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American Civil Liberties Union V. Ashcroft (2002)
''Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union'', 535 U.S. 564 (2002), followed by 542 U.S. 656 (2004), was a decision of the United States Supreme Court, ruling that the Child Online Protection Act (COPA) was unconstitutional as a violation of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, First Amendment's guarantee of Freedom of speech in the United States, freedom of speech.''Ashcroft v. Am. Civil Liberties Union'', . Background In 1996 Congress passed the Communications Decency Act (CDA). The CDA prohibited the use of the Internet to purposely send indecent material to those under 18 years of age. In 1997 the Supreme Court unanimously struck down the anti-indecency provisions of the CDA in ''Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union,'' because in the CDA lacked the precision necessary for any regulation of speech. Congress attempted to address the issue of Internet pornography with a new and more specific statute the following year. Child Online Protection Act The Child ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Child Online Protection Act
The Child Online Protection Act (COPA) was a law in the United States of America, passed in 1998 with the declared purpose of restricting access by minors to any material defined as harmful to such minors on the Internet. The law, however, never took effect, as three separate rounds of litigation led to a permanent injunction against the law in 2009. The law was part of a series of efforts by US lawmakers legislating over Internet pornography. Parts of the earlier and much broader Communications Decency Act had been struck down as unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 1997 (''Reno v. ACLU''); COPA was a direct response to that decision, narrowing the range of material covered. COPA only limits commercial speech and only affects providers based within the United States. COPA required all commercial distributors of "material harmful to minors" to restrict their sites from access by minors. "Material harmful to minors" was defined as material that by "contemporary community ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |