United States v. Thirty-Seven Photographs/Concurrence Harlan

by by John Marshall Harlan

United States Supreme Court

402 U.S. 363

United States  v.  Thirty-Seven Photographs

 Argued: Jan. 20, 1971. --- Decided: May 3, 1971

Mr. Justice HARLAN, concurring in the judgment and in Part I of Mr. Justice WHITE'S opinion.

I agree, for the reasons set forth in Part I of Mr. Justice WHITE'S opinion, that this statute may and should be construed as requiring administrative and judicial action within specified time limits that will avoid the constitutional issue that would otherwise be presented by Freedman v. Maryland, 380 U.S. 51, 85 S.Ct. 734, 13 L.Ed.2d 649 (1965). Our decision today in United States v. Reidel, 402 U.S. 351, 91 S.Ct. 1410, 28 L.Ed.2d 813, forecloses Luros' claim that the Government may not prohibit the importation of obscene materials for commercial distribution.

Luros also attacked the statute on its face as overbroad because of its apparent prohibition of importation for private use. A statutory scheme purporting to proscribe only importation for commercial purposes would certainly be sufficiently clear to withstand a facial attack on the statute based on the notion that the line between commercial and private importation is so unclear as to inhibit the alleged right to import for private use. Cf. Breard v. Alexandria, 341 U.S. 622, 71 S.Ct. 920, 95 L.Ed. 1233 (1951). It is incontestable that 19 U.S.C. § 1305(a) is intended to cover at the very least importation of obscene materials for commercial purposes. See n. 1 of Mr. Justice WHITE'S opinion. Since the parties stipulated that the materials were imported for commercial purposes, Luros cannot claim that his primary conduct was not intended to be within the statute's sweep. Cf. Dombrowski v. Pfister, 380 U.S. 479, 491-492, 85 S.Ct. 1116, 1123-1124, 14 L.Ed.2d 22 (1965). Finally, the statute includes a severability clause. 19 U.S.C. § 1652.

Thus it is apparent that we could only narrow the statute's sweep to commercial importation, were we to determine that importation for private use is constitutionally privileged. In these circumstances, the argument that Luros should be allowed to raise the question of constitutional privilege to import for private use, in order to protect the alleged First Amendment rights of private importers of obscenity from the 'chilling effects' of the statute's presence on the books, seems to me to be clearly outweighed by the policy that the resolution of constitutional questions should be avoided where not necessary to the decision of the case at hand.

I would hold that Luros lacked standing to raise the overbreadth claim. See Note, The First Amendment Overbreadth Doctrine, 83 Harv.L.Rev. 844, 910 (1970).

On the foregoing premises I join Part I of the Court's opinion and as to Part II, concur in the judgment.

Notes