Opinion ID: 662398
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Actionable Statements Under Milkovich and White

Text: 32 Prior to the Supreme Court's decision in Milkovich v. Lorain Journal Co., 497 U.S. 1, 110 S.Ct. 2695, 111 L.Ed.2d 1 (1990), most courts recognized a strict dichotomy in defamation actions between assertions of opinion and assertions of fact. See, e.g., Ollman v. Evans, 750 F.2d 970 (D.C.Cir.1984) (en banc), cert. denied, 471 U.S. 1127, 105 S.Ct. 2662, 86 L.Ed.2d 278 (1985). Under this practice, only false statements of fact could be defamatory; statements of opinion could not be defamatory because all such expression was thought to be protected by the First Amendment. As we recognized in White, however, Milkovich rejected this practice in favor of an analysis that recognizes that statements of opinion can be actionable if they imply a provably false fact. See White, 909 F.2d at 522. 33 In Milkovich, a high school wrestling coach argued that an Ohio newspaper libeled him in a column which implied that he had perjured himself in a state court proceeding. The newspaper argued that, because the published material merely expressed the opinion of a writer and not an open accusation of perjury, the column could not be defamatory. The Court, however, squarely refused to recognize a separate constitutional privilege for opinion. Milkovich, 497 U.S. at 21, 110 S.Ct. at 2707. Rather, the Court in Milkovich held that an opinion exception for defamation actions was unnecessary because existing First Amendment principles ensured sufficient protection of speech. Specifically, the Court stated that its decision in Philadelphia Newspapers, Inc. v. Hepps, 475 U.S. 767, 106 S.Ct. 1558, 89 L.Ed.2d 783 (1986), established that, when a plaintiff seeks damages against a media defendant for speech of public concern, there is no presumption that defamatory speech is false. In other words, the Court fashioned 'a constitutional requirement that the plaintiff bear the burden of showing falsity, as well as fault, before recovering damages.'  Milkovich, 497 U.S. at 16, 110 S.Ct. at 2704 (quoting Hepps, 475 U.S. at 776, 106 S.Ct. at 1563). 34 Milkovich also held that loose, figurative, or hyperbolic statements generally are not actionable in defamation. 497 U.S. at 21, 110 S.Ct. at 2706. However, the special status of these types of expression derives from the constitutional protection provided for parody and other imaginative commentary by decisions such as Hustler Magazine, Inc. v. Falwell, 485 U.S. 46, 108 S.Ct. 876, 99 L.Ed.2d 41 (1988), and Greenbelt Cooperative Publishing [304 U.S.App.D.C. 413] Association Inc. v. Bresler, 398 U.S. 6, 90 S.Ct. 1537, 26 L.Ed.2d 6 (1970), rather than from any separate constitutional protection for opinion. Milkovich, 497 U.S. at 20, 21, 110 S.Ct. at 2706-2707. In addition to examining the specific statements challenged by the petitioner in that case, the Court in Milkovich noted that the general tenor of the article at issue did not suggest that it was intended to be hyperbolic or figurative. Id. at 21, 110 S.Ct. at 2707. 35 Thus, the Court in Milkovich concluded that the breathing space which freedoms of expression require in order to survive is adequately secured by existing constitutional doctrine without the creation of an artificial dichotomy between 'opinion' and fact. Id. at 19, 110 S.Ct. at 2706 (citation and internal quotations omitted). This is so because statements of opinion relating to matters of public concern which do not contain a provably false factual connotation will receive full constitutional protection. Id. at 20, 110 S.Ct. at 2706; see also White, 909 F.2d at 522. 36 In construing the bounds of Milkovich, the court in White made it clear that even a per se opinion is actionable if it can reasonably be understood as implying provable facts. White, 909 F.2d at 522. The determination whether a statement should be characterized as factual or as implying provable facts is separate from the defamatory meaning inquiry. In White we first held that the statements at issue in that case were capable of bearing implied defamatory meanings, then went on to consider whether they were protected by the First Amendment as non-verifiable statements which did not imply provable facts. See White, 909 F.2d at 522. The judgment as to whether a challenged statement asserts actionable facts or implies such facts is a question of law for the court to determine as a threshold matter. See SMOLLA Sec. 6.10. 37 In light of Milkovich and White, it is now clear that, in a case of this sort, the relevant inquiry is no longer simply whether a challenged statement is fact or opinion. Statements of defamatory fact of course remain actionable (although truth remains a complete defense in defamation actions). The bald statement Jones is a liar, for example, would plainly fall within the class of factual defamatory statements. See Milkovich, 497 U.S. at 19, 110 S.Ct. at 2706. In the case of assertions of opinion, however, the analysis required by Milkovich is more complex. As the Supreme Court held in that case: expressions of 'opinion' may often imply an assertion of objective fact. Id. at 18, 110 S.Ct. at 2705. To illustrate this type of expression, Milkovich noted that: If a speaker says, 'In my opinion John Jones is a liar,' he implies a knowledge of facts which lead to the conclusion that Jones told an untruth. Id. Thus, an unsupported statement of opinion that implies defamatory facts can be actionable. Milkovich further held that: Even if the speaker states the facts upon which he bases his opinion, if those facts are either incorrect or incomplete, or if his assessment of them is erroneous, the statement may still imply a false assertion of fact. Id. at 18-19, 110 S.Ct. at 2705-2706. Just as a speaker is not immunized from liability simply by prefacing otherwise defamatory statements with the words In my opinion ..., defamatory assessments based on incorrect facts stated by the speaker are also actionable. Thus, the statement In my opinion Jones is a liar because he cheats on his taxes could be libelous if the allegation of cheating were untrue. 5 38 On the other hand, when a writer gives a statement of opinion that is based upon true facts that are revealed to readers or which are already known to readers, such opinions generally are not actionable so long as the opinion does not otherwise imply unstated defamatory facts. Because the reader understands that such supported opinions represent [304 U.S.App.D.C. 414] the writer's interpretation of the facts presented, and because the reader is free to draw his or her own conclusions based upon those facts, this type of statement is not actionable in defamation. See Phantom Touring, Inc. v. Affiliated Publications, 953 F.2d 724, 730 (1st Cir.) (contrasting Milkovich on the ground that in that case defendant did not reveal factual bases for his opinions and so did not invite[ ] readers to draw their own conclusions), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 112 S.Ct. 2942, 119 L.Ed.2d 567 (1992); Potomac Valve & Fitting, Inc. v. Crawford Fitting Co., 829 F.2d 1280, 1290 (4th Cir.1987) (challenged statement not actionable because its premises are explicit, and the reader is by no means required to share [defendant's] conclusion); Lewis v. Time, Inc., 710 F.2d 549, 556 (9th Cir.1983) (no liability for defamation where a publication sets forth [true facts] underlying its statement that someone is dishonest). Thus, the statement In my opinion Jones is a liar because he cheats on his taxes would not be actionable if Jones had in fact recently been convicted of tax evasion, so long as the statement did not imply additional, unstated bases for calling Jones a liar. While it might be wholly unreasonable to attack Jones' veracity on the basis of his tax returns, a reader would be free to make his or her own assessment of the facts presented. 39