Court Opinion

ID: 9420788
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 22:55:58.356656+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:27.037488
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Frankfurter,
concurring in the judgment of reversal.
The appellant here was convicted under an ordinance of the city of Marshall, Texas, for exhibiting a picture after being denied a license by the local Board of Censors, and the conviction was affirmed by the Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas. The ordinance authorizes a local Board of Censors to deny a license for the showing of a motion picture, which the Board is “of the opinion” is “of such character as to be prejudicial to the best interests of the people of said City,” and makes the showing of a picture without a license a misdemeanor. This ordinance offends the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment on the score of indefiniteness. See my concurring opinion in Joseph Burstyn, Inc. v. Wilson, 343 U. S. 495, 507; and Winters v. Wilson, 333 U. S. 507.