Opinion ID: 2567337
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: State and First Amendment Interests in Defamation Law

Text: ¶ 18 At its core, an action for defamation is intended to protect an individual's interest in maintaining a good reputation. West v. Thomson Newspapers, 872 P.2d 999, 1008 (Utah 1994); see Seegmiller v. KSL, Inc., 626 P.2d 968, 973 (Utah 1981) (recognizing that the integrity of an individual's reputation is essential to his standing in society, in his vocation, and even in his family). [2] Before 1964, defamation was a strict liability tort, and a plaintiff would recover from the publisher of a defamatory statement unless the publisher could prove the statement was true. Id. at 971 (noting that pre-1964 law presumed damage to reputation from the defamation itself); see Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U.S. 323, 334, 94 S.Ct. 2997, 41 L.Ed.2d 789 (1974). ¶ 19 The law changed, however, when the United States Supreme Court ruled in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254, 84 S.Ct. 710, 11 L.Ed.2d 686 (1964), that state defamation law, like any governmentally sanctioned formulae for the repression of expression, must be bound by standards that satisfy the First Amendment. Id. at 269, 84 S.Ct. 710. The Court reasoned that the First Amendment protects `unfettered interchange of ideas for the bringing about of political and social changes desired by the people' even though this interchange may well include vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials, and even though, in such a context, erroneous statements inevitably occur. Id. at 269-71, 84 S.Ct. 710 (quoting Roth v. United States, 354 U.S. 476, 484, 77 S.Ct. 1304, 1 L.Ed.2d 1498 (1957)). A strict liability rule in defamation law deprives the critic of official conduct of necessary breathing space, id. at 271-72, 84 S.Ct. 710, by compelling [him] to guarantee the truth of all his factual assertions, deterring some true speech along with the false, id. at 279, 84 S.Ct. 710. Concluding that the First Amendment essentially imposes a federal rule on state defamation law, the Court held that a public official could not recover[] damages [under state law] 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. Id. at 279-80, 84 S.Ct. 710. In essence, the Court recognized a constitutional privilege for the citizen-critic of government. Id. at 282, 84 S.Ct. 710; see Madsen v. United Television, Inc., 797 P.2d 1083, 1084-85 (Utah 1990); Van Dyke, 663 P.2d at 54-55. ¶ 20 In Curtis Publishing Co. v. Butts, 388 U.S. 130, 87 S.Ct. 1975, 18 L.Ed.2d 1094 (1967), the Court extended this constitutional privilege to defamatory statements concerning public figures who are not government officials. Id. at 163, 87 S.Ct. 1975 (Warren, C.J., concurring in the result, joined by four Justices). The Court reasoned that, in the modern world, power has . . . become much more organized in what we have commonly considered the private sector. In many situations, policy determinations which traditionally were channeled through formal political institutions are now originated and implemented through a complex array of boards, committees, commissions, corporations, and associations, some only loosely connected with the Government. This blending of positions and power has also occurred in the case of individuals so that many who do not hold public office at the moment are nevertheless intimately involved in the resolution of important public questions or, by reason of their fame, shape events in areas of concern to society at large. Id. at 163-64, 87 S.Ct. 1975 (controlling opinion of Warren, C.J.) (emphasis added); see also id. at 147-48, 87 S.Ct. 1975 (plurality) ([A] rational distinction cannot be founded on the assumption that criticism of private citizens who seek to lead in the determination of . . . policy will be less important to the public interest than will criticism of government officials. (internal quotation omitted)). ¶ 21 The Court in Curtis did not define precisely who should be considered a public figure for purposes of applying the constitutional privilege to state defamation law. In a subsequent opinion, Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U.S. 323, 94 S.Ct. 2997, 41 L.Ed.2d 789 (1974), the Court indicated that the definition of public figure in effect rests on a judicial determination of the proper accommodation between First Amendment concerns and the state interest in compensating individuals for the harm caused by defamatory falsehood. Id. at 341-43, 94 S.Ct. 2997. The Court recognized that the state interest at issue was strong and legitimate with regard to private individuals. Id. at 348, 94 S.Ct. 2997. With regard to public figures, however, the state interest is reduced, in part because such individuals are able to engage in self-help, counteracting defamatory statements through their own access to and use of the channels of effective communication. Id. at 344, 94 S.Ct. 2997. Moreover, in most cases, such individuals have voluntarily exposed themselves to increased risk of injury from defamatory falsehood and are thus less deserving of state law protection than the average private person. Id. at 345, 94 S.Ct. 2997; see Wolston v. Reader's Digest Ass'n, 443 U.S. 157, 164, 99 S.Ct. 2701, 61 L.Ed.2d 450 (1979) (considering this normative consideration the more important of the two).