Opinion ID: 757585
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Suppression of Free Speech

Text: 21 As a publisher of magazines containing sexually explicit visual depictions, Connection asserts that its First Amendment rights to publish and distribute constitutionally protected expression, as well as the rights of its advertisers to communicate with each other, 6 have been unconstitutionally suppressed as a result of the record-keeping and disclosure provisions of the Act. The protected nature of the expression involved in this case was not challenged before the district court and thus is not at issue. There is the possibility that the sexually explicit photographs published by Connection could be found constitutional because it is well-settled that [s]exual expression which is indecent but not obscene is protected by the First Amendment, and hence subject to constitutional strictures. 7 Sable Communications of Cal., Inc. v. FCC, 492 U.S. 115, 126, 109 S.Ct. 2829, 106 L.Ed.2d 93 (1989). Furthermore, the Supreme Court specifically has held that non-obscene, sexually explicit materials involving persons over the age of 17 are protected by the First Amendment. United States v. X-Citement Video, Inc., 513 U.S. 64, 72, 115 S.Ct. 464, 130 L.Ed.2d 372 (1994). Therefore, the photographs published by Connection are protected expression to the extent they feature adults engaged in non-obscene, sexually explicit conduct. 8 22 Photographs featuring children engaged in sexually explicit conduct, however, would not constitute protected expression. In New York v. Ferber, 458 U.S. 747, 764, 102 S.Ct. 3348, 73 L.Ed.2d 1113 (1982), the Supreme Court held that, as long as the activity to be prohibited is adequately defined and limited by applicable state law, child pornography--defined generally as works that visually depict sexual conduct by children below a specified age--is not entitled to First Amendment protection. In upholding a statute prohibiting the distribution of child pornography, the Court in Ferber noted that States are entitled to greater leeway in the regulation of child pornography because of the State's interest in preventing the sexual exploitation of children and in closing down the distribution network that generates the market for child pornography, which in turn leads to the abuse of children involved in the production of the materials. Id. at 757-59, 102 S.Ct. 3348. The Court also has upheld a State's right to prohibit even the possession of child pornography. See Osborne v. Ohio, 495 U.S. 103, 111, 110 S.Ct. 1691, 109 L.Ed.2d 98 (1990) ([g]iven the gravity of the State's interests ... we find that Ohio may constitutionally proscribe the possession and viewing of child pornography). 23 The goal of preventing the sexual exploitation of children undoubtedly is a compelling and important one, which the government not only is permitted but perhaps obliged to pursue. See Ferber, 458 U.S. at 757, 102 S.Ct. 3348 (finding prevention of the sexual exploitation and abuse of children to be a government objective of surpassing importance). Recently, Congress has further attempted to fight child pornography through the passage of the Child Pornography Prevention Act of 1996, Pub.L. No. 104-208, 110 Stat. 3009-26 (codified at 18 U.S.C. § 2252A (Supp. II 1996)). This new statute, aimed at curbing the effects of computer technology upon the child pornography industry, broadens the scope of child pornography laws by making it illegal to possess or distribute, electronically or otherwise, child pornography and defining child pornography to include visual depictions, however generated or created, that feature minors, have been created or modified to appear to feature minors, or are marketed as featuring minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct. See 18 U.S.C. § 2252A (Supp. II 1996) (incorporating definition of child pornography contained in 18 U.S.C. § 2256(8)(Supp. II 1996)). 9 24 However, even in the pursuit of the most worthy of goals, the government may not unduly burden free speech. In determining whether the Act inappropriately hinders the exercise of the protected speech at issue, it is necessary first to determine whether the Act is content-based or content-neutral because that determination will decide the level of scrutiny. 25 The principal inquiry in determining content neutrality ... is whether the government has adopted a regulation of speech because of disagreement with the message it conveys. The government's purpose is the controlling consideration. A regulation that serves purposes unrelated to the content of expression is deemed neutral, even if it has an incidental effect on some speakers or messages but not others. Government regulation of expressive activity is content neutral so long as it is justified without reference to the content of the regulated speech. 26 Ward v. Rock Against Racism, 491 U.S. 781, 791, 109 S.Ct. 2746, 105 L.Ed.2d 661 (1989) (citations and internal quotations omitted). 27 The stated purpose of the original Child Protection and Obscenity Enforcement Act of 1988, which § 2257 amended, was to alleviate the difficulty for law enforcement officers in ascertaining whether an individual in a film or other visual depiction is a minor for the purpose of combating child pornography. See 1 Attorney General's Commission on Pornography, Final Report 618-20 (July 1986) (Final Report). The Attorney General's Commission on Pornography reasoned that, because some pornographers deliberately use youthful-looking adult models, there needed to be a statute requiring producers of sexually explicit material to maintain records of age verification. Id. at 618. The Commission also concluded that minors deserve special protection from the risks inherent in the production of pornographic materials and, therefore, individuals should be prohibited from employing, using, persuading, inducing, or coercing any minor to engage in sexually explicit conduct for the purpose of producing any visual depiction of such conduct. Id. at 618-19. 28 The government's goal of preventing child pornography through the record-keeping provisions of the Act clearly is not an attempt to regulate the speech of Connection and its advertisers because of disagreement with the messages they convey. Although the Act does require that the content of speech be examined to determine its applicability, the Act is not directed at the protected speech but rather unprotected conduct--namely, child pornography--that may be identified by the speech. Therefore, the fact that publishers or producers of sexually explicit visual depictions are, to some extent, treated differently from other types of producers of visual depictions does not make the Act content-based. Cf. City of Renton v. Playtime Theatres, Inc., 475 U.S. 41, 47-48, 106 S.Ct. 925, 89 L.Ed.2d 29 (1986) (finding that zoning ordinance restricting the placement of adult theaters was aimed at the secondary effects of such theaters on the surrounding community and thus was a content-neutral regulation despite the differing treatment received by adult theater owners as compared to other theater owners); see also R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul, Minn., 505 U.S. 377, 389, 112 S.Ct. 2538, 120 L.Ed.2d 305 (1992) (noting that a valid basis for according differential treatment to even a content-defined subclass of proscribable speech is that the subclass happens to be associated with particular 'secondary effects' of the speech, so that the regulation is 'justified without reference to the content of the ... speech' ) (citations omitted). Thus, although the Act may not be content-neutral in a technical sense, because it is directed at curbing the secondary effects of the speech and not the speech itself, it is proper to deem it content-neutral for First Amendment purposes. See Richland Bookmart, Inc. v. Nichols, 137 F.3d 435, 440 (6th Cir.1998) (noting that regulations of sexually explicit speech which are aimed at its secondary effects are, in fact, content-based but merely are to be treated as content-neutral). The reason for this difference in treatment is that the Supreme Court has held that although sexually explicit expression is protected by the First Amendment, society's interest in protecting this type of expression is of a wholly different, and lesser, magnitude than the societal interest in other forms of expression, such as political debate. Young v. American Mini Theatres, Inc., 427 U.S. 50, 70, 96 S.Ct. 2440, 49 L.Ed.2d 310 (1976) (plurality). Accordingly, because § 2257 is a regulation aimed at the secondary effects of sexually explicit speech, it is properly analyzed as a content-neutral regulation. 29 The intermediate level of scrutiny applies to content-neutral regulations that impose an incidental burden on speech. Turner Broadcasting Sys., Inc. v. FCC, 512 U.S. 622, 662, 114 S.Ct. 2445, 129 L.Ed.2d 497 (1994). Under this standard, a government regulation is constitutional if the obligations it imposes are narrowly tailored to serve a significant governmental interest, and ... leave open ample alternative channels for communication of the information. Ward, 491 U.S. at 791, 109 S.Ct. 2746 (citation and internal quotations omitted). 30 With regard to the requirement of narrow tailoring, Connection argues that the Act burdens substantially more speech than is necessary to achieve its professed goal of combating child pornography. Although Connection acknowledges that the protection of children is a legitimate and substantial government interest, it claims that the Act's record-keeping provisions unnecessarily diminish the First Amendment rights of adults because the Act's goal is not furthered by the record-keeping provisions as applied to Connection and its readers. 31 It is true that the interest of protecting children may not always justify limitations on the First Amendment rights of adults, and the government is not excused from the tailoring requirement merely because the interests of children are involved. In Sable Communications of Cal., Inc. v. FCC, 492 U.S. 115, 130-31, 109 S.Ct. 2829, 106 L.Ed.2d 93 (1989), the Supreme Court struck down a total ban on indecent commercial telephone communications as not sufficiently justified by the government interest in preventing minors from being exposed to those messages. In balancing the interests at stake, the Court found that the statute's complete denial of adult access to telephone messages which are indecent but not obscene far exceeded that which was necessary to limit the access of minors to such messages. Id. at 131, 109 S.Ct. 2829. Similarly, in Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union, 521 U.S. 844, 117 S.Ct. 2329, 138 L.Ed.2d 874 (1997), the Court invalidated provisions of an act designed to protect minors from harmful material on the Internet because the statute unnecessarily suppressed a broad amount of adult speech. Id. 521 U.S. at ----, 117 S.Ct. at 2346-48. Therefore, courts must weigh the interests at stake in determining whether a statute impermissibly burdens free speech. 32 It is alleged by Connection that the vast majority of its advertisers are well over the age of majority. Nonetheless, a universal requirement of age disclosure, regardless of the apparent age of an individual in a visual depiction, is critical to the government's interest in ensuring that no minors are depicted in actual sexual conduct. Although standards based on obvious maturity would lead to accurate determinations in many cases, they also would attach an ineffectual subjectivity to the age determination, which was the target of the Act in the first place. See Final Report at 620 (By viewing a visual depiction, how does one decide if the performer is fourteen or eighteen, seventeen or twenty-one?). 33 Furthermore, to satisfy the narrow tailoring requirement of the intermediate scrutiny test, a regulation need not be the least speech-restrictive means of achieving the government's interests. Turner Broadcasting, 512 U.S. at 662, 114 S.Ct. 2445. All that is required for narrow tailoring is that the regulation does not burden substantially more speech than is necessary to further the government's legitimate interest. Id. If the government wishes to prevent the sexual exploitation of children through the production of child pornography, application of the record-keeping provisions to all producers of sexually explicit materials is necessary and not unduly burdensome. 34 In City of Renton v. Playtime Theatres, Inc., 475 U.S. 41, 106 S.Ct. 925, 89 L.Ed.2d 29 (1986), the Supreme Court analyzed a zoning ordinance that prohibited adult motion pictures from locating within 1,000 feet of any residential zone. After noting that the ordinance did not ban adult theaters altogether, but merely put restrictions on their location, the Court upheld the ordinance under the intermediate scrutiny test. Id. at 52-54, 106 S.Ct. 925. The Court found that the ordinance represented a valid governmental response to the admittedly serious problems created by adult theaters and was not used as a pretext for suppressing expression but rather was an attempt to make some areas available for adult theaters and their patrons, while at the same time preserving the quality of life in the community at large. Id. at 54, 106 S.Ct. 925 (citations omitted). 35 The Act, like the ordinance at issue in City of Renton, also is a reasonable attempt to balance the free speech interests of Connection and its readers against the interest of the government in fighting child pornography. Child pornography is an admittedly serious problem, and the record-keeping provisions of the Act clearly are not a pretext for suppressing expression. See City of Renton, 475 U.S. at 54, 106 S.Ct. 925. The provisions are a reasonable attempt to prevent the use of minors in pornographic materials. By requiring that age verification records be submitted and maintained, the provisions do not prohibit the sexually explicit speech at issue or unduly burden the opportunity of Connection and its readers to engage in the expression. Because the Act supports the government's interest in fighting pornography, while allowing Connection and its readers to exercise their free speech rights, it satisfies the requirement of narrow tailoring. See Turner Broadcasting, 512 U.S. at 662, 114 S.Ct. 2445. 36 Similarly, the Act is not impermissibly overbroad. A statute is overbroad when it includes within its prohibitions activities that are constitutionally protected. See Grayned v. City of Rockford, 408 U.S. 104, 114, 92 S.Ct. 2294, 33 L.Ed.2d 222 (1972). Although the majority of Connection's readership may not be the object of the Act's focus, the allowance of exceptions to the disclosure requirements--presumably based on a subjective determination by Connection as to a subscriber's age--would not promote the Act's goal of eliminating the use of minors in pornography. 37 Connection also argues that the Act unconstitutionally chills protected speech. A statute may be stricken as unconstitutional under the First Amendment if it has a substantial chilling effect upon protected speech. See, e.g., Reno, 521 U.S. at ----, 117 S.Ct. at 2345 (explaining that the vagueness of the Communications Decency Act and the severity of its criminal sanctions may well cause speakers to remain silent rather than communicate even arguably unlawful words, ideas, and images). Connection contends, based primarily on anecdotal evidence and supposition, that the potential of their identifying information being disclosed to the government will chill its advertisers from exercising their right to publish sexually explicit photographs and will result in the self-censorship of their speech. 38 The Supreme Court consistently has refused to allow government to chill the exercise of constitutional rights by requiring disclosure of protected, but sometimes unpopular, activities. Thornburgh v. American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, 476 U.S. 747, 767, 106 S.Ct. 2169, 90 L.Ed.2d 779 (1986) (striking down reporting requirements of Pennsylvania abortion law where records would be available to public), overruled on other grounds by Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pa. v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833, 112 S.Ct. 2791, 120 L.Ed.2d 674 (1992). In this case, however, the provisions at issue do not require the disclosure of any information about the subscribers to the public. The Act does not constitute an impermissible chill on the exercise of free speech rights because it clearly does not contemplate public release of the information or raise the specter of public exposure and harassment of swingers who choose to express themselves through Connection's publications. Thornburgh, 476 U.S. at 767, 106 S.Ct. 2169; cf. Planned Parenthood of Central Mo. v. Danforth, 428 U.S. 52, 79-81, 96 S.Ct. 2831, 49 L.Ed.2d 788 (1976) (upholding constitutionality of mandatory abortion records that were accessible only to public health officers). 39 All of the preceding relates to the requirement that a content-neutral regulation of speech be narrowly tailored. This requirement is satisfied  'so long as the ... regulation promotes a substantial government interest that would be achieved less effectively absent the regulation.'  Ward, 491 U.S. at 799, 109 S.Ct. 2746 (1989) (quoting United States v. Albertini, 472 U.S. 675, 689, 105 S.Ct. 2897, 86 L.Ed.2d 536 (1985)). The Act complies with this requirement and is neither overbroad nor an impermissible chill on free expression because, as explained above, the government's interest in eliminating child pornography would be less effectively promoted without the record-keeping and disclosure requirements. 40 Connection also argues that the Act does not comply with the part of the intermediate scrutiny test which requires that a regulation of protected expression leave open ample alternative channels for the communication. Related to this argument is the contention that the regulation interferes with the rights of Connection's readers to express themselves anonymously. Connection contends that a person wishing to publish a sexually explicit message without submitting identification documents that may be made available to the government no longer has a forum where he or she can publish that message anonymously. 41 Connection is correct that the Supreme Court has recognized that the right to communicate anonymously is encompassed within the First Amendment. In McIntyre v. Ohio Elections Comm'n, 514 U.S. 334, 115 S.Ct. 1511, 131 L.Ed.2d 426 (1995), the Court struck down an ordinance prohibiting the anonymous distribution of political leaflets. The Court noted that an author's decision to remain anonymous, like other decisions concerning omissions or additions to the content of a publication, is an aspect of the freedom of speech protected by the First Amendment. Id. at 342, 115 S.Ct. 1511. Nonetheless, Connection's and its readers' First Amendment rights have not been violated. 42 First, Connection has defined the relevant channel of communication too narrowly. Connection claims that what is destroyed by the Act is a channel for anonymous, sexually explicit visual expression that does not require the submission of identification documents. However, the requirement that ample alternative channels be left available does not mean that there must be a channel where Connection and its readers can express themselves in precisely the same manner as before the regulation. Cf. Heffron v. Int'l Soc'y for Krishna Consciousness, Inc., 452 U.S. 640, 647, 101 S.Ct. 2559, 69 L.Ed.2d 298 (1981) (noting that the First Amendment does not guarantee the right to communicate one's views at all times and places or in any manner that may be desired). Indeed, if there were an identical channel available for the communication, there likely would be no constitutional challenge. 43 If the relevant channel instead is defined merely as a forum for anonymous, sexually explicit visual expression, alternative channels clearly remain available. People who wish to submit sexually explicit photographs to Connection's magazines still may do so. These persons also may have their photographs published anonymously. All that has been restricted is their ability to submit their photographs without identification but not their right to express themselves, via their advertisements, anonymously. In point of fact, Connection's subscribers already were required to identify themselves and verify their ages to the magazines' editor. All that has changed is that documentation of age is required, and this information must be made available to the government if requested. Public disclosure of this information is neither required nor suggested by the terms of the Act. This condition of entry to this forum for anonymous, sexually explicit speech does not destroy the forum. Even assuming arguendo that Connection's readers will be less likely to engage in this form of expression because of the fear of disclosure, this unsubstantiated fear, and not the Act, is what is diminishing the forum. See Fort Wayne Books, Inc. v. Indiana, 489 U.S. 46, 60, 109 S.Ct. 916, 103 L.Ed.2d 34 (1989) (mere assertion of some possible self-censorship resulting from a statute is not enough to render ... [a] law unconstitutional). 44 In addition, this fear of disclosure argument is weakened by the fact that Connection's readers already have placed themselves at risk of losing the anonymity of their speech by submitting sexually explicit photographs of themselves to be published and distributed in Connection's magazines. Even if the majority of Connection's advertisers do ask to have their faces blocked out of the advertisements and identify themselves only through the code at the beginning of each message, they still are subjecting themselves to potential disclosure because anyone may respond to the advertisement and then discover the advertisers' identities. Likewise, advertisers already have been disclosing their identities to Connection, which could also subject them to at least some risk of public disclosure. 45 Furthermore, defining the forum even more broadly indicates that there are numerous reasonable alternative avenues of communication available for sexually explicit expression. See City of Renton, 475 U.S. at 53, 106 S.Ct. 925 (finding zoning ordinance which prohibited adult motion pictures from locating near residential zones left ample land available for theaters in other areas). Undocumented sexually explicit expression is permitted if the acts of sexual conduct are simulated or do not otherwise fall within the proscriptions of the Act. Obviously, documentation also is not required for photographs of subscribers who are merely nude, fully clothed, or submit text-only messages. Connection's subscribers also may make use of its voice mailboxes for swingers and its service on the Internet. Therefore, subscribers who wish to engage in sexually explicit expression, without submitting documentation, still have alternative channels of communication available. Because the regulation at issue does not restrict the quantity or content of the expression, in the absence of any showing that the remaining channels of communication are inadequate, the requirement for alternative channels has been met. See Ward, 491 U.S. at 802, 109 S.Ct. 2746. Therefore, as applied in this case, the Act does not impermissibly burden Connection's or its subscribers' free speech rights.