Cinema Classics, Ltd. v. Busch’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 federal appellate · 2 district · 4 state decisions

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 16 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““It is appropriate to say one last word. The few samples which we have seen of the material involved in this case clearly exceed the boundaries of good taste. We do not express any opinion on whether or not they are obscene. Confronted with them, most people would probably express sentiments similar to our own as to their obnoxiousness. But constitutional principles are meant for the protection of the unpopular and the obnoxious. If the materials are found to be obscene, there are adequate remedies under the criminal laws of both the states and federal Government to punish those responsible for their circulation. But censorship in advance of such a finding is not permitted. Nor is a mass police raid undertaken without due process for the purpose of punishing those who publish materials found hateful by a majority of the citizens. “The censor and the illegal police raiding party are even less welcome in this country than the peddler of execrable sex materials, and with good cause. If such activity as appears in the instant case is not promptly rebuked and redressed, who will call an eventual halt, and where will it be called, when the civil liberties of all the citizens become more and more eroded in the name of ‘decency?’ ””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 433 F. Supp. 223 - Maguin v. Miller

2. ““Under existing decisions, the material in question in this case is presumptively within the protection of the First Amendment. A mass seizure of such material, without a prior adversary hearing and a determination therein that the material is obscene, constitutes a prior restraint on the circulation of presumptively protected material and, as such, violates the federal Constitution, [citations omitted] The proper remedy for such illegal action, and, indeed, the only feasible way to undo the effects of an illegal prior restraint on circulation, is to return the material seized or, at minimum, to return it less a small amount needed as evidence of possible criminal violations.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Sooner State News Agency, Inc. v. Fallis