Brian Martin Quotes
The basic idea of defamation law is simple. It is an attempt to balance the private right to protect one's reputation with the public right to freedom of speech …. defamation law is often used by the rich and powerful to deter criticisms. It is seldom helpful to ordinary people whose reputations are attacked unfairly.
Brian Martin, Australian Political Scientist & Sociologist, Defamation Law and Free Speech
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
This principle was incorporated into American law by the Supreme Court 1964 decision in Sullivan v. New York Times, where this argument drove the opinion.
The libel and slander laws in England were then, and are today, dramatically different from those of the United States in two fundamental ways: In America truth is an absolute defense; in England you can’t say true things about people which are personally libelous. Second, in America politicians and public figures are not entitled to a verdict even if the statements are inadvertently or possibly false. Without the Constitutional protections of freedom of speech and freedom of the press, the reputations of people including public figures are given much more weight in England than in America.
Usually Jefferson was the strongest voice for rights with no loopholes. However, he wanted to have a slander exception as this quote shows. However, the issue is what happens if a government official or an agency believed that it has been falsely slandered? If Jefferson’s proposal was accepted completely, the government and officials could sue someone who published negative information that they thought was false. Our supreme court has limited the exception to private parties who were NOT “public figures” unless the publisher knew the information was false and proceeded anyway for malicious reasons.
England and most other countries do not have such an exception and the press is very timid about criticizing the government or officials lest they make a mistake .
The word “printer” had a slightly different meaning then. In Jefferson’s time the printer was also the publisher, Benjamin Franklin was known as a printer but he not only published material but wrote much of it himself. This was typical. So Jefferson is concerned with the rights of the printer, the publisher and the writer.
Samuel Langhorne Clemens, 1835-1910. Grant was the victim of more journalistic errors than most politicians as a number of his appointees turned out to abuse their position for their own gain. Often, Democratic leaning newspapers would claim the Grant was aware of the corruption, sharing in it or both, When there was later proof of Grant’s non involvement, most newspapers would never publish a retraction of correction.
Brian Martin (born 1947) is a social scientist in the School of Humanities and Social Inquiry, Faculty of Law, Humanities and the Arts, at the University of Wollongong (UOW) in NSW, Australia. He was appointed a Professor at the University in 2007, and in 2017 was appointed Emeritus Professor. His work is in the fields of peace research, scientific controversies, science and technology studies, sociology, political science, media studies, law, journalism, freedom of speech, education and corrupted institutions, as well as research on whistleblowing and dissent in the context of science. Martin was president of Whistleblowers Australia from 1996 to 1999 and remains their International Director. He has been criticized by medical professionals and public health advocates for promoting HIV/AIDS denialism and vaccine hesitancy in the context of his work.
