YNOT – Two Republican state lawmakers in Tennessee are co-sponsoring a bill that — in the name of saving marriages and reducing the state’s budget deficit — would add a 25-percent tax to adult movies, magazine and books; escort services and cabarets, and admission to any adult entertainment venue.
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State Rep. Joe Carr, author of the bill, cited Tennessee’s position at the top of national divorce rates charts as part of the impetus behind the proposal. His bill will help preserve marriages by placing a burden on users of pornography, he said.

“If we can’t outlaw it, and the Supreme Court says we cannot, then what we’ll do is put a 25-percent tax on adult material — hardcore pornography,” Carr told Nashville’s Channel 5 television news.

HB3081 (PDF), which Campfield calls the “tax porn, not corn” bill, places the revenue generated by the adult industry in Tennessee at $222 million annually. Carr and Campfield said they expect the tax, if approved, to generate $55 million in state tax revenue in the first year. The money, Carr said, would be used to lower or eliminate the sales tax on food, hence Campfield’s nickname for the bill.

“What the bill does is increase the tax on hardcore pornography, escort services, strip clubs and other such products, and the resulting income will be dedicated to lowering the tax on groceries,” Campfield wrote on his blog. “It is not a true tax increase in that it is revenue-neutral for the state.”

Surely what Campfield meant to write is that HB3081 would not represent a tax increase, because revenues generated by the “porn, not corn” tax would offset sales taxes, thereby resulting in a revenue-neutral exchange. The tax most definitely is a true tax, as it adds a government-mandated surcharge to the consumer cost of specific goods.

Carr and Campfield expect the bill to be a no-brainer for their colleagues in the state legislature. As Campfield stated on his blog, during an election year “this will put one simple question out there to legislators: Why would you vote for cheap porn, escorts and strippers and against lowering the tax on food?”

Constitutional experts aren’t sure the bill will pass legal muster.

“To tax something based on its First Amendment content would clearly be unconstitutional, in my view,” Tennessee attorney David Raybin told Channel 5 News, adding that he expects immediate challenges to the tax if it becomes law.