Enlarge By H. Darr Beiser, USA TODAY Robert Stevens was indicted under a 1999 federal law that bans the sale of depictions of animal cruelty. He says his videos are educational. If the Supreme Court upholds the law, he could face time in prison. WASHINGTON  The videos show pit bulls fighting hard, biting deep into each other, getting a hold of a shoulder, trying to throw each other to the ground. The images are gruesome, yet grainy and amateurish. Upbeat music plays incongruously; one video includes music from Fiddler on the Roof. CASE LOG: Major cases on tap for the Supreme Court NEW COURT: Justice bios and the impact of Sotomayor PAW PRINT POSTS: Is video "too vile" to be protected? After federal agents seized the videos advertised by Robert Stevens in a magazine that tracks illegal dogfighting, he was indicted under a federal law that makes it a crime to sell depictions of animal cruelty. The 1999 law stemmed from congressional worries about "crush" videos, which typically show women pounding their high heels on small animals and sometimes talking in a dominatrix fashion. O'CONNOR COMMENTS: Current court 'dismantled' her legacy In 2005, Stevens, of Virginia, became the first person to go to trial and be convicted under the law. His appeal, to be argued before the Supreme Court on Tuesday, has become a major First Amendment test of whether depictions of animal cruelty can be so vile that they are on par with pictures of child pornography and can be banned. The case pulls the staid high court into the underworld of dogfighting and features a clash of competing societal values: antipathy to animal cruelty vs. the right of free speech. More broadly, it presents a potentially defining moment for how the court regulates pictures of abhorrent conduct. Scores of advocacy groups have lined up on each side of United States v. Stevens. "The stakes here are very high, and extend well beyond the specific context of depictions of animal cruelty," says Washington and Lee University Law Dean Rodney Smolla, who is in a group of First Amendment scholars on Stevens' side. "Our culture is filled with images of repulsive activities and expressions of repulsive ideas, and our free speech tradition stands against ... sending people to jail for it." Free-speech advocates such as Smolla say that if the federal government prevails with its arguments that animal-cruelty images can be as bad as child pornography and obscenity, it would be able to ban depictions of any conduct that is illegal or even deemed highly offensive. Yet groups such as the Humane Society of the United States and American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals stress that the ban on pictures of animal torture lessens the abuse of animals and promotes public morality. "This is the first case in a long time on animal welfare," says Humane Society President Wayne Pacelle, adding that the Supreme Court dispute arises at a time of heightened interest in animals. "Our nation is much more attuned to animals and animal welfare than in 1989, even in 1999. There's Animal Planet on TV and a surge in publishing on pets." Pacelle said there has been a near tripling of ownership of cats and dogs in America since the 1970s, to 165 million domesticated animals today. The battle over images of animal cruelty comes two years after the prosecution of former Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick drew national attention to dogfighting and other types of animal cruelty in the United States. Vick, now out of prison, joined the Philadelphia Eagles in August. Dogfighting already is illegal nationwide. This dispute is not about acts of animal abuse, rather pictures of it. Justice Department lawyers, defending the law, say commercial videos such as those made by Stevens promote animal abuse itself. Even so, it has been more than 25 years since the Supreme Court declared a category of speech beyond the reach of the Constitution. That was in the 1982 case of New York v. Ferber, when the justices ruled that depictions of children engaged in pornographic acts were not protected by the First Amendment. Law called too broad In the new case, a lower federal appeals court rejected the Justice Department's effort to put animal cruelty on similar terms with child pornography, saying, "Preventing cruelty to animals, although an exceedingly worthy goal, simply does not implicate interests of the same magnitude as protecting children from physical and psychological harm." The Philadelphia-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit struck down the law criminalizing videos of animal torture. Twenty-six states are siding with the federal government in its effort to win reinstatement of Stevens' conviction. "Evidence suggests that over the last decade with (the law) in place, the market for depictions of animal violence and cruelty has declined significantly," Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum says on behalf of the states. McCollum, a former Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives, was among the promoters of the 1999 law. Stevens' attorneys say he was wrongly snared by an unconstitutionally broad law. A longtime pit-bull trainer in Pittsville, in southern Virginia, Stevens ran a business called Dogs of Velvet and Steel and wrote a book of that same name published in 1983. Stevens, 69, declined through his lawyers to be interviewed. His son, Mike Stevens, said his father was drawn to pit bulls as a breed because "they're very loyal and playful and lovable creatures. Their heart is as ferocious as their strength." Stevens' attorneys say he opposes dogfighting and showed matches in his videos only to demonstrate that pit bulls are "courageous and intelligent." Federal prosecutors charged him based on three of his videos: Pick-A-Winna, in which Stevens, narrating, invites viewers to guess which pit bull might win a fight; Japan Pit Fights, which offers a ring-side view of matches in Japan; and Catch Dogs and Country Living, which showed how pit bulls are used to hunt, attack and subdue hogs and other animals. In Catch Dogs, upbeat music plays; the two-hour Pick-A-Winna video includes the instrumental music from Fiddler on the Roof. Stevens challenged the law's constitutionality and argued that his videos were educational and of historical value. One of Stevens' witnesses at trial said the videos were valuable in documenting dogfighting before it became illegal in the USA. The trial judge spurned Stevens' contention that the law was too broadly written, noting that it applied only to depictions of activities that are illegal and depictions that lack societal value. A jury then rejected Stevens' defenses about the educational worth of the videos and convicted him on all three counts. He was sentenced to 37 months in prisonbut has been free during the appeal. Aware that the activities in the video can generate strong emotions, Stevens' lead lawyer Patricia Millett opens her argument to the high court by saying, "This case is not about dogfighting or animal cruelty. ... The question here is more fundamental: whether the government can send an individual to jail for up to five years just for making films — films that are not obscene, pornographic, inflammatory, defamatory or even untruthful." 'As inhumane as you can get' The law at the center of the case was spurred by so-called "crush" videos. The arrest of a Ventura County, Calif., man who produced a video showing a woman's heels crushing rats and mice caught the attention of U.S. Rep. Elton Gallegly, a Republican who represents the area. In a recent interview, Gallegly said the original focus of the bill was "depictions of women scantily dressed, doing this for sick reasons." He said that as he became familiar with the crush videos, he also learned of reports that some of the country's most notorious murderers had an early history of torturing animals. He said he was convinced drying up the market for pictures of animal cruelty would discourage the behavior itself. The Humane Society, which helped push for the law, says that "over 2,000 crush video titles existed" in 1999, selling for as much as $300 apiece, with annual industry sales totaling nearly $1 million. Society President Pacelle says they have no recent sales data on the industry. "Stopping the profit for the videos stops them from being made in the first place," Gallegly said. "This is about as inhumane as you can get, and it leads to so much else. ... There aren't very many nice people involved in this." Among the animal-rights advocates who testified before Congress a decade ago for the legislation was actress Loretta Swit, who played Maj. Margaret "Hot Lips" Houlihan in television's M*A*S*H series. "The purposeful production of such cruelty, for money, is mind-boggling," she told the House Judiciary Committee. President Clinton signed the bill into law in December 1999. Now defending it against a constitutional challenge, U.S. Solicitor General Elena Kagan insists the government is targeting specific types of images, such as those in which animals are tormented to gratify sexual fetishes, and is not going after a swath of speech. She says the law was designed to prevent people from profiting from the unlawful torture and killing of animals. Justice Department lawyers also stress that the animal law exempts any depiction "with serious religious, political, scientific, educational, journalistic, historical or artistic values." Stevens' attorneys say his case shows federal prosecutors will invoke the law broadly. Millett, who will argue the case at the high court, emphasizes that Stevens' videos are tame compared with what Congress sought to outlaw and compared to some illegal dog matches. Stevens' videos lack "images of blood or serious injury to the dogs both because he opposes dogfighting and because his purpose is to illustrate the genetic traits of pit bulls," such as endurance and strength, Millett says in her filing to the court. She also highlights the public value of some pictures of deplorable conduct: "Documentaries and photographs depicting far more gruesome dogfights, the clubbing of baby seals, and animal mistreatment at slaughterhouses ... have fueled the animal rights movement, supported legislation, and prompted vigorous public debate." Warnings of censorship The organizations that have weighed in warn of the potential consequences of a decision by the nation's highest court. Backing Stevens, the National Coalition Against Censorship tells the justices that if the government prevails, Congress could outlaw images that depict acts of terrorism, drug use or torture. The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press and 13 news media organizations have joined the case, concerned about press coverage about animal abuse or other illegal activities that could fall under the disputed law. The Humane Society counters that if the 1999 statute is not upheld, cruelty to animals will rise. It says that since the 3rd Circuit's 2008 decision finding the law unconstitutional there has been a "resurgence" in crush videos. The Society recently released a report based on a staff investigation earlier this year that found an apparently increasing number of horrific videos — such as of caged kittens being burned — for sale on the Internet. It said videos ranged in price from $20 to $100. Humane Society President Pacelle said the videos cannot be separated from the cruel acts, and that because the faces of abusers typically are not shown in the videos, perpetrators remain anonymous. The 1999 law, he says, "is the only tool available to crack down on this horrific form of extreme animal cruelty." Guidelines: You share in the USA TODAY community, so please keep your comments smart and civil. Don't attack other readers personally, and keep your language decent. Use the "Report Abuse" button to make a difference. You share in the USA TODAY community, so please keep your comments smart and civil. Don't attack other readers personally, and keep your language decent. Use the "Report Abuse" button to make a difference. Read more