Actual Malice: Past & Present in The New York Times v. Sullivan (1964)

"Heed their Rising Voices" proclaimed the full-page advertisement published in The New York Times on March 29, 1960. The ad, funded by the newly formed Committee to Defend Martin Luther King and the Struggle for the South, cited some sixty supporters by name, both ministers and celebrities, describing the violent response to civil rights protest in cities like Montgomery, Alabama.  

The response was immediate. Alabama Gov. John Patterson demanded a retraction. Arguing that his reputation had been damaged and citing factual inaccuracies in the text, L.B. Sullivan, elected commissioner of Montgomery, Alabama, sued The New York Times for defamation.  The jury found in his favor, awarding him $500,000, a decision upheld by the Alabama Supreme Court.

On January 6, 1964, as the U.S. Supreme Court convened to hear oral arguments in The New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, Dr. King was seated in the gallery. "Actual Malice" examines The New York Times v. Sullivan and the historic decision authored by Justice William J. Brennan in its historical moment, tracing the case's influence from its present to our own.