New York Times Vs Sullivan Case

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Intro To Media Take Home Final Exam

Why is the case of New York Times V. Sullivan so significant in First Amendment history? The case of New York Times Vs Sullivan was significant because it dealt caused people to think about how opinionated media could be before it was considered libel. The court case dealt with The New York Times newspaper and L. B. Sullivan, who was the Montgomery city commissioner. The New York Times printed in their newspaper that they believed the arrest of Martin Luther King Jr. was unjust and an attempt to discredit the movement fighting to give black people the right to vote. The city commissioner, Sullivan, sued the newspaper and some endorsers of the article because he believed that what they said was libel and a direct attack towards him. According to the Alabama law at the time, Sullivan did not need to present any proof that the article
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that are considered obscene, politically unacceptable, or a threat to security”. I believe that throughout history, this term has been abused and taken advantage of, in order to suppress ideas that the people in power didn’t agree with. When I think of censorship, I immediately think of books. In books such as Fahrenheit 451 or the Giver, the government is usually implied to be the antagonist, suppressing the main characters by not letting them do, say, or think what they want. However this happens quite often in real life as well and people don’t even realize it. I remember reading a news article about a school in Minnesota that banned the books “To Kill a Mockingbird” and “Huckleberry Finn” because of the use of the “N” word. I understand thats a bad word for people to say, but the teachers felt uncomfortable reading it in the book and that just feels like they’re trying to erase that part of history; In school we are supposed to learn from history so we can avoid repeating