Lower panel to get look at porn issue

The high court is split over the Child Online Protection Act.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Supreme Court ruled today that a law meant to punish pornographers who peddle dirty pictures to Web-surfing kids is probably an unconstitutional muzzle on free speech.
The high court divided 5-to-4 over a law passed in 1998, signed by then-President Clinton and now backed by the Bush administration. The majority said a lower court was correct to block the law from taking effect because it likely violates the First Amendment.
The court did not end the long fight over the law, however. The majority sent the case back to a lower court for a trial that could give the government a chance to prove the law does not go too far.
Technicalities
The majority, led by Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, said there may have been important technological advances in the five years since a federal judge blocked the law.
Holding a new trial will allow discussion of what technology, if any, might allow adults to see and buy material that is legal for them while keeping that material out of the hands of children.
Justices John Paul Stevens, David H. Souter, Clarence Thomas and Ruth Bader Ginsburg agreed with Justice Kennedy.
The American Civil Liberties Union and other critics of the anti-pornography law said that it would restrict far too much material that adults may legally see and buy, the court said.
The law, which never took effect, would have authorized fines up to $50,000 for the crime of placing material that is "harmful to minors" within the easy reach of children on the Internet.
The law also would have required adults to use access codes and or other ways of registering before they could see objectionable material online.
First Amendment offense
For now, the law, known as the Child Online Protection Act, would sweep with too broad a brush, Kennedy wrote.
"There is a potential for extraordinary harm and a serious chill upon protected speech" if the law took effect, he wrote.
Kennedy said that filtering software "is not a perfect solution to the problem of children gaining access to harmful-to-minors materials."
He said that so far, the government has failed to prove that other technologies would work better.
The ruling in Ashcroft vs. American Civil Liberties Union was the last of nearly 80 cases decided in a busy court term. The year's marquee cases involving presidential power in dealing with suspected terrorists were announced Monday and mostly represented a loss for the Bush administration.
In dissent, Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and Justices Sandra Day O'Connor, Antonin Scalia and Stephen Breyer said the law is constitutional and should be upheld.
Restrictions about who would be covered by the law and how it would be enforced "answer many of the concerns raised by those who attack its constitutionality," Justice Breyer wrote.
The ACLU challenged the law on behalf of online bookstores, artists and others, including operators of Web sites that offer explicit how-to sex advice or health information. The ACLU argued that its clients could face jail time or fines for distributing information that, while racy or graphic, is perfectly legal for adult eyes and ears.
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