Opinion ID: 1206236
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: history and development of criminal defamation laws

Text: The history and development of the law of criminal defamation has been the topic of several excellent law journal articles, [3] and has been discussed by the United States Supreme Court in Beauharnais v. Illinois, 343 U.S. 250, 72 S.Ct. 725, 96 L.Ed. 919 (1952), and Garrison v. Louisiana, 379 U.S. 64, 85 S.Ct. 209, 13 L.Ed.2d 125 (1964). These histories indicate that in England prior to the American revolution criminal defamation had two purposes: (1) to prevent public unrest caused by critical statements concerning those in power; and, (2) to preserve public order by providing criminal sanctions for insults to private persons, thus tending to prevent dueling or other violent responses. Lord Coke explained these concerns in reporting De Libellis Famosis : Every libel is made either against a private man, or against a magistrate or public person. If it be against a private man it deserves a severe punishment, for although the libel be made against one, yet it incites all those of the same family, kindred or society to revenge, and so tends per consequens to quarrels and breach of the peace, and may be the cause of the shedding of blood and great inconvenience; if it be against a magistrate, or other public person, it is a greater offense; for it concerns not only the breach of the peace, but also the scandal of Government; for what greater scandal of Government can there be than to have corrupt and wicked magistrates to be appointed and constituted by the King to govern his subjects under him? 77 Eng.Rep. 250-251 (1609). Any statement which tended to degrade or disgrace another, to hold him up to public hatred, contempt or ridicule, or cause him to be shunned or avoided, was regarded as defamatory. Defamatory statements of opinion, as well as statements of fact, were considered unlawful. Intention to injure or defame was not an element of the offense. [4] Truth was not a defense. In fact, if the defamation was true it was thought to sting all the more and have an even greater tendency to incite violence than a falsehood. [5] Remarkably, public as well as private aspects of criminal defamation initially survived the passage of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. Thus, the Sedition Act of 1798 made unlawful writing, publishing or speaking anything false, scandalous and malicious ... against the government ... or the President ... with intent to defame ... or to bring them... into contempt or disrepute ... [6] This unpopular act was not long in existence, but was never held unconstitutional. Further, it has not been orthodox constitutional doctrine that the First Amendment was intended to bar criminal defamation, although some of our most eminent judges have believed it was. [7] The primary substantive reform effected by the American states was to modify the rule that truth was no defense. Most states, by statutes similar to AS 11.15.320, made truth a defense so long as the otherwise defamatory statement was uttered with good motives and for a justifiable end. [8] Apart from that modification, the common law of criminal defamation continued in force unchanged, but largely unused, until the Garrison decision. The court in Garrison applied the rule of New York Times v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254, 84 S.Ct. 710, 11 L.Ed.2d 686 (1964) to Louisiana's criminal libel statutes. That rule extends constitutional protection to defamations concerning public figures which are either true or not intentionally or recklessly false. Since Louisiana's statute, like AS 11.15.320, limited truth as a defense to situations where publication was made with good motives and for justifiable ends, it was inconsistent with the New York Times rule and held unconstitutional on that basis. The Garrison decision would dictate an instant reversal in this case, except for the State's argument that we can and should narrow Alaska's criminal defamation statutes to save them from unconstitutionality. This contention is discussed in the portion of this opinion concerning overbreadth. Before turning to the issue of vagueness, one final word should be said about the nature of the offense of criminal defamation. Although one of its reasons for being was to prevent statements having a tendency to excite a violent response, that tendency is not generally regarded as an element of the offense. [9] It has become clear that the real interest being protected by criminal defamation statutes is personal reputation. Whether that purpose justifies use of the criminal law has been questioned. Reflecting the sentiments of the draftsmen of the Model Penal Code, the court in Garrison wrote: `It goes without saying that penal sanctions cannot be justified merely by the fact that defamation is evil or damaging to a person in ways that entitle him to maintain a civil suit. Usually we reserve the criminal law for harmful behavior which exceptionally disturbs the community's sense of security ... It seems evident that personal calumny falls in neither of these classes in the USA, that it is therefore inappropriate for penal control, and that this probably accounts for the paucity of prosecutions and the near desuetude of private criminal libel legislation in this country . .'. Model Penal Code, Tent.Draft # 13, 1961, § 250.7, Comments, at 44. The Reporters therefore recommended only narrowly drawn statutes designed to reach words tending to cause a breach of the peace, such as the statute sustained in Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, 315 U.S. 568, 62 S.Ct. 766, 86 L.Ed. 1031, or designed to reach speech, such as group vilification, `especially likely to lead to public disorders,' such as the statute sustained in Beauharnais v. Illinois, 343 U.S. 250, 72 S.Ct. 725, 96 L.Ed. 919. Model Penal Code, supra, at 45. But Louisiana's rejection of the clear-and-present-danger standard as irrelevant to the application of its statute (citation omitted) coupled with the absence of any limitation of the statute itself to speech calculated to cause breaches of the peace, leads us to conclude that the Louisiana statute is not this sort of narrowly drawn statute. 379 U.S. at 69, 85 S.Ct. at 213, 13 L.Ed.2d at 130.