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New Rules For Zoning Adult Uses: The Supreme Court's Renton Decision, Alan Weinstein
New Rules For Zoning Adult Uses: The Supreme Court's Renton Decision, Alan Weinstein
Law Faculty Articles and Essays
This term, for the third time in 10 years, the U.S. Supreme Court considered the validity of zoning that restricts the location or operation of businesses that trade in sexually oriented books, magazines, movies, or entertainment. Restrictions on such "adult businesses" raise serious constitutional issues because the First Amendment's guarantee of freedom of speech extends to sexually oriented media so long as the material is not considered obscene. In the latest case, City of Renton v. Playtime Theatres, 106 S.Ct. 925 (1986), 38 ZD 258, the Court upheld a zoning ordinance that limited the location of theaters exhibiting adult movies …
Billboards, Aesthetics, And The First Amendment: Municipal Sign Regulation After Metromedia, Alan Weinstein
Billboards, Aesthetics, And The First Amendment: Municipal Sign Regulation After Metromedia, Alan Weinstein
Law Faculty Articles and Essays
In Metromedia, Inc. v. City of San Diego, 453 U.S. 490 (1981), 33 ZD 238, the U.S. Supreme Court, although sharply divided, held that states and municipalities could regulate signs and billboards to reduce traffic hazards and improve a community's appearance, but cautioned that regulations which imposed too many restrictions on protected First Amendment rights to freedom of speech would be struck down. The nine Supreme Court justices wrote five separate opinions in Metromedia, struggling to find a workable accommodation between free speech guarantees and the deference normally granted to a municipality's exercise of the police power.' This article, after …
Regulating Pornography: Recent Legal Trends, Alan C. Weinstein
Regulating Pornography: Recent Legal Trends, Alan C. Weinstein
Law Faculty Articles and Essays
Since the Supreme Court's 1976 decision in Young v. American Mini Theaters, Inc., 427 U.S. 50 (1976) local governments have been permitted to single out adult bookstores and theaters for special regulatory treatment.' In the wake of Young, many municipalities enacted "pornography zoning" ordinances based on the Detroit dispersion model. Observing this trend in 1978, the Harvard Law Review noted that these municipalities were interpreting Young as approving pornography zoning as constitutionally acceptable "in nearly all circumstances." 2 This interpretation seemed incorrect, however, to the Review's editors: "Detroit's pornography zoning was found to satisfy three established First Amendment criteria; future …