Cite as: 505 U. S. 377 (1992)
Opinion of the Court
The concurrences describe us as setting forth a new First Amendment principle that prohibition of constitutionally proscribable speech cannot be "underinclusiv[e]," post, at 402 (White, J., concurring in judgment)—a First Amendment "absolutism" whereby "[w]ithin a particular 'proscribable' category of expression, . . . a government must either proscribe all speech or no speech at all," post, at 419 (Stevens, J., concurring in judgment). That easy target is of the concurrences' own invention. In our view, the First Amendment imposes not an "underinclusiveness" limitation but a "content discrimination" limitation upon a State's prohibition of proscribable speech. There is no problem whatever, for example, with a State's prohibiting obscenity (and other forms of proscribable expression) only in certain media or markets, for although that prohibition would be "underinclusive," it would not discriminate on the basis of content. See, e. g., Sable Communications, 492 U. S., at 124-126 (upholding 47 U. S. C. § 223(b)(1), which prohibits obscene telephone communications).
Even the prohibition against content discrimination that we assert the First Amendment requires is not absolute. It applies differently in the context of proscribable speech than in the area of fully protected speech. The rationale of the general prohibition, after all, is that content discrimination "raises the specter that the Government may effectively drive certain ideas or viewpoints from the marketplace," Simon & Schuster, 502 U. S., at 116; Leathers v. Medlock, 499 U. S. 439, 448 (1991); FCC v. League of Women Voters of Cal., 468 U. S. 364, 383-384 (1984); Consolidated Edison Co., 447 U. S., at 536; Police Dept. of Chicago v. Mosley, 408 U. S.,
sidered and resolved, the issue of content discrimination through regulation of "unprotected" speech—though we plainly recognized that as an issue in New York v. Ferber, 458 U. S. 747 (1982). It is of course contrary to all traditions of our jurisprudence to consider the law on this point conclusively resolved by broad language in cases where the issue was not presented or even envisioned.
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