Opinion ID: 169651
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Sources of Law

Text: Claims for defamation are deeply rooted in the common law. Since New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254, 84 S.Ct. 710, 11 L.Ed.2d 686 (1964), however, courts have had to supplement their common-law analysis with a federal constitutional inquiry to determine whether a claim can survive. Moreover, a number of states, including Colorado, have invoked state constitutions to restrict defamation claims. See, e.g., NBC Subsidiary (KCNC-TV), Inc. v. Living Will Ctr., 879 P.2d 6, 9 (Colo.1994) ([t]o decide the issues . . . we must first identify the appropriate standard for evaluating when defamatory statements are constitutionally protected under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution and article II, section 10 of the Colorado Constitution.). When there are multiple sources of applicable law, we must be careful in determining what deference is due to state-court decisions. A federal court must follow the state's highest court in pronouncing or construing the state's common law, statutory law, or constitutional law. But it owes no deference to state-court interpretation of the United States Constitution. See Ace Cycle World, Inc. v. Am. Honda Motor Co., 788 F.2d 1225, 1228 (7th Cir.1986). Thus, if we disagree with the state court's view that the federal constitution imposes a particular limitation on defamation claims, we will not impose that limitation. On the other hand, if state law imposes that limitation, we must recognize that limitation even if the federal constitution is not so restrictive. Accordingly, when a state-court decision imposes a limitation on defamation claims, particularly when we doubt whether that limitation is required by the federal constitution, it is important that we determine whether the state court imposed that limitation as a matter of state law or federal constitutional law. Unfortunately, the task of determining the source of a limitation in a state-court decision can be rather difficult. Because the common law of defamation, federal constitutional law, and the constitutional law of the various states reflect many of the same underlying principles and adopt similar propositions, it is often unclear to what extent a court decision relies on each. We have found this to be true in some of the leading Colorado opinions on defamation. To assist us in determining the source of Colorado court pronouncements, we rely on two observations. First, the Colorado Supreme Court has been willing to recognize limitations on the defamation cause of action that are not required by the federal constitution. In Walker v. Colorado Springs Sun, Inc., 188 Colo. 86, 538 P.2d 450, 457 (1975), overruled on other grounds by Diversified Management, Inc. v. Denver Post, Inc., 653 P.2d 1103 (Colo.1982), the court imposed a malice requirement when the allegedly defamatory statement related to a matter of public concern, even though the United States Supreme Court requires malice only when the alleged victim is a public official or public figure. See Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U.S. 323, 342-43, 94 S.Ct. 2997, 41 L.Ed.2d 789 (1974). Second, the Colorado Supreme Court, both in its opinions [2] and in the Uniform Jury Instructions it promulgates, see Colorado Jury Instructions, Civil (4th ed.2007) (copyrighted by Supreme Court of Colorado) [3] , has displayed great respect for the formulations of the tort of defamation in the Restatement (Second) of Torts (1977) (Restatement). [4] We therefore think it a safe presumption (though not an irrebuttable one) that the Colorado Supreme Court will adopt as part of its common law of defamation the various provisions of the Restatement, even if those provisions may impose restrictions not required by controlling authority from the United States Supreme Court.