Board of Education v. Pico -- 457 U.S. 853 (1982). [Click Here] 

Ordered the board of the Island Trees Union Free School District in New York to return nine titles to the school library. The nine titles removed by the board were: Slaughter House Five, by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.; The Naked Ape, by Desmond Morris; Down These Mean Streets, by Piri Thomas; Best Short Stories of Negro Writers, edited by Langston Hughes; Go Ask Alice, of anonymous authorship; Laughing Boy, by Oliver LaFarge; Black Boy, by Richard Wright; A Hero Ain't Nothin' But A Sandwich, by Alice Childress; and Soul On Ice, by Eldridge Cleaver.  Acknowledged that school boards have broad power to control the informational content of schools, but also held that boards may not remove books merely because of personal objections or to enforce social or political orthodoxy.  

Butler v. Michigan --  352 U.S. 380 (1957). [Click Here]

Obscenity laws cannot be so overly broad that they reduce adults to reading only what is fit for children.

Cohen v. California -- 403 U.S. 15 (1971). [Click Here] 

Offensive words, per se, may be protected speech. 

Erznoznik v. City of Jacksonville -- 422 US 205 (1975).   [Click Here]

The court held that nudity, per se, is not automatically obscene.  Acknowledged a legitimate government interest in protecting children, even from materials that are not obscene for adults,  but emphasized that minors have Free Speech rights too, and any regulation restricting their access to protected speech must be very carefully and narrowly constructed.  

Freedman v. Maryland -- 380 U.S. 51 (1965). [Click Here]

Places strong restrictions on "prior restraint," meaning processes or procedures that can halt the initial distribution of protected speech pending review or approval.

Jenkins v. Georgia -- 418 U.S. 153 (1974). [Click Here] 

Held that contested materials must rise to certain minimum levels of explicitness before a jury can find them "patently offensive." 

Miller v. California -- 413 U.S. 15 (1973). [Click Here] 

The current legal definition of "obscenity" was established in this case.

Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union -- 521 U.S. 844 (1997).  [Click Here]

Affirmed a US District Court decision overturning the Communications Decency Act as an overly broad infringement upon the First Amendment.  The Court held that speech on the Internet is entitled to the highest level of First Amendment protection, similar to the protection the Court gives to books and newspapers.

Sable Communications v. Federal Communications Commission -- 492 U.S. 115 (1989).  [Click Here]

Held that some forms of expression about sex or sexuality may be indecent without rising to the level of obscene.  While speech that is obscene can be restricted, speech that is merely indecent cannot be restricted, as it is protected by the First Amendment.

Street v. New York -- 394 U.S. 576 (1969). [Click Here]

Freedom of Speech means that some people will be offended by what others may say.  The mere fact that such offense does or might occur is not justification for interfering in Free Speech.

United States v. American Library Association -- 539 U.S. 194 (2003). [Click Here] 

The Federal Government may require libraries receiving certain federal funds to implement internet filters on all library computers, provided that the filters can deactivated quickly upon demand by adult patrons wishing to access legitimate websites.

Winters v. People Of The State Of New York -- 333 U.S. 507 (1948). [Click Here]