Case Citator › Mutual Film Corp. v. Industrial Commission of Ohio

Mutual Film Corp. v. Industrial Commission of Ohio

Is it still good law? What later courts have actually done to this case.

Overruled in part
Court
Supreme Court of the United States
Citation
236 U.S. 230
Decided
Confirmed treatments
2
Flagged citations read
14 of 14
Citing cases (total)
14
Treatment dates
1950–1952
Overruled in part
A reviewed court has overruled part of this case’s holding. Mutual Film Corp. v. Industrial Commission of Ohio was overruled in part by Joseph Burstyn, Inc. v. Wilson on constitutional protection for motion pictures. All 14 flagged citations have been read.
More on how this was screened

The Supreme Court held that films are protected expression and expressly stopped adhering to the contrary language in Mutual Film. The Constitution Annotated lists Mutual Film as overruled by Burstyn; Burstyn confined its rejection to the conflicting speech ruling and did not decide that every film censorship law is invalid. The 2 confirmed treatments are listed below.

Every treatment on this page is written from the citing opinion itself, with a verbatim quote, never copied from a commercial citator. A citation flagged by our screen but not shown here was read and found not to weaken this case.

14 later cases cite Mutual Film Corp. v. Industrial Commission of Ohio; 14 of those citations sat close to treatment language and were flagged for reading, and all of them have been read. Citations that did not sit near treatment language were not flagged and were not read one by one, so a court that weakened this case without using any of that language would not appear here.

Relying on Mutual Film Corp. v. Industrial Commission of Ohio?

This page shows what later courts did to it. Ask about your specific facts and see whether it still carries your argument, with citations you can check.

Treatments

Overruled in part

  • The Supreme Court rejected Mutual Film's exclusion of motion pictures from free speech and free press protection.

    Joseph Burstyn, Inc. v. Wilson · Supreme Court of the United States · filed

    For the foregoing reasons, we conclude that expression by means of motion pictures is included within the free speech and free press guaranty of the First and Fourteenth Amendments. To the extent that language in the opinion in Mutual Film Corp. v. Industrial Comm’n, supra, is out of harmony with the views here set forth, we no longer adhere to it.
    Read the full opinion on CourtListener →

Questioned

  • The district court said Mutual Film's exclusion of motion pictures from press protection needed re-examination after later Supreme Court speech decisions, while applying it as binding precedent.

    RD-DR Corp. v. Smith · N.D. Georgia · filed

    I can not anticipate that the Court will overrule the Mutual Film cases. But the question appears to need re-examination since Gitlow v. People of State of New York, 1925, 268 U.S. 652, 45 S.Ct. 625, 69 L.Ed. 1138
    Read the full opinion on CourtListener →

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