| New York v. Ferber
(No. 81-55)
52 N.Y.2d 674, 422 N.E.2d 523, reversed and remanded. |
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| Syllabus
| Opinion
[ White ] | Concurrence
[ O'Connor ] | Concurrence
[ Brennan ] | Concurrence
[ Stevens ] |
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New York v. Ferber
CERTIORARI TO THE COURT OF APPEALS OF NEW YORK
JUSTICE O'CONNOR, concurring.
Although I join the Court's opinion, I write separately to stress that the Court does not hold that New York must except "material with serious literary, scientific, or educational value," ante at 766, from its statute. The Court merely holds that, even if the First Amendment shelters such material, New York's current statute is not sufficiently overbroad to support respondent's facial attack. The compelling interests identified in today's opinion, see ante at 756-764, suggest that the Constitution might, in fact, permit New York to ban knowing distribution of works depicting minors engaged in explicit sexual conduct, regardless of the social value of the depictions. For example, a 12-year-old child photographed while [p775] masturbating surely suffers the same psychological harm whether the community labels the photograph "edifying" or "tasteless." The audience's appreciation of the depiction is simply irrelevant to New York's asserted interest in protecting children from psychological, emotional, and mental harm.
An exception for depictions of serious social value, moreover, would actually increase opportunities for the content-based censorship disfavored by the First Amendment. As drafted, New York's statute does not attempt to suppress the communication of particular ideas. The statute permits discussion of child sexuality, forbidding only attempts to render the "portrayal[s] somewhat more ‘realistic' by utilizing or photographing children." Ante at 763. Thus, the statute attempts to protect minors from abuse without attempting to restrict the expression of ideas by those who might use children as live models.
On the other hand, it is quite possible that New York's statute is overbroad because it bans depictions that do not actually threaten the harms identified by the Court. For example, clinical pictures of adolescent sexuality, such as those that might appear in medical textbooks, might not involve the type of sexual exploitation and abuse targeted by New York's statute. Nor might such depictions feed the poisonous "kiddie porn" market that New York and other States have attempted to regulate. Similarly, pictures of children engaged in rites widely approved by their cultures, such as those that might appear in issues of the National Geographic, might not trigger the compelling interests identified by the Court. It is not necessary to address these possibilities further today, however, because this potential overbreadth is not sufficiently substantial to warrant facial invalidation of New York's statute.