''Erie v. Pap's A. M.'', 529 U.S. 277 (2000), was a

landmark decision Landmark court decisions, in present-day common law legal systems, establish precedents that determine a significant new legal principle or concept, or otherwise substantially affect the interpretation of existing law. "Leading case" is commonly ...

by the

Supreme Court of the United States The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all Federal tribunals in the United States, U.S. federal court cases, and over Stat ...

regarding

nude dancing A striptease is an erotic or exotic dance in which the performer gradually undresses, either partly or completely, in a seductive and sexually suggestive manner. The person who performs a striptease is commonly known as a "stripper", "exotic dan ...

free speech Freedom of speech is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or a community to articulate their opinions and ideas without fear of retaliation, censorship, or legal sanction. The right to freedom of expression has been recognise ...

. The court held that an ordinance banning

public nudity Nudity is the state of being in which a human is without clothing. While estimates vary, for the first 90,000 years of pre-history, anatomically modern humans were naked, having lost their body hair, living in hospitable climates, and not ...

did not violate the operator of a totally nude entertainment establishment's constitutional right to free speech..

Prior history

On September 28, 1994, the city council of

Erie, Pennsylvania Erie is a city on the south shore of Lake Erie and the county seat of Erie County, Pennsylvania, United States. It is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, fifth-most populous city in Pennsylvania and the most populous in Northwestern Pen ...

, enacted Ordinance 75–1994, a

public indecency Indecent exposure is the deliberate public exposure by a person of a portion of their body in a manner contrary to local standards of appropriate behavior. Laws and social attitudes regarding indecent exposure vary significantly in different ...

ordinance that makes it a

summary offense A summary offence or petty offence is a violation in some common law jurisdictions that can be proceeded against summarily, without the right to a jury trial and/or indictment (required for an indictable offence). Canada In Canada, summary offe ...

to knowingly or intentionally appear in public in a "state of nudity."Ordinance 75-1994, City of Erie, Pennsylvania The respondent, Pap's, a Pennsylvania corporation, operated an establishment in Erie known as "Kandyland" that featured totally nude erotic dancing performed by women. To comply with the ordinance, these dancers would need to wear, at a minimum,

pasties Pasties (singular pasty or pastie) are patches that cover a person's nipples and areolae, typically self-adhesive or affixed with adhesive. They are usually worn in pairs. They originated as part of burlesque shows, allowing dancers to perform ...

and a

G-string A G-string is a garment consisting of a narrow piece of material that barely covers the genitals, a string-like piece that passes between the buttocks, and a very thin waistband around the hips. There are designs for both women and men. Men's G- ...

. On October 14, 1994, two days after the ordinance went into effect, Pap's filed a complaint against the city of Erie, the mayor (Joyce Savacchio), city solicitor (Gregory A. Karle), and members of the city council, seeking declaratory relief and a permanent injunction against the enforcement of the ordinance. The

Court of Common Pleas A court of common pleas is a common kind of court structure found in various common law jurisdictions. The form originated with the Court of Common Pleas at Westminster, which was created to permit individuals to press civil grievances against one ...

struck down the ordinance as unconstitutional, but the Commonwealth Court reversed the decision. The

Pennsylvania Supreme Court The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania is the highest court in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania's Unified Judicial System. It began in 1684 as the Provincial Court, and casual references to it as the "Supreme Court" of Pennsylvania were made offici ...

in turn reversed the Commonwealth Court, finding that the ordinance's public nudity section was an unconstitutional violation of Pap's

First Amendment First most commonly refers to: * First, the ordinal form of the number 1 First or 1st may also refer to: Acronyms * Faint Images of the Radio Sky at Twenty-Centimeters, an astronomical survey carried out by the Very Large Array * Far Infrared a ...

rights.

Certiorari In law, ''certiorari'' is a court process to seek judicial review of a decision of a lower court or government agency. ''Certiorari'' comes from the name of a prerogative writ in England, issued by a superior court to direct that the recor ...

was granted on appeal from the State Supreme Court.

Case

Mootness

The Court proceeded to the merits despite a possible mootness issue. While the case was pending, Pap's A.M. went out of business, meaning that no concrete private rights were left to litigate. Despite going out of business, the Supreme Court still proceeded to decide the case on the merits because 1) the City of Erie was suffering an "ongoing injury" and 2) Pap's was still incorporated and could potentially go back into business.

Rules of law

The Court found the following rules of law to apply: *Being in a state of nudity is not an inherently expressive condition. Totally nude erotic dancing is expressive conduct, although it falls only within the outer ambit of the protection of the First Amendment to the

United States Constitution The Constitution of the United States is the Supremacy Clause, supreme law of the United States, United States of America. It superseded the Articles of Confederation, the nation's first constitution, on March 4, 1789. Originally includi ...

. *Government restrictions on public nudity that ban all public nudity should be evaluated under the framework set forth in ''

United States v. O'Brien ''United States v. O'Brien'', 391 U.S. 367 (1968), was a List of landmark court decisions in the United States, landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court, ruling that a criminal prohibition against Draft-card burning, burning a draft c ...

'' for content-neutral restrictions on symbolic speech. *While the doctrinal theories behind incidental burdens and secondary effects are, of course, not identical, there is nothing objectionable about a city passing a general ordinance to ban public nudity, even though such a ban may place incidental burdens on some protected speech, and at the same time recognizing that one specific occurrence of public nudity, nude erotic dancing, is particularly problematic because it produces harmful secondary effects. *For purposes of analysis under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, even if a regulation has an incidental effect on some speakers or messages but not others, the regulation is content neutral if it can be justified without reference to the content of the expression.

Test

After determining that the ordinance was content neutral, the Court then applied the ''O'Brien'' test. The first factor of the ''O'Brien'' test for evaluating restrictions on symbolic speech is whether the government regulation is within the constitutional power of the government to enact. The second factor of the ''O'Brien'' test for evaluating restrictions on symbolic speech is whether the regulation furthers an important or substantial government interest. The third ''O'Brien'' factor is that the government interest must be unrelated to the suppression of free expression. The fourth and final ''O'Brien'' factor is that the restriction be no greater than is essential to the furtherance of the government interest. The court found that the ordinance met all four factors of the ''O'Brien'' test, and that a "least restrictive means" analysis was not necessary. The Court reversed the decision of the

, and found the ordinance to be constitutional.

Aftermath

The effects of this case reach beyond simple restriction of nudity. The majority opinion noted:

Concurrence

Justice

Scalia Antonin Gregory Scalia (March 11, 1936 – February 13, 2016) was an American jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1986 until his death in 2016. He was described as the intellectual an ...

, joined by Justice

Thomas Thomas may refer to: People * List of people with given name Thomas * Thomas (name) * Thomas (surname) * Saint Thomas (disambiguation) * Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) Italian Dominican friar, philosopher, and Doctor of the Church * Thomas the A ...

, agreed that the

's decision must be reversed, but disagreed with the mode of analysis that should be applied.

References

External links

* {{US1stAmendment Freedom of Speech Clause Supreme Court case law, state=collapsed United States Supreme Court cases United States Free Speech Clause case law 1994 in United States case law 2000 in United States case law History of Erie, Pennsylvania Legal history of Pennsylvania 2000 in Pennsylvania Strip clubs United States Supreme Court cases of the Rehnquist Court