Burstyn v. Wilson
Burstyn v. Wilson is a landmark Supreme Court case from 1952 that addressed the issue of film censorship and the First Amendment rights of filmmakers. The case arose when the New York censors banned the Italian film "The Miracle," which depicted a peasant girl's belief that her child was Jesus Christ, labeling it as "sacrilegious." This ruling sparked a significant legal debate regarding the standards used for censorship, particularly the vagueness of the term "sacrilegious." The Supreme Court unanimously overturned a prior ruling from 1915, which had deemed films as mere business and not protected by free expression rights.
In its decision, the Court emphasized that preexhibition censorship should only occur in exceptional circumstances and that censors should not have unfettered discretion. While acknowledging that films might warrant slightly less First Amendment protection than other forms of expression, the ruling signaled a shift towards greater freedoms for filmmakers. The case set important precedents for future rulings on obscenity and censorship, leading to stricter standards and judicial review processes in subsequent cases, such as Roth v. United States and Freedman v. Maryland. Overall, Burstyn v. Wilson represents a critical moment in the evolution of free expression rights in the context of film.
Burstyn v. Wilson
Date: May 26, 1952
Citation: 343 U.S. 495
Issue: Freedom of speech
Significance: The Supreme Court held, for the first time, that films were a medium for expressing ideas and therefore deserved a degree of protection under the First and Fourteenth Amendments.
The film in question, The Miracle, was an Italian import that told the story of a peasant girl who, after being seduced by a stranger, gave birth to a son she believed to be Jesus Christ. The New York censors ruled that the film was “sacrilegious,” and it was banned from the state. The practice of film censorship had been approved by the Supreme Court in its first ruling on films, Mutual Film Corp. v. Industrial Commission of Ohio (1915), which held that films were not covered by any constitutional guarantee of free expression because they were “business pure and simple.”
The Court unanimously reversed the 1915 ruling and ruled that the vague concept “sacrilegious” was unacceptable as a standard for prior restraint. Justice Tom C. Clark’s opinion for the majority argued that preexhibition censorship was justified only in exceptional cases, and that standards must not permit unfettered discretion by censors. Clark acknowledged that films, because of their special potential for harm, might enjoy less First Amendment protection than printed materials, but he refused to discuss whether states had a legitimate interest in censoring pornographic films.
The prerogative of states to engage in film censorship was further restricted in Roth v. United States (1957), when the Court narrowly defined obscenity and ruled that any nonobscene expression of ideas was protected by the First and Fourteenth Amendments. In Freedman v. Maryland (1965), the Court continued to allow censorship of films but only under stringent procedures that include prompt judicial review.