Court Opinion

ID: 9434415
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:45:55.781357+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:50.299900
License: Public Domain

Justice Stevens,
concurring.
Cross burning with “an intent to intimidate,” Va. Code Ann. § 18.2-423 (1996), unquestionably qualifies as the kind of threat that is unprotected by the First Amendment. For the reasons stated in the separate opinions that Justice White and I wrote in R. A. V. v. St. Paul, 505 U. S. 377 (1992), that simple proposition provides a sufficient basis for upholding the basic prohibition in the Virginia statute even though it does not cover other types of threatening expressive conduct. With this observation, I join Justice O’Connor’s opinion.