Stanley v. Georgia

• Court: U.S. Supreme Court
• Writing for the Court: MARSHALL
• Citation: Stanley v. Georgia, 394 U.S. 557, 89 S.Ct. 1243, 22 L.Ed.2d 542 (1969)
• Decision Date: 07 April 1969
• Docket Number: No. 293,293
• Parties: Robert Eli STANLEY, Appellant, v. State of GEORGIA

394 U.S. 557

89 S.Ct. 1243

22 L.Ed.2d 542

Robert Eli STANLEY, Appellant,

v State of GEORGIA.

No. 293.

Argued Jan. 14 and 15, 1969.

Decided April 7, 1969.

Wesley R. Asinof, Atlanta, Ga., for appellant.

J. Robert Sparks, Atlanta, Ga., for appellee.

Mr. Justice MARSHALL delivered the opinion of the Court.

An investigation of appellant's alleged bookmaking activities led to the issuance of a search warrant for appellant's home. Under authority of this warrant, federal and state agents secured entrance. They found very little evidence of bookmaking activity, but while looking through a desk drawer in an upstairs bedroom, one of the federal agents, accompanied by a state officer, found three reels of eight-millimeter film. Using a projector and screen found in an upstairs living room, they viewed the films. The state officer concluded that they were obscene and seized them. Since a further examination of the bedroom indicated that appellant occupied it, he was charged with possession of obscene matter and placed under arrest. He was later indicted for 'knowingly hav(ing) possession of * * * obscene matter' in violation of Georgia law.¹ Appel- lant was tried before a jury and convicted. The Supreme Court of Georgia affirmed. Stanley v. State, 224 Ga. 259, 161 S.E.2d 309 (1968). We noted probable jurisdiction of an appeal brought under 28 U.S.C. § 1257(2), 393 U.S. 819, 89 S.Ct. 124, 21 L.Ed.2d 90 (1968).

Appellant raises several challenges to the validity of his conviction.² We find it necessary to consider only one. Appellant argues here, and argued below, that the Georgia obscenity statute, insofar as it punishes mere private possession of obscene matter, violates the First Amendment, as made applicable to the States by the Fourteenth Amendment. For reasons set forth below, we agree that the mere private possession of obscene matter cannot constitutionally be made a crime.

The court below saw no valid constitutional objection to the Georgia statute, even though it extends further than the typical statute forbidding commercial sales of obscene material. It held that '(i)t is not essential to an indictment charging one with possession of obscene matter that it be alleged that such possession was 'with intent to sell, expose or circulate the same." Stanley v. State, supra, 224 Ga., at 261, 161 S.E.2d, at 311. The State and appellant both agree that the question here before us is whether 'a statute imposing criminal sanctions upon the mere (knowing) possession of obscene matter' is constitutional. In this context, Georgia concedes that the present case appears to be one of 'first impression * * * on this exact point,'³ but contends that since 'obscenity is not within the area of constitutionally protected speech or press,' Roth v. United States, 354 U.S. 476, 485, 77 S.Ct. 1304, 1309, 1 L.Ed.2d 1498 (1957), the States are free, subject to the limits of other provisions of the Constitution, see, e.g., Ginsberg v. New York, 390 U.S. 629, 637—645, 88 S.Ct. 1274, 1279—1283, 20 L.Ed.2d 195 (1968), to deal with it any way deemed necessary, just as they may deal with possession of other things thought to be detrimental to the welfare of their citizens. If the State can protect the body of a citizen, may it not, argues Georgia, protect his mind?

It is true that Roth does declare, seemingly without qualification, that obscenity is not protected by the First Amendment. That statement has been repeated in various forms in subsequent cases. See, e.g. Smith v. California, 361 U.S. 147, 152, 80 S.Ct. 215, 218, 4 L.Ed.2d 205 (1959); Jacobellis v. Ohio, 378 U.S. 184, 186—187, 84 S.Ct. 1676, 1677—1678, 12 L.Ed.2d 793 (1964) (opinion of Brennan, J.); Ginsberg v. New York, supra, 390 U.S., at 635, 88 S.Ct., at 1278. However, neither Roth nor any subsequent decision of this Court dealt with the precise problem involved in the present case. Roth was convicted of mailing obscene circulars and advertising, and an obscene book, in violation of a federal obscenity statute.⁴ The defendant in a companion case, Alberts v. California, 354 U.S. 476, 77 S.Ct. 1304, 1 L.Ed.2d 1498 (1957), was convicted of 'lewdly keeping for sale obscene and indecent books, and (of) writing, composing and publishing an obscene advertisement of them * * *.' Id., at 481, 77 S.Ct., at 1307. None of the statements cited by the Court in Roth for the proposition that 'this Court has always assumed that obscenity is not protected by the freedoms of speech and press' were made in the context of a statute punishing mere private possession of obscene material; the cases cited deal for the most part with use of the mails to distribute objectionable material or with some form of public distribution or dissemination.⁵ Moreover, none of this Court's decisions subsequent to Roth involved prosecution for private possession of obscene materials. Those cases dealt with the power of the State and Federal Governments to prohibit or regulate certain public actions taken or intended to be taken with respect to obscene matter.⁶ Indeed, with one exception, we have been unable to discover any case in which the issue in the present case has been fully considered.⁷

In this context, we do not believe that this case can be decided simply by citing Roth. Roth and its progeny certainly do mean that the First and Fourteenth Amendments recognize a valid governmental interest in dealing with the problem of obscenity. But the assertion of that interest cannot, in every context, be insulated from all constitutional protections. Neither Roth nor any other decision of this Court reaches that far. As the Court said in Roth itself, '(c)easeless vigilance is the watchword to prevent * * * erosion (of First Amendment rights) by Congress or by the States. The door barring federal the state intrusion into this area cannot be left ajar; it must be kept tightly closed and opened only the slightest crack necessary to prevent encroachment upon more important interests.' 354 U.S., at 488, 77 S.Ct., at 1311. Roth and the cases following it discerned such an 'important interest' in the regulation of commercial distribution of obscene material. That holding cannot foreclose an examination of the constitutional implications of a statute forbidding mere private possession of such material.

It is now well established that the Constitution protects the right to receive information and ideas. 'This freedom (of speech and press) * * * necessarily protects the right to receive * * *.' Martin v. City of Struthers, 319 U.S. 141, 143, 63 S.Ct. 862, 863, 87 L.Ed. 1313 (1943); see Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479, 482, 85 S.Ct. 1678, 1680, 14 L.Ed.2d 510 (1965); Lamont v. Postmaster General, 381 U.S. 301, 307—308, 85 S.Ct. 1493, 1496 1497, 14 L.Ed.2d 398 (1965) (Brennan, J., concurring); cf. Pierce v. Society of the Sisters, 268 U.S. 510, 45 S.Ct. 571, 69 L.Ed. 1070 (1925). This right to receive information and ideas, regardless of their social worth, see Winters v. New York, 333 U.S. 507, 510, 68 S.Ct. 665, 667, 92 L.Ed. 840 (1948), is fundamental to our free society. Moreover, in the context of this case—a prosecution for mere possession of printed or filmed matter in the privacy of a person's own home—that right takes on an added dimension. For also fundamental is the right to be free, except in very limited circumstances, from unwanted governmental intrusions into one's privacy.

'The makers of our Constitution undertook to secure conditions favorable to the pursuit of happiness. They recognized the significance of man's spiritual nature, of his feelings and of his intellect. They knew that only a part of the pain, pleasure and satisfactions of life are to be found in material things. They sought to protect Americans in their beliefs, their thoughts, their emotions and their sensations. They conferred, as against the government, the right to be let alone—the most comprehensive of rights and the right most valued by civilized man.' Olmstead v. United States, 277 U.S. 438, 478, 48 S.Ct. 564, 572, 72 L.Ed. 944 (1928) (Brandeis, J., dissenting).

See Griswold v. Connecticut, supra; cf. NAACP v. Alabama, 357 U.S. 449, 462, 78 S.Ct. 1163, 1171, 2 L.Ed.2d 1488 (1958).

These are the rights that appellant is asserting in the case before us. He is asserting the right to read or observe what he pleases—the right to satisfy his intellectual and emotional needs in the privacy of his own home. He is asserting the right to be free from state inquiry into the contents of his library. Georgia contends that appellant does not have these rights, that there are certain types of materials that the individual may not read or even possess. Georgia justifies this assertion by arguing that the films in the present case are obscene. But we think that mere categorization of these films as 'obscene' is insufficient justification for such a drastic invasion of personal liberties guaranteed by the First and Fourteenth Amendments. Whatever may be the justifications for other statutes regulating obscenity, we do not think they reach into the privacy of one's own home. If the First Amendmen means anything, it means that a State has no business telling a man, sitting alone in his own house, what books he may read or what films he may watch. Our whole constitutional heritage rebels at the thought of giving government the power to control men's minds.

And yet, in the face of these traditional notions of individual liberty, Georgia asserts the right to protect the individual's mind from the effects of obscenity. We are not certain that this argument amounts to anything more than the assertion that the State has the right to control the moral content of a person's thoughts.⁸ To some, this may be a noble purpose, but it is wholly inconsistent with the philosophy of the First Amendment. As the Court said in Kingsley International Pictures Corp. v. Regents, 360 U.S. 684, 688—689, 79 S.Ct. 1362, 1365, 3 L.Ed.2d 1512 (1959), '(t)his argument...