In the 1965 case, A Book Named 'John Cleland's Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure' et al. v. Attorney General of Massachusetts, the U.S Supreme Court ruled that John Cleland's novel "Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure," also known as "Fanny Hill," could not be banned on grounds it was obscene because it had some social value. The court held that for material to be considered obscene and thus outside First Amendment protection, three elements must coexist: (1) the dominant theme must appeal to prurient interest in sex; (2) the material must depict or describe sexual conduct in an offensive way; and (3) taken as a whole, it should lack serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value. This ruling set forth what is commonly referred to as “the Roth test” which became pivotal in determining obscenity cases.

In the dissenting opinion for A Book Named 'John Cleland's Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure' v. Attorney General of Massachusetts, Justice Potter Stewart argued that the majority had misapplied the Roth test for obscenity by failing to consider whether or not the work as a whole was without social value. He contended that while certain passages in John Cleland's novel might be considered obscene, it did not mean that entire book should be deemed so. Furthermore, he criticized the majority’s decision to allow states broad discretion in determining what constitutes obscenity and expressed concern about potential censorship implications. He believed this could lead to suppression of works with serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value based on isolated explicit content.