explaining that that a public official is someone who is “among the hierarch of government employees who have, or appear to the public to have, substantial responsibility for or control over the conduct of governmental affairs”
How later courts described this case
- explaining that that a public official is someone who is “among the hierarch of government employees who have, or appear to the public to have, substantial responsibility for or control over the conduct of governmental affairs”
- stating that “public officials” include “those among the hierarchy of government employees who have, or appear to the public to have, substantial responsibility for or control over the conduct of governmental affairs”
- stating that public official status “at the very least” applies to appointed government employees who have substantial responsibility for or control over conduct of government affairs
- rejecting the suggestion that the determination of public official status should be answered by reference to state law standards because states "have developed definitions of 'public official' for local administrative purposes, not the purposes of a national constitutional protection"
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
Mr. Justice Fortas,
dissenting.
I would vacate the writ in this case as improvidently granted. The trial below occurred before this Court’s decision in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254 . As a result, the factual record in this ease was not shaped in light of the principles announced in New York Times. Particularly in this type of case it is important to observe *101 the practice of relating our decisions to factual -records. They serve to guide our judgment and to help us measure theory against the sharp outlines of reality. Especially where our decision furnishes a necessarily Procrustean bed for state law, I think, with all respect, that we should insist upon a relevant factual record. A subsequent trial may conceivably help respondent, but it will be too late to be of assistance to us.