Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union

Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued November 28, 2001 Decided May 13, 2002
Full case name	John Ashcroft, Attorney General v. American Civil Liberties Union, et al.
Citations	535 U.S. 564 (more) 122 S. Ct. 1700; 152 L. Ed. 2d 771; 70 U.S.L.W. 4381; 30 Media L. Rep. 1801; 2002 Cal. Daily Op. Service 4057; 2002 Daily Journal DAR 5183; 15 Fla. L. Weekly Fed. S 256
Argument	Oral argument
Case history
Prior	American Civil Liberties Union v. Reno, 31 F. Supp. 2d 473 (E.D. Pa. 1999); affirmed, 217 F.3d 162 (3d Cir. 2000); cert. granted, 532 U.S. 1037 (2001).
Subsequent	On remand, American Civil Liberties Union v. Ashcroft, 322 F.3d 240 (3d Cir. 2003); affirmed, 542 U.S. 656 (2004).
Holding
The Child Online Protection Act's reliance on community standards to identify what material "is harmful to minors" may make the statute unconstitutional, but community standards need further definition.
Court membership
Chief Justice William Rehnquist Associate Justices John P. Stevens · Sandra Day O'Connor Antonin Scalia · Anthony Kennedy David Souter · Clarence Thomas Ruth Bader Ginsburg · Stephen Breyer
Case opinions
Majority	Thomas, joined by Rehnquist, Scalia, O'Connor, Kennedy, Souter, Ginsburg, Breyer
Dissent	Stevens
Laws applied
Child Online Protection Act; U.S. Const. amend. I

Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union, 535 U.S. 564 (2002), followed by 542 U.S. 656 (2004), was a decision of the United States Supreme Court, ruling that the Child Online Protection Act (COPA) was unconstitutional as a violation of the First Amendment's guarantee of freedom of speech.^[1]