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376 U.S. 254 (1964)
New York Times Co. v. Sullivan

handle is hein.usreports/usrep376 and id is 314 raw text is: OCTOBER TERM, 1963. Syllabus. 376 U. S. NEW YORK TIMES CO. v. SULLIVAN. CERTIORARI TO THE SUPREME COURT OF ALABAMA. No. 39. Argued January 6, 1964.-Decided March 9, 1964.* Respondent, an elected official in Montgomery, Alabama, brought suit in a state court alleging that he had been libeled by an adver- tisement in corporate petitioner's newspaper, the text of which appeared over the names of the four individual petitioners and many others. The advertisement included statements, some of which were false, about police action allegedly directed against students who participated in a civil rights demonstration and against a leader of the civil rights movement; respondent claimed the statements referred to him because his duties included super- vision of the police department. The trial judge instructed the jury that such statements were libelous per se, legal injury being implied without proof of actual damages, and that for the purpose of compensatory damages malice was presumed, so that such damages could be awarded against petitioners if the statements were found to have been published by them and to have related to respondent. As to punitive damages, the judge instructed that mere negligence was not evidence of actual malice and would not justify an award of punitive damages; he refused to instruct that actual intent to harm or recklessness had to be found before puni- tive damages could be awarded, or that a verdict for respondent should differentiate between compensatory and punitive damages. The jury found for respondent and the State Supreme Court affirmed. Held: A- State cannot under the First and Fourteenth Amendments award damages to a puhlic official for defamatory falsehgod relating to his official conduct unless he proves actuial malice-that the statement was made with knowledge of its fat-ity or with reckless disregard of whether it was true or false. Pp. 265-292. (a) Application by state courts of a rule of law, whether statu- tory or not, to award a judgment in a civil action, is state action under the Fourteenth Amendment. P. 265. (b) Expression does not lose constitutional protection to which it would otherwise be entitled because it appears in the form of a paid advertisement. Pp. 265-266. *Together with No. 40, Abernathy et al. v. Sullivan, also on certiorari to the same court, argued January 7, 1964.

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