) 11:06, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
That's all for now; I'll give it another run-through once you're ready. My usual disclaimer: I tend to stray beyond what the GA criteria strictly require, so you're always welcome to push back against any suggestions you're not on board with. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 11:29, 6 January 2025 (UTC)
Thanks for the comments! I added some responses above – I'll follow up on the rest later. Adumbrativus (talk) 11:33, 7 January 2025 (UTC)

William "Jud" Campbell – Wesley, right?
Oops! Adumbrativus (talk) 19:16, 16 January 2025 (UTC)
This analysis is incomplete, with many other exceptions that have been proposed – "incomplete" is a bit strong for wikivoice. Maybe something along the lines of "Lower courts and scholars have seen this analysis as incomplete, proposing several additional exceptions".
Ok I went with that. Adumbrativus (talk) 19:16, 16 January 2025 (UTC)
An undercover deputy sheriff investigated the store and allegedly witnessed sexual activity and solicitation of prostitution on multiple occasions – might be worth mentioning that he (allegedly) informed employees and nothing was done. (You could also get away with being a bit more specific than sexual activity, though I can't really fault you there.)
This is obviously not includable, but just for your amusement: if I'm parsing the footnote in [1] correctly, Burger's draft opinion in Arcara "proposed to reverse a state supreme court's interpretation of its own state's statute"—evidence of his penchant for "fuzzy legal analysis".
That's all I have for you. None of it is a blocker for GA purposes, so I'll just go ahead and pass it. Thanks for your work on this—it's a fascinating case I enjoyed learning about. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 12:11, 16 January 2025 (UTC)
Thank you for the review! Adumbrativus (talk) 19:16, 16 January 2025 (UTC)