Court Opinion

ID: 9679577
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 06:57:09.501437+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:15.868899
License: Public Domain

ON MOTION FOR REHEARING
REAVLEY, Justice.
I would affirm the judgment of the lower courts. The Constitution of Texas provides that the Legislature shall “prescribe the duties and provide for the election” of a County Surveyor “who shall have an office at the county seat . . .. ” Article 16, Section 44. Plaintiff is a public official as the elected County Surveyor of Webb County and the newspaper article, to the extent that it could be said to be defamatory, bears upon the plaintiff’s fitness for that office. I find no basis for our holding that the newspaper article itself must give notice of the office or performance of official duties of the plaintiff. Can it be the law that the Sullivan rule applies to the publication of a news article about an officeholder whose identity and office is not familiar to the general public — if, but Only if, the article itself reveals that the defamed person is an elected official? I regard this rule as contrary to the decisions of the United States Supreme Court.
GREENHILL, C. J., joins in this dissenting opinion.