582
Opinion of the Court
lence'), rather than isolated and treated as exogenous considerations." Report to Congress 89. In keeping with that recommendation, the criteria in § 954(d)(1) inform the assessment of artistic merit, but Congress declined to disallow any particular viewpoints. As the sponsors of § 954(d)(1) noted in urging rejection of the Rohrabacher Amendment: "[I]f we start down that road of prohibiting categories of expression, categories which are indeed constitutionally protected speech, where do we end? Where one Member's aversions end, others with different sensibilities and with different values begin." 136 Cong. Rec. 28624 (statement of Rep. Coleman); see also id., at 28663 (statement of Rep. Williams) (arguing that the Rohrabacher Amendment would prevent the funding of Jasper Johns' flag series, The Merchant of Venice, Chorus Line, Birth of a Nation, and the Grapes of Wrath). In contrast, before the vote on § 954(d)(1), one of its sponsors stated: "If we have done one important thing in this amendment, it is this. We have maintained the integrity of freedom of expression in the United States." Id., at 28674.
That § 954(d)(1) admonishes the NEA merely to take "decency and respect" into consideration and that the legislation was aimed at reforming procedures rather than precluding speech undercut respondents' argument that the provision inevitably will be utilized as a tool for invidious viewpoint discrimination. In cases where we have struck down legislation as facially unconstitutional, the dangers were both more evident and more substantial. In R. A. V. v. St. Paul, 505 U. S. 377 (1992), for example, we invalidated on its face a municipal ordinance that defined as a criminal offense the placement of a symbol on public or private property " 'which one knows or has reasonable grounds to know arouses anger, alarm or resentment in others on the basis of race, color, creed, religion or gender.' " See id., at 380. That provision set forth a clear penalty, proscribed views on particular "dis-favored subjects," id., at 391, and suppressed "distinctive idea[s], conveyed by a distinctive message," id., at 393.
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