The Associated Press calls the Supreme Court session "lively". On Wednesday, the nation's highest court heard arguments in a Pennsylvania case involving a public indecency law in Erie, the far reaches of free speech, and some rather colorful discourse.
"Nude entertainment has become a significant staple of the American scene... 3,000 adult clubs nationwide," argued attorney John Weston for the plaintiffs in the suit. The ordinance requires exotic dancers to wear at least pasties and a G-string.
Justice Stephen Breyer suggested some nude dancing has "as much to do with (free) expression as turning a mouse loose in a house. You are intending to get a reaction, not to express something."
The Supreme Court had ruled eight years ago that nude dancing is a form of expression within the First Amendment's "outer perimeters" and thus immune to government censorship, but the ruling also allowed Indiana to ban all barroom-style nude dancing under a state law.
Weston represents the owner of a nude bar now closed. He argued the Erie law was aimed directly at adult nightclubs, not at public nudity, making a constitutional difference. Justice David H. Souter seemed to agree, the AP says, when he said the ordinance "as applied ... is not covering all nudity" and may be guilty of making content-based distinctions.
Erie city attorney Gregory Karle called the law content-neutral and argued it only sought the same restrictions as those the Court approved in 1991. Pennsylvania's Supreme Court didn't quite agree, throwing it out and calling the 1991 U.S. Supreme Court ruling "a hodgepodge of opinions" offering little guidance, the AP says.
Justice Antonin Scalia mulled whether the Erie law would be enforced against someone appearing in public "while in the buff", the AP continues, while Karle tried to distance himself from his previous assurance to a Pennsylvania judge that the ordinance would not be used to censor such productions as "Equus" and "Hair."
At that point, the AP says, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy leaned forward and told Karle, "I think your answer is getting worse."
The Supreme Court will decide the case by late June.
