FCC v. Pacifica Foundation
E76730
FCC v. Pacifica Foundation is a landmark 1978 U.S. Supreme Court case that upheld the government's authority to regulate indecent material on public airwaves, stemming from a radio broadcast of George Carlin's "Seven Dirty Words" monologue.
All labels observed (2)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| FCC v. Pacifica Foundation canonical | 7 |
| Federal Communications Commission v. Pacifica Foundation | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T611794 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: FCC v. Pacifica Foundation Context triple: [George Carlin, associatedCourtCase, FCC v. Pacifica Foundation]
-
A.
New York Times Co. v. United States
New York Times Co. v. United States is a 1971 U.S. Supreme Court case that upheld the press’s right to publish the Pentagon Papers, sharply limiting the government’s power to impose prior restraint on the media.
-
B.
Brandenburg v. Ohio
Brandenburg v. Ohio is a 1969 U.S. Supreme Court decision that significantly strengthened free speech protections by establishing the "imminent lawless action" test for when advocacy of violence can be punished under the First Amendment.
-
C.
County of Allegheny v. ACLU
County of Allegheny v. ACLU is a 1989 U.S. Supreme Court case that refined the interpretation of the Establishment Clause by addressing the constitutionality of religious holiday displays on government property.
-
D.
Printz v. United States
Printz v. United States is a 1997 U.S. Supreme Court decision that limited federal power by holding that Congress cannot compel state or local officials to implement federal regulatory programs.
-
E.
Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission
Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission is a landmark 2010 U.S. Supreme Court case that dramatically expanded the political spending rights of corporations and unions by treating such expenditures as protected speech.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: FCC v. Pacifica Foundation Target entity description: FCC v. Pacifica Foundation is a landmark 1978 U.S. Supreme Court case that upheld the government's authority to regulate indecent material on public airwaves, stemming from a radio broadcast of George Carlin's "Seven Dirty Words" monologue.
-
A.
New York Times Co. v. United States
New York Times Co. v. United States is a 1971 U.S. Supreme Court case that upheld the press’s right to publish the Pentagon Papers, sharply limiting the government’s power to impose prior restraint on the media.
-
B.
Brandenburg v. Ohio
Brandenburg v. Ohio is a 1969 U.S. Supreme Court decision that significantly strengthened free speech protections by establishing the "imminent lawless action" test for when advocacy of violence can be punished under the First Amendment.
-
C.
County of Allegheny v. ACLU
County of Allegheny v. ACLU is a 1989 U.S. Supreme Court case that refined the interpretation of the Establishment Clause by addressing the constitutionality of religious holiday displays on government property.
-
D.
Printz v. United States
Printz v. United States is a 1997 U.S. Supreme Court decision that limited federal power by holding that Congress cannot compel state or local officials to implement federal regulatory programs.
-
E.
Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission
Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission is a landmark 2010 U.S. Supreme Court case that dramatically expanded the political spending rights of corporations and unions by treating such expenditures as protected speech.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (51)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
United States Supreme Court case
ⓘ
landmark First Amendment case ⓘ |
| appliesTo |
over-the-air radio broadcasting
ⓘ
over-the-air television broadcasting ⓘ |
| areaOfLaw |
First Amendment to the United States Constitution
ⓘ
surface form:
First Amendment law
broadcast regulation ⓘ |
| citation | 438 U.S. 726 ⓘ |
| concurrenceBy |
Harry A. Blackmun
ⓘ
Lewis F. Powell Jr. ⓘ |
| country |
United States of America
ⓘ
surface form:
United States
|
| decidingCourt | Supreme Court of the United States ⓘ |
| decisionDate | 1978-07-03 ⓘ |
| dissentBy |
Potter Stewart
ⓘ
Thurgood Marshall ⓘ William H. Rehnquist ⓘ William J. Brennan Jr. ⓘ |
| distinctionFrom | obscenity, which is not protected by the First Amendment ⓘ |
| docketNumber | 77-528 ⓘ |
| doesNotDirectlyApplyTo |
cable television
ⓘ
print media ⓘ |
| factualBackground | A mid-afternoon radio broadcast of George Carlin's "Filthy Words" monologue prompted a listener complaint to the FCC. ⓘ |
| fullName |
FCC v. Pacifica Foundation
self-linksurface differs
ⓘ
surface form:
Federal Communications Commission v. Pacifica Foundation
|
| holding |
The FCC has authority to sanction a radio station for broadcasting indecent language at a time of day when children are likely to be listening.
ⓘ
The government may regulate indecent material on public airwaves during times when children are likely to be in the audience. ⓘ |
| holdingType | plurality opinion ⓘ |
| joinedByInMajorityOrPlurality |
Byron R. White
ⓘ
Harry A. Blackmun ⓘ Lewis F. Powell Jr. ⓘ Warren E. Burger ⓘ |
| keyConcept |
broadcast spectrum scarcity
ⓘ
indecency regulation ⓘ pervasiveness of broadcast media ⓘ protection of children from indecent content ⓘ |
| legalIssue |
regulation of indecent speech on public airwaves
ⓘ
scope of First Amendment protection for broadcast media ⓘ |
| majorityOpinionBy | John Paul Stevens ⓘ |
| originatingAgency | Federal Communications Commission ⓘ |
| originatingCity | New York City ⓘ |
| originatingMedium | radio broadcast ⓘ |
| originatingStation | WBAI ⓘ |
| pageInUnitedStatesReports | 726 ⓘ |
| petitioner | Federal Communications Commission ⓘ |
| relatedWork | George Carlin's "Seven Dirty Words" monologue ⓘ |
| respondent | Pacifica Foundation ⓘ |
| speechTypeAtIssue |
indecent speech
ⓘ
not legally obscene speech ⓘ |
| standardAnnounced | indecent material may be restricted to times of day when children are less likely to be in the audience ⓘ |
| subsequentInfluenceOn |
FCC indecency enforcement policies
ⓘ
later broadcast indecency cases and regulations ⓘ time-of-day restrictions for broadcast indecency ⓘ |
| volumeInUnitedStatesReports | 438 ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: FCC v. Pacifica Foundation Description of subject: FCC v. Pacifica Foundation is a landmark 1978 U.S. Supreme Court case that upheld the government's authority to regulate indecent material on public airwaves, stemming from a radio broadcast of George Carlin's "Seven Dirty Words" monologue.
Referenced by (8)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
this entity surface form:
Federal Communications Commission v. Pacifica Foundation