Court Opinion

ID: 9427162
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:19:55.472064+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:05.260197
License: Public Domain

Me. Justice Stewaet,
dissenting.
The appellant stands convicted of the single crime of distributing obscene material in violation of Ga. Code § 26-2101 (1975). Cf. Robinson v. State, 143 Ga. App. 37, 38-39, 237 S. E. 2d 436, 438 (1977), vacated and remanded on other grounds, post, p. 991. The one-count indictment charged that he had sold both sexual devices, alleged to be obscene material as defined in §26-2101 (c), and a magazine, alleged to be obscene under the definition in § 26-2101 (b).
While the appellant does not claim that the definition of obscenity in subsection (b) is unconstitutional, he does ask this Court to examine the magazine in question and to determine that it is constitutionally protected as a matter of law. I continue to believe that “at least in the absence of distribution to juveniles or obtrusive exposure to unconsenting adults, the First and Fourteenth Amendments prohibit the State and *989Federal Governments from attempting wholly to suppress sexually oriented materials on the basis of their allegedly ‘obscene’ contents.” Paris Adult Theatre I v. Slaton, 413 U. S. 49, 113 (Brennan, J., dissenting). I therefore believe that the appellant’s conviction cannot constitutionally rest on the sale of an allegedly obscene magazine.
Because it cannot be determined that the jury in this case did not convict the appellant on the basis of the magazine sale alone, I would reverse the judgment of the Supreme Court of Georgia.* See Stromberg v. California, 283 U. S. 359, 368.

Like my Brother Brennan, ante, at 984 n. 1, I recognize that a majority of the Court does not share this view, and since I also agree with Part I of his dissenting opinion, I would alternatively note probable jurisdiction and hear argument in this case on the scienter issue, if three other Members of the Court were like-minded.