Florida v. Thomas, 532 U.S. 774, 5 (2001)

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778

FLORIDA v. THOMAS

Opinion of the Court

which prohibited the publication of an editorial endorsement on election day did not violate the First Amendment, and remanded the case for trial. Id., at 216-217. Mills conceded that his only defense to the state charge was his constitutional claim; he admitted that he did publish the editorial. We held that this was a "final judgment" and took jurisdiction, saying that a trial "would be no more than a few formal gestures leading inexorably towards a conviction, and then another appeal to the Alabama Supreme Court for it formally to repeat its rejection of Mills' constitutional contentions whereupon the case could then once more wind its weary way back to us as a judgment unquestionably final and appealable. Such a roundabout process would not only be an inexcusable delay of the benefits Congress intended to grant by providing for appeal to this Court, but it would also result in a completely unnecessary waste of time and energy in judicial systems already troubled by delays due to congested dockets." Id., at 217-218.

The decision of the Supreme Court of Florida here differs considerably from that of the state court in Mills. The Florida Supreme Court remanded the case not only for application of Chimel, but for further factfinding, and the State has not conceded that the search is invalid under Chimel.

In Cox's second category are those cases in which "the federal issue, finally decided by the highest court in the State, will survive and require decision regardless of the outcome of future state-court proceedings." 420 U. S., at 480. In Cox we used our decision in Radio Station WOW, Inc. v. Johnson, 326 U. S. 120 (1945), to illustrate the second category. We said:

"In Radio Station WOW, the Nebraska Supreme Court directed the transfer of the properties of a federally licensed radio station and ordered an accounting, rejecting the claim that the transfer order would interfere with the federal license. . . . Nothing that could happen

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