Interactive Primer: Biographies of each of the nine current justices and background information on court history and the process by which decisions are made.
Tennessee v. Lane (No. 02-1667) • Status: Argued Jan. 13, decision pending • Issue: Application of the Americans with Disabilities Act to states
Locke v. Davey (No. 02-1315) • Issue: Washington law outlawing state scholarships for students who are studying for the ministry • Status: Decision upholds Washington law (Feb. 25)
By Anne Gearan Associated Press Writer
Tuesday, March 2, 2004; 4:05 PM
Kids, don't try this at home.
The Bush administration's top Supreme Court lawyer says he typed the words "free porn" into an Internet search engine on his home computer and got a list of more than 6 million Web sites. That's proof, Solicitor General Theodore Olson told the Supreme Court on Tuesday, of the need for a law protecting children from a tide of online smut.
Internet porn is "persistent and unavoidable," Olson told the court, and government has a strong interest in shielding teenagers and younger children from it.
The problem, as the Supreme Court has observed before, is that a lot of dirty pictures are constitutionally protected free speech that adults have the right to see and buy. Children don't have the same rights, but kids and adults alike can surf the Web.
Porn is "as easily available to children as a television remote," Olson told the justices as he defended a 1998 law that Congress meant as a firewall to shield children.
The Child Online Protection Act has never taken effect. A federal appeals court struck down the law twice, on separate constitutional grounds, and it is now before the Supreme Court for a second time.
The law, known as COPA, was a replacement for a broader law that the Supreme Court rejected as unconstitutional in 1997. Congress passed COPA the following year. The retooled law is tailored to address the high court's free speech concerns, Olson said.
Several justices weren't buying it.
"It seems to me this is very sweeping," Justice Anthony M. Kennedy said at one point.
If porn sellers are flouting the existing laws about obscenity, perhaps the government should go after them more aggressively, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor suggested.
