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Clarence Thomas Wants to Go After Freedom of the Press (www.rollingstone.com)

submitted 1 year ago by ZeroCool@feddit.ch to c/politics@lemmy.world

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The Supreme Court on Tuesday declined to review a challenge to its landmark New York Times v. Sullivan ruling. Justice Clarence Thomas has some thoughts.

The 1964 ruling established limits on public officials’ ability to sue on grounds of defamation, as well as the need to prove a standard of “actual malice” by the outlet making the allegedly defamatory statements.

The Supreme Court declined to hear Blankenship v. NBC Universal, LLC, a lawsuit brought by coal magnate Don Blankenship, who in 2015 was convicted of a misdemeanor charge of conspiring to violate safety standards at a Virginia mine where an explosion killed 29 workers. Blankenship was sentenced to a year in prison and fined $250,000. Last year, the Supreme Court upheld the conviction. Blankenship then sued NBC Universal, alleging that the news company had defamed him by describing him as a “felon.” Lower courts ruled that NBC had not acted with “malice” in their statements, and the case was appealed to the Supreme Court.

While Justice Thomas concurred that Blankenship’s case did not require a ruling by the Supreme Court, he called for the justices to review the standard set by New York Times v. Sullivan “in an appropriate case.”

“I continue to adhere to my view that we should reconsider the actual-malice standard,” Thomas wrote,” referencing his previous opinion in Coral Ridge Ministries Media, Inc. v. Southern Poverty Law Center. “New York Times and the Court’s decisions extending it were policy-driven decisions masquerading as constitutional law,” he added, “the actual-malice standard comes at a heavy cost, allowing media organizations and interest groups ‘to cast false aspersions on public figures with near impunity.’”

The push from Thomas comes amid widespread media reporting on allegations of corruption and improper financial relationships involving the justice. A series of investigations by ProPublica and The New York Times have uncovered unreported gifts, real estate deals, and luxury perks given to Thomas by high-profile conservative figures — many of which were not reported in financial disclosures, or weighed as conflicts of interest in relevant cases.

In April, ProPublica reported on the extent of Thomas’ relationship with billionaire Harlan Crow. The real estate mogul gifted Thomas frequent rides on private jets, vacations to luxury resorts, and trips on his superyachts. Crow also purchased $133,000 in real estate from Thomas, and footed private school tuition bills for a child Thomas was raising.

Subsequent reporting has exposed Thomas’ relationship with other powerful conservative players, including the Koch brothers, oil tycoon Paul “Tony” Novelly, H. Wayne Huizenga, the former owner of the Miami Dolphins, and investor David Sokol.

Thomas has claimed that the omissions from his financial statements were nothing more than oversights and that he had been advised that “this sort of personal hospitality from close personal friends, who did not have business before the Court, was not reportable.”

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[-] oxjox@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 year ago

I'm posting the content below in hope that someone can clarify what he's talking about. What I think I continue to read Thomas express is that he wants to pretty much throw out all laws that are not explicitly in the US Constitution. Because, when he says "The decisions have no relation to the text, history, or structure of the Constitution." he's saying 'The Constitution doesn't say a word about libel or malice therefore it should be left up to the states'. And, I have to ask, am I as ignorant as him in reading that Congress shall establish no law abridging the freedom of speech? How does that work, federally?
[Threaded because I've hit a character limit.]

What he said...

To be sure, the law was not static; “[i]n the first decades after the adoption of the Constitution,” the rule that “truth or good motives was no defense” to libel “was changed by judicial decision, statute or constitution in most States.” But from the founding until 1964, the law of defamation was “almost exclusively the business of state courts and legislatures.”

The Court usurped control over libel law and imposed its own elevated standard in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan. It decreed that the Constitution required “a federal rule that prohibits a public official from recovering damages for a defamatory falsehood relating to his official conduct unless he proves that the statement was made with ‘actual malice’—that is, with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not.”. The Court did not base this “actual malice” rule in the original meaning of the First Amendment. It limited its analysis of the historical record to a loose inference from opposition surrounding the Sedition Act of 1798 and primarily justified its constitutional rule by noting that 20th century state-court decisions and “the consensus of scholarly opinion apparently favor[ed] the rule.

I continue to adhere to my view that we should reconsider the actual-malice standard. “New York Times and the Court’s decisions extending it were policy-driven decisions masquerading as constitutional law.” The decisions have “no relation to the text, history, or structure of the Constitution.”

And the actual-malice standard comes at a heavy cost, allowing media organizations and interest groups “to cast false aspersions on public figures with near impunity.”. The Court cannot justify continuing to impose a rule of its own creation when it has not “even inquired whether the First or Fourteenth Amendment, as originally understood, encompasses an actual-malice standard.”

Petitioner Don Blankenship asks us to revisit New York Times. I agree with the Court’s decision not to take up that question in this case because it appears that Blankenship’s claims are independently subject to an actual-malice standard as a matter of state law. In an appropriate case, however, we should reconsider "NewYork Times" and our other decisions displacing state defamation law.

https://www.supremecourt.gov/orders/courtorders/101023zor_5i26.pdf

[-] oxjox@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 year ago

What Wikipedia says...

The origins of the United States' defamation laws pre-date the American Revolution; one influential case in 1734 involved John Peter Zenger and established precedent that "The Truth" is an absolute defense against charges of libel. Though the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution was designed to protect freedom of the press, for most of the history of the United States, the U.S. Supreme Court failed to use it to rule on libel cases. This left libel laws, based upon the traditional "Common Law" of defamation inherited from the English legal system, mixed across the states. The 1964 case New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, however, radically changed the nature of libel law in the United States by establishing that public officials could win a suit for libel only when they could prove the media outlet in question knew either that the information was wholly and patently false or that it was published "with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not". Later Supreme Court cases barred strict liability for libel and forbade libel claims for statements that are so ridiculous as to be obviously facetious. Recent cases have added precedent on defamation law and the Internet.

John Peter Zenger
In one of the most famous cases, New York City publisher John Peter Zenger was imprisoned for eight months in 1734 for printing attacks on the governor of the colony. Zenger won his case and was acquitted by jury in 1735 under the counsel of Andrew Hamilton.
Gouverneur Morris, a major contributor in the framing of the U.S. Constitution said, "The trial of Zenger in 1735 was the germ of American freedom, the morning star of that liberty which subsequently revolutionized America".

The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution was designed specifically to protect freedom of the press. However, for most of the history of the United States, the Supreme Court neglected to use it to rule on libel cases. This left libel laws, based upon the traditional common law of defamation inherited from the English legal system, mixed across the states.

People v. Croswell The Zenger case did not, however, establish a precedent. In 1804 Harry Croswell lost a libel suit in People v. Croswell when the Supreme Court of New York refused to accept truth as a defense. The following year the New York State Legislature changed the law to allow truth as a defense against a libel charge, breaking with English precedent under which the truthfulness of the statements alone is not a defense. Other states and the federal government followed suit.

New York Times v. Sullivan
In 1964, however, the court issued an opinion in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254 (1964) dramatically changing the nature of libel law in the United States. In that case, the court determined that public officials could win a suit for libel only if they could demonstrate "actual malice" on the part of reporters or publishers. In that case, "actual malice" was defined as "knowledge that the information was false" or that it was published "with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not". This decision was later extended to cover "public figures", although the standard is still considerably lower in the case of private individuals.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_defamation_law

[-] oxjox@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 year ago

What the First Amendment says...

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances

What the Sedition Act of 1798 says...

An Act in Addition to the Act, Entitled "An Act for the Punishment of Certain Crimes Against the United States."

SECTION 1. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled, That if any persons shall unlawfully combine or conspire together, with intent to oppose any measure or measures of the government of the United States, which are or shall be directed by proper authority, or to impede the operation of any law of the United States, or to intimidate or prevent any person holding a place or office in or under the government of the United States, from undertaking, performing or executing his trust or duty, and if any person or persons, with intent as aforesaid, shall counsel, advise or attempt to procure any insurrection, riot, unlawful assembly, or combination, whether such conspiracy, threatening, counsel, advice, or attempt shall have the proposed effect or not, he or they shall be deemed guilty of a high misdemeanor, and on conviction, before any court of the United States having jurisdiction thereof, shall be punished by a fine not exceeding five thousand dollars, and by imprisonment during a term not less than six months nor exceeding five years; and further, at the discretion of the court may be holden to find sureties for his good behaviour in such sum, and for such time, as the said court may direct.

SEC. 2. And be it farther enacted, That if any person shall write, print, utter or publish, or shall cause or procure to be written, printed, uttered or published, or shall knowingly and willingly assist or aid in writing, printing, uttering or publishing any false, scandalous and malicious writing or writings against the government of the United States, or either house of the Congress of the United States, or the President of the United States, with intent to defame the said government, or either house of the said Congress, or the said President, or to bring them, or either of them, into contempt or disrepute; or to excite against them, or either or any of them, the hatred of the good people of the United States, or to stir up sedition within the United States, or to excite any unlawful combinations therein, for opposing or resisting any law of the United States, or any act of the President of the United States, done in pursuance of any such law, or of the powers in him vested by the constitution of the United States, or to resist, oppose, or defeat any such law or act, or to aid, encourage or abet any hostile designs of any foreign nation against United States, their people or government, then such person, being thereof convicted before any court of the United States having jurisdiction thereof, shall be punished by a fine not exceeding two thousand dollars, and by imprisonment not exceeding two years.

SEC. 3. And be it further enacted and declared, That if any person shall be prosecuted under this act, for the writing or publishing any libel aforesaid, it shall be lawful for the defendant, upon the trial of the cause, to give in evidence in his defence, the truth of the matter contained in publication charged as a libel. And the jury who shall try the cause, shall have a right to determine the law and the fact, under the direction of the court, as in other cases.

SEC. 4. And be it further enacted, That this act shall continue and be in force until the third day of March, one thousand eight hundred and one, and no longer: Provided, that the expiration of the act shall not prevent or defeat a prosecution and punishment of any offence against the law, during the time it shall be in force.

https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/alien-and-sedition-acts

this post was submitted on 10 Oct 2023

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