Claim

Claim 824

Under Alabama law as it stood before the Supreme Court's ruling, Sullivan needed only to show the advertisement contained errors that could have harmed his reputation.

Published 2026-09-26. Last reviewed 2026-09-26. 1 source.

Statement: Under Alabama law as it stood before the Supreme Court's ruling, Sullivan needed only to show the advertisement contained errors that could have harmed his reputation.
Field: stated_justification
Value: Alabama libel standard before the ruling
About: incident 1960-us-montgomery-commissioner-sues-new-york-times-for-libel
Source: New York Times Co. v. Sullivan (1964)
Publisher: The First Amendment Encyclopedia, Middle Tennessee State University
Method: outlet report
Checked: 2026-09-26
Confidence: medium
Status: current
Source date: 2023-08-06

Quotation from the source

Under Alabama law, Sullivan only needed to prove that there were mistakes and that they likely harmed his reputation.