Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union, 535 U.S. 564, 41 (2002)

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604

ASHCROFT v. AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION

Stevens, J., dissenting

enced by the distinctive characteristics of the broadcast medium, as well as the expertise of the agency, and the narrow scope of its order. Id., at 748-750; see also ACLU I, 521 U. S., at 867. On the other hand, we have repeatedly rejected the position that the free speech rights of adults can be limited to what is acceptable for children. See id., at 875 (quoting Bolger v. Youngs Drug Products Corp., 463 U. S. 60, 74-75 (1983) ("[R]egardless of the strength of the govern-ment's interest" in protecting children, "[t]he level of discourse reaching a mailbox simply cannot be limited to that which would be suitable for a sandbox" (internal quotation marks omitted))); Sable, 492 U. S., at 128; Butler v. Michigan, 352 U. S. 380, 383 (1957).

Petitioner relies on our decision in Ginsberg v. New York, 390 U. S. 629 (1968), for the proposition that Congress can prohibit the display of materials that are harmful to minors. But the statute upheld in Ginsberg prohibited selling indecent materials directly to children, id., at 633 (describing N. Y. Penal Law § 484-h, making it unlawful " 'knowingly to sell . . . to a minor . . .'"), whereas the speech implicated here is simply posted on a medium that is accessible to both adults and children, 47 U. S. C. § 231(a)(1) (prohibiting anyone from "knowingly . . . mak[ing] any communication for commercial purposes that is available to any minor . . ."). Like the restriction on indecent "dial-a-porn" numbers invalidated in Sable, the prohibition against mailing advertisements for contraceptives invalidated in Bolger, and the ban against selling adult books found impermissible in Butler, COPA seeks to limit protected speech that is not targeted at children, simply because it can be obtained by them while surfing the Web.1 In evaluating the overbreadth of such a

1 Petitioner cites examples of display statutes in 23 States that require magazine racks to shield minors from the covers of pornographic magazines. Brief for Petitioner 22, 3a. This Court has yet to rule on the constitutionality of any of these statutes, which are in any event of little relevance to regulation of speech on the Internet. As we recognized in

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