Court Opinion

ID: 9625834
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 07:52:31.84734+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:06:16.033801
License: Public Domain

Hawes, Justice,
dissenting. I join in the dissenting opinion of Mr. Justice Gunter, a classic of legal reasoning and First Amendment wisdom, and I would add nothing to what has been said were it not for my concern for the grave danger to free speech and expression inherent in the majority opinion and about which I cannot here remain silent.
Two aspects of the opinion of the majority which are of most concern to me are the following: (1) the tacit approval of small towns and hamlets as being the "community” from which the standard for obscenity is drawn; and (2) the determination by four members of this court, upon an independent appellate review, that the film Carnal Knowledge is obscene, that is, that it has no artistic or literary value and is "utterly without *738redeeming social value.” To give approval to the first would be to place in the hands of the few the tastes and the cultural advancement of the many who are members of the greater state community and to deny in large measure the basic freedom of individuals to participate as they will in the general commerce of ideas. And to approve of the latter would be to equate realistic commentary on our sexual natures in a social context with that of obscenity, an equivalence surely belied as a matter of constitutional law and as a matter of fact. Certainly, the film under consideration here is not the kind of hard-core pornography we removed from public consumption in Slaton v. Paris Adult Theater I, 228 Ga. 343 (185 SE2d 768) (1971).
I add these few remarks only because I believe if the majority opinion is accepted we shall have suffered a serious injury to free speech and free expression in Georgia.