Court Opinion

ID: 9472950
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 04:15:27.315598+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:43:14.510737
License: Public Domain

WALD, Circuit Judge, with whom Circuit Judges EDWARDS and SCALIA join,
dissenting in part:
I basically agree with the plurality’s outline of the appropriate strategy for identifying absolutely privileged opinion and its judgment that most of the statements made by Evans and Novak about the plaintiff are non-actionable statements of opinion. However, in my mind the columnists’ statement that “Oilman has no status within the profession, but is a pure and simple activist” is an assertion of fact for which its authors can be made to answer, consistent with the requirements of the first amendment, in a suit for libel.
In many areas of the law, the factual nature of statements about reputation is recognized and indeed taken for granted. Lay witnesses are generally allowed to testify as to someone’s reputation in the community for veracity or violence, for example, although they cannot give their personal opinion as to those matters. See McCormick on Evidence § 44 (Cleary ed. 1984). Expert witnesses are often asked in the course of their testimony whether other authors, scholars or practitioners are generally regarded as authorities in the field, see 7 Wigmore on Evidence § 1984 (Chadbourne rev. 1974), and their own qualifications may be established or attacked on the basis of professional reputation, see 5 id. § 1621.
Similarly, as the plurality concedes, the law of libel has long recognized the basically factual nature of attacks on reputation. I do not dispute the plurality’s assertion that the first amendment often demands modifications of the common law of libel so as to limit the chilling effect of potential civil liability on an “uninhibited, robust, and wide-open debate on public issues.” New York Times v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254, 270, 84 S.Ct. 710, 721, 11 L.Ed.2d 686 (1964). In particular, the first amendment demands that we evaluate the allegedly libelous statement in the context in which it appeared to determine whether it can claim the constitutional privilege for statements of opinion. Yet I find that a fair application of both the plurality’s test and the approach suggested by Judge Bork in his concurrence indicates that the statement before us is more a statement of fact than of opinion.
The plurality would ask four questions about the particular statement at issue: (1) do the words have a “precise core of meaning”; (2) is the statement verifiable; (3) how do the immediate context — in this case the article — and (4) the broader context affect the likelihood that the statement will be read as an assertion of fact? Although Judge Bork calls for a more flexible, ad hoc balancing approach to the fact-opinion distinction, his analysis of this case strikes me as conceptually indistinguishable from the plurality’s approach. I fully agree that the distinction between fact and opinion is rarely self-evident or exact and that we should not attempt to impose any mechanical set of categories on the complexities of libel litigation. Although the task may not always be an easy one, however, we are surely obliged to articulate some set of principles to guide the district court in determining which types of statements can give rise to a libel action.
Indeed, despite the plea for a case-by-case consideration of the “totality of cir*1033cumstances,” Judge Bork apparently recognizes precisely this obligation. After purporting to engage in an open-textured balancing of first amendment values, Judge Bork relies on three factors of his own in order to immunize libel defendants from suit. He reasons that (1) Oilman should be expected to endure the challenged statement because he placed himself in a public, political debate, (2) the factual nature of the “no status” statement is inherently unsuitable for jury determination, and (3) the functional meaning and general context of the statement indicate its rhetorical purpose. The first of these factors represents an unprecedented extension into the fact-opinion doctrine of the distinction between public and private officials for the purposes of defamation suits. The second two considerations merely restate the plurality’s test. The challenged statement is surely capable of adjudication if it admits of a stable core of meaning and if Oilman’s professional reputation is in fact verifiable. Similarly, the functional meaning or practical impact of the “no status” assertion can only be determined in light of the factual and social context surrounding the appellees’ column.
In any event, I believe that the challenged statement is properly characterized as a factual assertion rather than a rhetorical hyperbole under either the plurality’s or Judge Bork’s approach. The statement that Oilman has no status within his profession undoubtedly admits of a sufficiently ascertainable and stable core of meaning: a decisive majority of his fellow political scientists do not regard him as a good scholar. That one might find a wide diversity of views among political scientists about Oilman’s work and about what constitutes scholarly excellence in no way undermines the commonly understood meaning of a statement like this about reputation. The statement says to the ordinary reader that, however each individual scholar evaluates excellence, there is an overwhelming consensus that Oilman does not have it.
Furthermore, Oilman’s scholarly reputation is adequately verifiable. One could, for instance, devise a poll of American Political Science Association members as to their opinion, on a scale of one to ten, of the scholarly value of Oilman’s work. Testimony of prominent political scientists or other measures of reputation would also serve to verify or refute the statement about Oilman’s reputation without sending the jury into a sea of speculation.
As both Judge Bork and Judge MacKinnon point out, neither a poll nor the testimony of his peers will, in all likelihood, conclusively establish Oilman’s professional reputation in the eyes of the jury. Nonetheless, juries traditionally are called on to resolve conflicting opinions in libel cases, and the uncertainties endemic to determining a person’s reputation do not, in themselves, render the issue “inherently unsusceptible to accurate resolution by a jury.” Op. of Bork, J., at p. 1005. Whatever their limits as truth finding devices, expert testimony or a poll could surely establish whether Oilman enjoys some reputation as an academic scholar as opposed to a mere activist — whether that scholarly reputation is supported by consensus or sharp disagreement among his colleagues. Given appropriate instruction by the trial judge, a jury is as well equipped to determine whether an individual has or has not established professional reputation in this context as it is in a host of others. Although I share Judge Bork’s concern that juries may, in some defamation cases, tend to underemphasize the limits imposed by the first amendment, I cannot subscribe to his astonishing view that “[t]he only solution to the problem libel actions pose would appear to be close judicial scrutiny to ensure that cases about the types of speech and writing essential to a vigorous first amendment do not reach the jury.” Id. at p. 997 (emphasis added). Instead, I believe that any such problems should be remedied through careful supervision by the trial judge and vigorous appellate review, not through stripping the jury of its historic function merely because qualities *1034such as “professional reputation” are difficult to adjudicate.1
The plurality cites the statement that “[o]ur academic culture does not permit the raising of such questions” as a concession of non-verifiability by Evans and Novak and their source that should warn the reader not to accept the foregoing statement about reputation as one of fact. Op. of Starr, J., at p. 991. But to me — and I believe to the ordinary reader as well — the liberal professor’s refusal to be cited publicly means simply that Oilman’s writings are not openly attacked in the academic community as mere polemics. Moreover, the majority’s implication that Oilman has no verifiable reputation — that there is no way of evaluating the conglomeration of his colleagues’ opinions, public or private, of his work — is belied by the characterization of the political scientist quoted as one “whose scholarship and reputation as a liberal are well known,” as well as by the complex procedures for hiring, evaluation and tenure decisions set up by academic institutions throughout the nation. As judges we are familiar as well with how prominently academic reputation and stature figures in judicial nominations, evaluations and confirmation proceedings.
The plurality readily concedes that a statement about one’s professional reputation, even the very statement before us, might be deemed a factual assertion in a different context. Yet the majority concludes that the facts, noted in the article, that Oilman was at the time a professor at New York University and was the top candidate for the position of chairman of the political science department at the University of Maryland would undermine a reader’s belief in the factual accuracy of the statement. See Op. of Starr, J., at p. 990 & n. 42. But as I read the article, these “facts” could as well be understood as an assertion that Oilman’s prominence is due solely to his vociferousness and is entirely out of proportion to his poor reputation as a scholar among his peers. Indeed, the article as a whole, while it purports merely to raise questions about Oilman’s qualifications, promotes itself as a call to sanity and objectivity and away from mere polemics. Thus, the immediate context in which this statement was made does little to warn a reader to regard with skepticism what might otherwise appear to be an assertion of fact.
In his concurrence, Judge Bork advances the further argument that the “no status” statement is, in its “practical impact,” in the nature of opinion or rhetorical hyperbole because it is attributed to an anonymous source who is reporting the opinions of others. In the context of Evans’ and Novak’s column, however, the attribution of Oilman’s utter lack of professional status to a political scientist “whose scholarship and reputation as a liberal are well known” gives the statement more rather than less of a factual and verifiable quality.
Under either the plurality’s or Judge Bork’s analysis, then, we are left with the bareboned fact that this article was written by Evans and Novak, well known political columnists, and appeared on the op-ed page. I agree wholeheartedly with both the plurality and Judge Bork that editorial pieces such as this one are commonly filled with “rhetorical hyperbole” and are often *1035read with a degree of skepticism as to their factual content. The first amendment demands extraordinary caution in subjecting to the burdens of a lawsuit isolated statements in this kind of writing. The very statement before us, if adjudged to be a factual assertion, would have to cross numerous sturdily-constructed constitutional hurdles. In particular, Oilman would have to persuade a jury that the statement was false — that he indeed enjoyed a reputation as an academic scholar — and, if he were ruled a public figure subject to the standards of New York Times v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254, 84 S.Ct. 710, 11 L.Ed.2d 686 (1964), that Evans and Novak made the statement with malice or reckless disregard for its truth or falsity.2 Furthermore, a jury verdict on these issues is subject to more searching appellate review than under the “clearly erroneous” standard. Bose Corp. v. Consumers Union, - U.S. -, 104 S.Ct. 1949, 80 L.Ed.2d 502 (1984). Our decision today, however, means that, even assuming that the statement was utterly false, that it was made with knowledge of its falsity, and that it precipitated Oilman’s loss of an important academic position and a decline in his professional standing, the statement’s authors cannot be made to answer in a suit for libel. I do not believe that the first amendment requires this result, and I therefore respectfully dissent.

. After the war of words has ended, I am left with the simple fact that, in assessing or mitigating damages, juries have historically been required to determine what a plaintiffs reputation was before the libel in order to determine how much the plaintiff has been injured by the libel. See Prosser and Keeton on the Law of Torts § 116A at 847-48 (W. Keeton 5th ed. 1984); L. Elderedge, The Law of Defamation § 97 at 564-66 (1978); M. Newell, The Law of Libel and Slander § 730 (4th ed. 1924). Indeed, the Supreme Court clearly stated in Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U.S. 323, 94 S.Ct. 2997, 41 L.Ed.2d 789 (1974), that defamation plaintiffs are entitled to damages, including jury awarded damages, for “actual injury ... including] impairment of reputation and standing in the community." Id., 418 U.S. at 349-50, 94 S.Ct. at 3012 (emphasis added). The determination of actual injury ordinarily turns on an assessment of the status quo ante, and courts have routinely upheld jury awards predicated on a libel plaintiffs prelibel reputation. See, e.g., Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 680 F.2d 527, 540 (7th Cir.1982); Dixon v. Newsweek, Inc., 562 F.2d 626, 631-32 (10th Cir.1977). It is therefore incomprehensible to me how both the plurality and the concurrences can so glibly conclude that juries are inherently incapable of making such a determination.

. Judge Bork’s concurrence would apply the fact-opinion distinction differently to statements made in the context of public political controversy than to those made in other contexts. He argues that "we ought to accept the proposition that those who place themselves in a political arena must accept a degree of derogation that others need not.” Op. of Bork, J. at p. 1002. To be sure, public debate lies at the very core of the values protected by the first amendment. Yet it is precisely this idea that underscores the current distinction between public and private figures and the rigorous New York Times standards governing defamation suits against the former. See Gertz, 418 U.S. at 342-45, 94 S.Ct. at 3008-09. By transforming arguably factual assertions into privileged statements of opinion or rhetorical hyperbole merely because they appear in a charged political context, Judge Bork's wholly novel approach would deprive the plaintiff of an opportunity even to prove that Evans and Novak acted with actual malice or reckless disregard of the truth. In my view, the first amendment does not require such an egregious result, and New York Times, by giving quite a different effect to the "political context” factor, implicitly forbids it.
At stake in Judge Bork’s new political rhetoric doctrine is the extent to which libel plaintiffs will ever be able to bring their claims to trial. In the context of the present dispute, for example, Judge Bork concedes that a cloistered scholar who "confined himself to academic pursuits and eschewed political proselytizing” could legitimately expect any criticism to concern his work and could bring a libel action over false statements about his reputation. Op. of Bork, J., at pp. 1002-03. Yet because Oilman is a "proponent not just of Marxist scholarship but of Marxist politics,” Judge Bork reasons, he should be deprived of the opportunity to bring the same legal action. Id. at p. 1003. Not only does this approach overlook the fact that cloistered scholarship can often function as a form of political advocacy, but it also creates a special set of libel laws for academics. Under Judge Bork’s approach, if an editorialist makes identical, maliciously false statements concerning the professional reputation of a retiring scholar and that of an activist academic, only the former could bring a defamation action. In effect, trial judges would be required to distinguish politics from scholarship as a condition of allowing a defamation suit to proceed at ¿11. Of course, trial courts currently face a similar task when they determine whether the plaintiff is a public or private figure under New York Times. They do so, however, only for the purpose of determining the plaintiffs burden of proof at trial. Judge Bork’s application of New York Times' public-private distinction — political activism is "public” under his view while scholarship is "private” — to the fact-opinion doctrine would create an absolute and, needless to say, unprecedented threshold requirement for access to the jury at all. In view of the protections already afforded public debate by the “actual malice” standard, I can see no reason other than a vague, but obviously overpowering, distrust of juries for holding the entire law of libel hostage to this quite subtle distinction.