Kois v. Wisconsin, 408 U.S. 229 (1972)

Kois v. Wisconsin

No. 71-5625

Decided June 26, 1972
408 U.S. 229

ON PETITION FOR WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO

THE SUPREME COURT OF WISCONSIN

Syllabus

Petitioner was convicted under an obscenity statute for publishing in his underground newspaper pictures of nudes and a sex poem. The State Supreme Court upheld the conviction as not violative of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Held: In the context in which they appeared, the photographs were rationally related to a news article, in conjunction with which they appeared, and were entitled to Fourteenth Amendment protection. In view of the poem’s content and placement with other poems inside the newspaper, its dominant theme cannot be said to appeal to prurient interest. Roth v. United States, 354 U.S. 476.

Certiorari granted; 51 Wis.2d 668, 188 N.W.2d 467, reversed.