Decision on U.S. v Stevens, No. 08-769
In trying to come up with some interesting topics regarding animal advocacy and free speech, I came across the case of Robert J. Stevens, an infamous dogfighter and dogfight promoter.
He shipped his dogs to
Japan to fight against other dogs and sold videos that taught others how to stage the same cruel fights.
These battles often ended in a dog’s death, disembowelment, and incomprehensible injuries.
He also wrote a book called
Dogs of Velvet and Steel. During an investigation, law enforcement officials bought three videotapes from Stevens, the first two showing footage of pit bulls in dogfights, and the third showing footage of trained pit bulls attacking wild boar.
In April 2003, law enforcement officials searched Stevens' residence and found several copies of the videos and other related merchandise.
In March 2004, a grand jury sitting in the District Court of Western Pennsylvania indicted Stevens for violating a 1999 Public Law 106-152 (Title 18, Section 48), which prohibits a person from knowingly creating, selling, or possessing “a depiction of animal cruelty with the intention of placing that depiction in interstate or foreign commerce for commercial gain.”
It was mainly aimed at “crush” videos, which cater to fetishists who gain sexual gratification from watching women torture and kill small animals by stepping on them.
An exception says this law “does not apply to any depiction that has serious religious, political, scientific, educational, journalistic, historical, or artistic value.”
Stevens moved to dismiss the indictment, arguing the law violated his First Amendment right to free speech and was therefore unconstitutional.
The District Court still denied Stevens’ motion and a jury found Stevens guilty on three counts of violating the law.
The District Court sentenced Stevens to thirty-seven months of imprisonment.
Attorneys for Stevens said his sentence was 14 months longer than Michael Vick’s prison term for running a dog-fighting ring.
Stevens appealed his convictions to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals.
The First Amendment gives anti-cruelty organizations the right to show videos by dogfighters to bring awareness to this crime. The Government contends that depictions of illegal acts of animal cruelty lack expressive value and may be regulated as unprotected speech, but the Supreme Court disagreed and struck down Public Law 106-152, Title 19, Section 48 as unconstitutional.
Stevens argued that depictions of intentional harm to animals can have genuine expressive value and that such depictions should not be categorically banned because some find them offensive.
He points out that animal rights activists, journalists, and others have properly used depictions of animal cruelty to stimulate debate about the treatment of animals.
In support of Stevens, the Cato Institute argued that if the Supreme Court decides to preserve this law, Congress would be free to ban other forms of expression, including the “defamation” of religion and depictions of criminal acts in general whenever it felt that the benefits of a speech ban outweighed the costs.
Stevens further agues that the law is too vague about what kind of speech is prohibited.
Note the exceptions in the first paragraph above, instructing exceptions for “serious religious, political, scientific, educational, journalistic, historical, or artistic value.”
Stevens says that this carve-out would have a “chilling effect” on speech, because people will be afraid to speak for fear of inadvertently violating a law.
The NRA chimed in, saying they worried about ramifications of their popular hunting videos and media.
Since hunting is illegal in the
District of Columbia, their media could result in “depictions of animal cruelty” since this law includes any depictions of unlawful killing of animals.
The Court had difficulty distinguishing between animal cruelty itself and “depictions of animal cruelty.” In his majority opinion, Chief Justice Roberts was reluctant to expand the definition of obscene material outside protection of the First Amendment beyond content of an explicitly sexual nature. The court voted 8-1 to invalidate the 1999 legislation because it covered almost any depiction of cruelty or violence to animals. The law was so broad it exposed a swath of constitutionality-protected speech to criminal prosecution. However, the opinion left open the possibility that a narrower measure could pass constitutional muster. David Horowitz, executive director of a group called the Media Coalition, applauded the ruling. “If the court were to rewrite the First Amendment every time an unpopular or distasteful subject was at issue, we wouldn’t have any free speech left,” he said. As we’ve studied in Free Speech class, this is the case of the slippery slope, where the urge to curb a recognized evil can easily lead to an even greater evil—wide censorship of a potentially growing range of content. It was best that the court struck this down allowing author Rep. Elton Gallegly (R. Calif.) to craft a narrower law.
Wayne Pacelle, President of the Humane Society, urged Congress to adopt a more narrowly crafted law.
“Congress should act swiftly to make sure the First Amendment is not used as a shield for those committing barbaric acts of cruelty, and then peddling their videos on the Internet”.
Hours after the court struck down this law on April 20, 2010, the law’s author, Rep. Elton Gallegly (R., Calif.) worked to introduce a bill that will go after the “crush videos” that originally prompted the bill.
In July 2010, the House passed his new bill and in November, the Senate unanimously approved it.
In December, President Obama signed the
Prevention of Interstate Commerce in Animal Crush Videos Act of 2010 into law.
