“Near v. Minnesota”: Landmark Freedom of the Press Decision
The Supreme Court on this day declared unconstitutional a Minnesota public nuisance law and for the first time ruled that the First Amendment protected freedom of the press from prior restraints.
Jay Near published a Minneapolis newspaper, The Saturday Press, which was regarded as a scandal-sheet and indulged in exposés of alleged political scandals and attacks on local political figures. Near was anti-Catholic, anti-Semitic, and anti-African-American. He alleged, for example, that Jewish crime bosses “practically ran” Minneapolis politics. Authorities sought an injunction against his paper under a Minnesota law that allowed permanent injunctions against publications that were deemed a public nuisance.
Near challenged the injunction, and the Supreme Court in Near v. Minnesota, declared the law an unconstitutional prior restraint on freedom of the press. The case established the principle of “no prior restraints,” which is the foundation of constitutional law on freedom of the press.
The most famous and most important freedom of the press court decision occurred during the Vietnam War. By 1967, then Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara had become disillusioned with the war and did not think the U.S. could win. So on June 17, 1967 he commissioned a secret Pentagon report on the history of American involvement in Vietnam. The report revealed that several presidents, beginning with Dwight Eisenhower had lied to the American people about the nature and extent of U.S. involvement in Vietnam. Daniel Ellsberg, formerly a hawk on the war, secretly and illegally made a photocopy of the report, which he leaked to the New York Times. The Times began published articles based on the Pentagon Papers on June 13, 1971. The articles’ revelations about government lying caused an enormous scandal. President Nixon’s administration won a court injunction on June 15, 1971 stopping further publication of any articles. The Times took the case to the Supreme Court and on June 30, 1971 the Court ruled against the injunction in a landmark victory for freedom of the press.
The Court: “The question is whether a statute authorizing such proceedings in restraint of publication is consistent with the conception of the liberty of the press as historically conceived and guaranteed. In determining the extent of the constitutional protection, it has been generally, if not universally, considered that it is the chief purpose of the guaranty to prevent previous restraints upon publication.”
Read the outstanding book about the case: Fred W. Friendly, Minnesota Rag (1981)
Learn about Freedom of the Press at the First Amendment Center: http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/category/press
Read about the Near decision on the occasion of its 85 birthday.