Overbreadth doctrine

[Johnsen, Dawn Elizabeth]

I would recommend looking at Michael Dorf's article Facial Challenges to
State and Federal Statutes, 46 Stanford L. Rev. 235 (1994).  I haven't read
it for some time, but it includes an extensive discussion of overbreadth
doctrine and the concern about chilling effect, both in the context of First
Amendment rights and restrictions on abortion, and may contain the cites you
seek.

Dawn Johnsen

-----Original Message-----
From: Leslie Goldstein [mailto:lesl at UDEL.EDU]
Sent: Saturday, October 06, 2001 6:05 AM
To: CONLAWPROF at LISTSERV.UCLA.EDU
Subject: Re: Overbreadth doctrine


All th cases that come to my mind for this assertion are 1st Amd cases (e.g.
the fighting words ones) and the underlying point is that if the statute on
its face does not have a clearly narrow meaning (at least clear to
lawyers,anyway) the Supreme Court worries that they will engender
self-censorship of that which is protected.
LFG

Mark Tushnet wrote:

> A request for research assistance from the list:  What can be cited in
> support of this:  "In U.S. constitutional law, an overbroad statute is
> not saved by a judicial assertion that the courts will allow the statute
> to be invoked only when doing so would not violate the Constitution."?
> (The point is not that overbroad statutes cannot be saved by narrowing
> constructions -- they can -- but that "This statute applies only to
> cases where application would be constitutional" is not an acceptable
> narrowing construction.)  Thanks.