NetChoice v. Paxton
Media Coalition Foundation signed an amicus brief urging the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals to uphold the district court finding that the Texas law on social media censorship is unconstitutional.
Category: U.S. Circuit Court
NetChoice v. Attorney General, Florida
Media Coalition Foundation signed an amicus brief submitted in the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals arguing that a Florida law that bars the removal, labeling, hiding speech, or suspending of accounts on certain social media websites of candidates for elected office or on certain “journalistic enterprises.”
Higginbotham v. City of New York
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit dismissed Higginbotham’s First Amendment retaliation lawsuit against police officers who arrested him when he was filming an Occupy Wall Street arrest.
Tobinick v. Novella
Dr. Edward Tobinick sued Dr. Steven Novella, a professor at Yale University Medical School, for criticizing his unusual medical treatments that he provides at his clinics in Florida and California. In a blog post on his website “Science Based Medicine,” Novella called Tobinick’s clinic, the Institute of Neurological Recovery, a “quack clinic.” Novella also took issue that Tobinick used the anti-inflammatory drug Enbrel to treat Alzheimer’s disease, as reported by an article in the Los Angeles Times.
Animal Legal Defense Fund v. Wasden
Media Coalition Foundation joined an amicus brief urging the Ninth Circuit to uphold the lower court’s ruling that Idaho’s “ag-gag” law is unconstitutional.
Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association
In striking down a California law that banned video games with violent content, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that all violent content is fully protected by the First Amendment for both adults and minors. The landmark ruling also set precedent that video games have the same First Amendment protection as other media. The 9th Circuit had previously ruled that the law’s labeling requirement is unconstitutional compelled speech and a content-based requirement.
Powell’s Books, Inc. v. Kroger
The 9th Circuit struck down the Oregon statute barring the dissemination of sexual material to minors that does not follow the test in Miller/Ginsberg.
American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression v. Strickland
The 6th Circuit upheld Ohio’s “harmful to minors” Internet statute after the Ohio Supreme Court narrowed it so that it does not apply to websites, listservs or public chatrooms and is limited to “personally directed” communications. In the initial part of the lawsuit, the U.S. District Court struck down a provision in the law that included depictions or descriptions of violence to the definition of “harmful to minors.”
American Civil Liberties Union v. Mukasey
The U.S. Supreme ruled in 2004 that the federal Child Online Protection Act (COPA) is overbroad and it was not the least restrictive means to prevent minors from accessing material harmful to minors. The Court remanded it to the U.S. District Court for fact-finding. The U.S. District Court struck down the law, which the 6th Circuit upheld. The Supreme Court refused to hear the case for a third time, leaving in place the decision that the law is unconstitutional.
Entertainment Software Association v. Swanson
The 8th Circuit struck down a Minnesota law that restricted the sale of rental of games rated “M” or “AO” for any content, including violence, to anyone under 17 and imposed a $25 fine on any minor purchasing or renting a restricted game.
Entertainment Software Association v. Blagojevich
The 7th Circuit upheld a U.S. District Court decision striking down an Illinois law that banned the sale or rental of video games with sexually explicit content to minors beyond what may be restricted by the Supreme Court. The District Court had previously ruled a provision in the law that banned the sale or rental of video games with violent content to minors unconstitutional, which the state did not appeal in the 7th Circuit.
Yahoo!, Inc. v. LICRA (La Ligue Contre Le Racisme et L’Antisemitisme)
A French court held U.S.-based Yahoo!, Inc. liable under a broad French anti-hate law for content carried on its auction site in the United States, because the site is accessible to French citizens.
PSINet, Inc. v. Chapman
The 4th Circuit found that a Virginia law amending the state’s existing “harmful to juveniles” law to impose restrictions on Internet content was invalid under both the First Amendment and the Commerce Clause.
American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression v. Dean
The 2nd Circuit ruled that Vermont’s “harmful to minors” law as applied to the Internet violates the First Amendment and the Commerce Clause.
Interactive Digital Software Association v. St. Louis County, Missouri
The 8th Circuit ruled unconstitutional a St. Louis County ordinance that made it a crime to knowingly sell, rent, make available, or permit the “free play of” video games with violent content to or by minors without the consent of a parent or guardian.
General Media Communications, Inc. v. Cohen
In General Media Communications v. Cohen, the 2nd Circuit Court ruled that the Military Honor and Decency Act, a law that banned the sale or rental, at a military facility, of any material that “depicts or describes nudity … in a lascivious way” is constitutional. In PMG International v. Rumsfeld, the 9th Circuit Court affirmed the U.S. District Court’s dismissal of the lawsuit arguing that the Military Honor and Decency Act is unconstitutional.
Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition
The U.S. Supreme Court struck down provisions of the Child Pornography Prevention Act of 1996 that expanded the definition of child pornography to images do not include an actual child, such as visual media involving adults portraying minors, computer-generated images, drawings and sculptures. The Court held that child pornography is limited to depictions of actual minors.
Cyberspace Communications, Inc. v. Engler
The U.S. District Court ruled that Michigan’s “harmful to minors” law as applied to the Internet violates the First Amendment.
American Amusement Machine Association, et al. v. Kendrick, et al.
The 7th Circuit ruled that an Indianapolis ordinance adding “graphic violence” to the definition of “harmful to minors” is unconstitutional.
American Civil Liberties Union v. Johnson
The 10th Circuit ruled that New Mexico’s “harmful to minors” statute as applied to the Internet is unconstitutional.
United States v. Knox
The 3rd Circuit ruled that non-nude depictions of minors can be prosecuted as child pornography.
United States v. PHE, Inc.
The 10th Circuit Court of Appeals found that the Justice Department’s use of multi-jurisdictional prosecutions against Adam and Eve, a mail order business for sexually explicit materials, to force the company out of business was malicious.
American Booksellers Association, Inc. v. Webb
The 11th Circuit found that the Georgia “harmful to minors” law is constitutional but narrowed the scope of the law to limits on display only if the material is harmful to the oldest minors.
Virginia v. American Booksellers Association, Inc.
The 4th Circuit upheld Virginia’s “harmful to minors” display law after the Virginia Supreme Court narrowed it to apply only to the display of materials that would be illegal for the oldest minors. Before remanding the case to the 4th Circuit, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed the plaintiffs’ standing to challenge the law absent the threat of prosecution.
American Booksellers Association, Inc. v. Schiff
The U.S. District Court ruled that New Mexico’s minors’ access is constitutional after limiting the statute’s definition of “harmful to minors.”
