In Jacobellis v. Ohio in 1964, about a state ban of an adult-oriented film, Justice Potter Stewart opined that the Court "was faced with the task of trying to define what may be indefinable", and that criminal laws were constitutionally limited to hardcore pornography, which he did not try to define: "perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so. But I know it when I see it". (Stewart, J., concurring); In Memoirs v. Massachusetts in 1966, the Supreme Court refined the Roth test to material that is "patently offensive" and "utterly without redeeming social value". These precedents resulted in an unclear definition of obscene material that could be banned by government authorities.
In Jacobellis v. Ohio in 1964, about a state ban of an adult-oriented film, Justice Potter Stewart opined that the Court "was faced with the task of trying to define what may be indefinable" and that criminal laws were constitutionally limited to hardcore pornography, which he did not try to define: "perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so But I know it when I s.ee it". (Stewart, J., conc,urring); In Memoirs v. Massachusetts in 1966 the Supreme Court refined the Roth test t,o material that is "patently offensive" and "utterly without redeeming social value". These precedents resulted in an unclear definition of obscene material that could be banned by government authorities.