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Kingsley Books, Inc. v. Brown, 354 U.S. 436 (1957)
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General SummaryThis case is from a collection containing the full text of over 16,000 Supreme Court cases from 1793 to the present. The body of Supreme Court decisions are, effectively, the final interpretation of the Constitution. Only an amendment to the Constitution can permanently overturn an interpretation and this has happened only four times in American history.
Kingsley Books, Inc. v. Brown, 354 U.S. 436 (1957)
Kingsley Books, Inc. v. Brown No. 107 Argued April 22, 1957 Decided June 24, 1957 354 U.S. 436
APPEAL FROM THE COURT OF APPEALS OF NEW YORK
Syllabus
In a proceeding under §22-a of the New York Code of Criminal Procedure, a State Court, sitting in equity, found that certain booklets displayed for sale by appellants were clearly obscene, and it enjoined their further distribution and ordered their destruction.
Held: resort to this remedy by the State was not violative of the freedom of speech and press protected by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment from encroachment by the States. Pp. 437-445.
(a) A State could constitutionally convict appellants for keeping for sale booklets found to be obscene. Alberts v. California, post, p. 476. P. 440.
(b) Nothing in the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment restricts a State to the criminal process in seeking to protect its people from the dissemination of pornography. P. 441.
(c) The injunction here sustained no more amounts to a "prior restraint" on freedom of speech or press than did the criminal prosecution in Alberts v. California, supra, where the defendant was fined, sentenced to imprisonment, and put on probation for two years on condition that he not violate the obscenity statute. Pp. 441-444.
(d) The Due Process Clause does not subject the States to the necessity of having trials by jury in misdemeanor prosecutions, and the procedure prescribed by § 22-a of the New York statute for determination whether a publication is obscene does not differ in essential procedural safeguards from that provided under many state statutes making the distribution of obscene publications a misdemeanor. Pp. 443-444.
(e) The provision in § 22-a for the seizure and destruction of instruments of ascertained wrongdoing is a resort to a legal remedy long sanctioned in Anglo-American law. P. 444.
(f) Near v. Minnesota, 283 U.S. 697, distinguished. P. 445.
1 N.Y.2d 177, 134 N.E.2d 461, affirmed.
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Chicago: U.S. Supreme Court, "Syllabus," Kingsley Books, Inc. v. Brown, 354 U.S. 436 (1957) in 354 U.S. 436 354 U.S. 437. Original Sources, accessed November 25, 2024, http://originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=Y9Y72I3HEPD62LB.
MLA: U.S. Supreme Court. "Syllabus." Kingsley Books, Inc. v. Brown, 354 U.S. 436 (1957), in 354 U.S. 436, page 354 U.S. 437. Original Sources. 25 Nov. 2024. http://originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=Y9Y72I3HEPD62LB.
Harvard: U.S. Supreme Court, 'Syllabus' in Kingsley Books, Inc. v. Brown, 354 U.S. 436 (1957). cited in 1957, 354 U.S. 436, pp.354 U.S. 437. Original Sources, retrieved 25 November 2024, from http://originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=Y9Y72I3HEPD62LB.
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