Based on the 1st ammendment, how can we have slander laws?

1st amendment text:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

How can we have slander and libel laws. I understand why some people want them, but how are they legal? By the same token, how to we have any TV or radio censorship. Again, I understand why some people want it, I just don't see how it is legal/constitutional.

Just curious if the scholars around here had a perspective on how we so easily get around such a simple and clear rule. This seems even more clear than the right to bear arms.

Freedom of speech carries with it the responsibility to know when to shut up.

You are not allowed to violate the rights of others in the exercise of your own otn. My inalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness can be taken from me by the action of your speaking about me in a way which you know not to be accurate or true. The purpose of the government is to protect and secure my rights and my liberty from being taken from me by force or by fraud. Libel and slander are certainly forms of fraud, are they not? Your rights do not include being able to engage in acts of fraud, regardless of the means by which that fraud is perpetrated.

That pretty much sums up why laws punishing libel and slander are permissible without violating the 1st Amendment.

Unless, or course, you are a politician. Then you can slander and lie with impunity

PrintSmith wrote: You are not allowed to violate the rights of others in the exercise of your own otn. My inalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness can be taken from me by the action of your speaking about me in a way which you know not to be accurate or true. The purpose of the government is to protect and secure my rights and my liberty from being taken from me by force or by fraud. Libel and slander are certainly forms of fraud, are they not? Your rights do not include being able to engage in acts of fraud, regardless of the means by which that fraud is perpetrated.

That pretty much sums up why laws punishing libel and slander are permissible without violating the 1st Amendment.

I understand why we have made laws against libel and slander, I understand that they are used to misrepresent. Despite this, you did not sum up why they don't violate the first amendment, you summed up why it is ok to violate it.

Would you feel comfortable saying that laws against libel or slander do not abridge the freedom of speech? I would not.

I am not suggesting libel be legal, just that the constitution seems very black and white on this issue - that libel is not only legal, but protected by the document, but we seem to be ok with living in the gray area on this one. Seems this would have to be updated to say "except in cases of yada yada" that's all.

I am suggesting that if we take such a simple and clear law, in the first amendment, and we are all willing to interpret something so clear so loosely or literally as the opposite (as I think you have, and perhaps many judges), does that not weaken any law, or make it excessively subject to the mood of the day or give precedent to allow folks to ignore it all together, as we already have?

I simply suggest the solution fixing the document to allow for the laws that people generally like.

May I respectfully suggest that the existence of the law does not prevent you from engaging in libel or slander? You have exercised your right to speak or to print what it was you wanted to disseminate, correct? When you engage in libel or slander you are committing an act of fraud against the equally inalienable rights of someone else to their life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. If I will be happier if I kill you and take possession of your home, that would be an exercise of my inalienable right to pursue my own happiness, right? The problem comes in that by my act I have taken from you that same inalienable right, to live and pursue your own happiness. Thus the law isn't to stop one from exercising their own rights, it is to provide for punishing them for doing harm to the rights of others in the process.

on that note wrote: I understand why we have made laws against libel and slander, I understand that they are used to misrepresent. Despite this, you did not sum up why they don't violate the first amendment, you summed up why it is ok to violate it.

The first amendment gives you the freedom of speech. It does not promise a complete lack of repercussions when you're stupid about exercising that freedom.

archer wrote: Unless, or course, you are a politician. Then you can slander and lie with impunity

You can also include what one might say about a politician to that list as well. Normally, publicly alleging that someone may be a felon without knowledge that they are one will land you in some hot water. Unless, that is, the target of the slur is a person seeking public office - then it's just partisan politics at play.

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