In order for such ordinances to be effective, they must be able to describe the establishments they regulate in terms at least slightly broader than the Miller definition of obscenity. Were the Miller standard to be used, the administrative enforcement mechanism commonly in force with respect to zoning would become bogged down in the more cumbersome procedures characteristic of full trials. Most such ordinances, therefore, regulate establishments that specialize in sexually explicit material, and usually the ordinance contains a definition of sexually explicit material that is more precise but more expansive than Miller.59 Although such ordinances include more than could criminally be prosecuted under Miller, the Supreme Court has approved zoning regulation of this variety, first in 1976 in Young v. American Mini Theatres, Inc.,60 and then again in February 1986 in City of Renton v. Playtime Theatres, Inc.61

59 For example, the Detroit ordinance that was before the Supreme Court in the Young case defined as an "adult establishment" any establishment concentrating on offering material emphasizing "specified sexual activities" or "specified anatomical areas." "Specified sexual activities" were defined to include, for example, "Human Genitals in a state of sexual stimulation or arousal," "Acts of human masturbation, sexual intercourse or sodomy," and "Fondling or other erotic touching of human genitals, public region, buttock or female breast." The definition of "Specified anatomical areas" was similarly broader than would be permitted by Miller if the aim were total prohibition. the extent that zoning approaches concentrate on establishments specializing in this material, we note that such approaches may have the effect of providing incentives for attempts to introduce more plainly pornographic material into more mainstream outlets.

Το

The most significant qualification imposed by the Court is the requirement that the zoning regulation not have the effect of a total prohibition.62

The result, therefore, is that if

communities wish to restrict the location of such "adults only" establishments, they may do so, but they may not under the guise of zoning banish them altogether.

Witnesses who have testified before us about zoning approaches in their localities have by and large not endorsed these approaches. Most of these witnesses, however, have been

law enforcement personnel who would prefer prohibition to relocation. The zoning approach, which is not aimed at prohibition, is not surprisingly a poor tool if prohibition is the desired result.

Moreover, in most localities these ordinances contain "grandfather" clauses, eliminating from the restrictions those

establishments already in place on the date of enactment of the ordinance.63 Thus the result has often been to prevent the problem from growing, but has done little to diminish the extent of an existing problem.

It has been suggested that zoning may be the ideal solution to the problem of pornography, because it allows people who wish access to this material to have such access without having its

62 On this point, see, Schad v. Mt. Ephraim, 452 U.S. 61 (1981).

63

Although such clauses may be required by state law, note that nothing in the First Amendment, or in federal constitutional law generally, would require such an approach.

we

sale intrude on the lives and sensibilities of the majority of the population who wish to have nothing to do with it. This solution is ideal, however, only under the presupposition that the material is not indeed harmful except insofar as it causes offense to non-users. With respect to sexually violent material and degrading material, we have found that the evidence does not support such a modest view of the likely consequences, and thus we reject an equivalently modest remedy for what we take to be harmful material, even when its access is restricted to willing buyers. If indeed the material in these categories is harmful, as we have found it to be, we cannot consistent with that finding urge a remedy of moving it to another part of town.

With respect to materials that are neither violent nor degrading, however, both the evidence of harms and the level of societal consensus are less, and zoning might possibly be more appropriate for establishments restricting their stock to materials in this category. As suggested above in Section 6.3.4, the absence of evidence for this material of a causal connection with sexual violence, sexual aggression, or sex discrimination may suggest lower prosecutorial priority within a system of enforcement of the criminal laws. But even for localities that may choose this course, the offensiveness of these materials and the deleterious effects on the neighborhoods in which they are made available may still be seen to justify some restriction. If this is the case, then zoning may be the appropriate way to deal with materials of this variety, although many of us are concerned

that in practice such an approach will concentrate such

establishments in or near the most economically disadvantaged

segments of a locality.

Some of us fear that zoning may be a way

for those with political power to shunt the establishments they do not want in their own neighborhoods into the neighborhoods of those with less wealth and less political power.

Restrictions on public display, whether through the criminal law or zoning ordinances, are in effect another form of zoning. The concept here is that there may be many materials that, regardless of their alleged harmlessness, and regardless of the fact that they are not legally obscene, ought not to be displayed in a manner that offends unwilling viewers. Moreover, the public display does not differentiate between passersby who are adults and those who are children, and taking into account the likelihood that children will be exposed to this material at inappropriate ages justifies restrictions that might seem harsh in settings involving only adults. Even those most likely to oppose obscenity regulation would, we suspect, have little difficulty in principle with restricting sexually explicit material from billboards. None of us has difficulty with this either, even when extended somewhat beyond the legally obscene. We believe that public display regulations, including but not limited to the control of advertising materials displayed on the exterior of adult establishments, and including but not limited to the display ordinances requiring shielding of the covers of sexually explicit magazines, are fully justifiable measures in a

If

society that has long restricted indecent exposure. copulating in a public park may be restricted, we are not troubled by regulations prohibiting billboards depicting copulation.

We ought finally to mention in this section the attempts in a number of communities to restrict "adults only" pornographic establishments through the use of nuisance laws and related legal remedies. Nuisance laws, when applied to sexually explicit materials, are attempts to serve many of the interests that generated the zoning approach, but here the aim is prohibition rather than relocation. The desired result in most such legal actions is an injunction against further operation of the establishment. For that reason, all effective uses of this approach have thus far been found unconstitutional.

Even where

an establishment has been found guilty of a criminal obscenity violation, the law as of this moment does not permit the finding of obscenity with respect to one magazine, or one film, to justify what is in fact a restriction on other films and other magazines not yet determined to be legally obscene, and therefore presumptively protected by the First Amendment. Total prohibition, therefore, on the state of the law right now, seems much more likely to stem from substantial criminal penalties for those involved with such establishments than from civil remedies directed in some way directed against the establishment and not

the person.

6.5 The Civil Rights Approach to Pornography