Free The Ensign Amendment Essay Example

The Ensign amendment was first introduced by the federal government in 1997 and contains the rules and regulations relating to the use of federal funds for inmates. As by the law, the funds are allocated by the federal authorities are not to be used for distributing materials such as pamphlets, magazines, books, and other print media that contain features of nudity. The implementing regulation promulgated by the BOP defined the significant terms of the amendment as: “sexually explicit” means a pictorial depiction of simulated or actual sexual acts such as oral sex, intercourse, or masturbation; “features” means that the publication that is in question contains various depictions of sexually explicit conduct or simply nudity on a regular basis and is promoted upon depictions in the case of personal one-time issues; and “nudity” means the pictorial depictions where a part or all the genitalia or breast of females are exposed. Even though the Ensign Amendment prohibited distribution of these materials to prisoners, implementation regulations exempted materials that contained nudity but illustrative of educational, medical, or anthropological context.
However, over the recent past there has been great debate on the issue. Some critics argue that the ban violated the First Amendment since it was not directly related to a legitimate penological interest that restricted mail based on sexual content, represented an inflated response to any asserted interest , it swept more than necessary, and it was rather based on individualized determinations. Unfortunately, the Court had rejected these contentions. The Ensign Amendment and its legislation is related to the lawful penological interests of rehabilitation of prisoners as well as security of the institution as a whole. Moreover, the ban is neutral in content and has applied on the facts of cases presented for disputes.