Supreme Court establishes the actual malice standard to shield civil rights press coverage in New York Times v. Sullivan

The Supreme Court unanimously reversed a $500,000 Alabama libel verdict against the New York Times — the largest in U.S. history at the time — that Montgomery Police Commissioner L.B. Sullivan had won after the Times published a civil rights advertisement containing minor factual errors. Justice William Brennan held that a public official suing for defamation must prove "actual malice" — that the defendant knew the statement was false or acted with reckless disregard for its truth. By the time the Court ruled, Southern officials had filed 17 libel suits against Northern newspapers seeking a combined $288 million in damages, a coordinated campaign that had effectively chilled press coverage of the civil rights movement.