Lies

The latest attack on free speech is called disinformation. Editors decide that something is not true and they then refuse to print it. Private companies have this right. This means that under current law if social media becomes dominant they can edit all news and we will know only what they want us to know. The question then becomes can these editors lie. Under U.S. law, many falsehoods—even some deliberate lies—receive the full protection of the First Amendment. That is true even though “there is no constitutional value in false statements of fact,” as Justice Lewis Powell Jr. wrote for the Supreme Court in 1974. Nonetheless, the Court has often refused to allow government to penalize speakers for mistakes, sloppy falsehoods, and lies. Political lies are strongly protected; but even private lies sometimes are as well.