Ginsberg v. New York, 390 U.S. 629 (1968)
The issue in this case was whether a New York criminal obscenity statute that prohibited the sale of magazines with sexual content to minors was constitutional on its face. A store owner was found guilty of selling two adult magazines to a 16 year old boy in violation of the criminal statute prohibiting the sale of such magazines to minors. The state supreme court affirmed the conviction and the store owner was denied leave to appeal to the state court of appeals. The store owner alleged that the constitutional freedom of expression secured to a citizen to read or see sexually explicit material could not depend upon the age of a citizen.
The U.S. Supreme Court affirmed the judgment of the lower court, finding that the statute did not “invade[s] the area of freedom of expression constitutionally secured to minors.” 390 U.S. at 637. The Court found that the criminal statute in question was rationally related to the interest of protecting children because both parents and the state have an interest in the well being of children. The Court also held that it was rational for the legislature to find that the minors’ exposure to sexually explicitly magazines might be harmful to children, even if the same material is suitable for adults. Thus, the Court found that the statute was constitutional and affirmed the lower court.
http://apps.americanbar.org/litigation/committees/childrights/content/notes/landmark_01.html
Not sure how this is different.
The battle for community standards was lost long ago. Some of the comments from other FReepers are enlightening. There was a time when a majority could vote to restrict minors from purchasing obscene materials. It’s a complete sham to say parents are to blame, but that’s what you’ll hear from many posters. Parents cannot watch their minor children all of the time. Yet, some FReepers say society has no responsibility whatsoever to protect its children from filth as defined by a majority of voters. Now the SCOTUS is affirming the right of minors to go out and buy materials from adults who are more than willing to sell the products, the wishes of the parents notwithstanding. It just goes how far our morality has slipped over the decades. Keep in mind that such laws in NO way restrict the rights of ADULTS to obtain said obscene or violent materials.
The short version: The court says violence is different than obscenity. From Scalia's opinion:
"California’s argument would fare better if there were a longstanding tradition in this country of specially restricting children’s access to depictions of violence, but there is none. Certainly the books we give children to read - or read to them when they are younger - contain no shortage of gore.Grimm’s Fairy Tales, for example, are grim indeed. As her just desserts for trying to poison Snow White, the wicked queen is made to dance in red hot slippers “till she fell dead on the floor, a sad example of envy and jealousy."
The majority opinion (by Scalia) holds that limits on the First Amendment are limited to the ones that existed when the Amendment was enacted 9an original intent argument). There were laws against obscenity in 1789, but none against violence in literature, so the First Amendment protects violent speech more than sexually explicit speech.