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Prior Restraints: Restrictions on compensation

Restrictions on receiving compensation for speech have been viewed by the courts as prior restraints on the speech itself.

The Supreme Court in 1991 struck down the New York "Son of Sam" law that required confiscation of any payments to criminals for telling stories about their crimes.³⁰

However, the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts upheld prohibition on the sale of a story imposed as a condition of probation for Katherine A. Power, a fugitive for 23 years before turning herself in to the authorities. It found that her First Amendment rights were not violated because she was not prohibited from telling her story as long as she received no payment for it.³¹

Notes

30. Simon & Schuster v. New York Crime Victims Bd., 502 U.S. 105 (1991); accord Bouchard v. Price, 694 A.2d 670 (R.I. 1997) (holding that the state Criminal Royalties Distribution Act, a "Son of Sam" law, violates the First Amendment because its focus on profits derived from expressive activity was unrelated to the state's interest in transferring the proceeds of crime from criminals to victims).

31. Massachusetts v. Power, 650 N.E.2d 87 (Mass. 1995).

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