What is the three part obscenity test?

The three-part obscenity test, established by the U.S. Supreme Court in Miller v. California (1973), determines whether material is obscene and thus unprotected by the First Amendment. The criteria are: (1) whether the average person, applying contemporary community standards, would find that the material appeals to prurient interests; (2) whether the material depicts sexual conduct in a patently offensive way as defined by state law; and (3) whether the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value. If any part of the test is not met, the material may not be considered obscene.