the case that determine the status of what is obscene
[b]ut I know it when I see it ..... In the United States, the 1973 ruling of the Supreme Court of the United States in Miller v. California established a three-tiered test to determine what was obsceneâand thus not protected, versus what was merely erotic and thus protected by the First Amendment.n obscenity is any utterance or act that strongly offends the prevalent morality of the time. It is derived from the Latin obscaena (offstage) a cognate of the Ancient Greek root skene, because some potentially offensive content, such as murder or sex, was depicted offstage in classical drama.