That would be a shame, Ben. Criminalization of lies is on the books all over the place.
In particular, fraud is illegal in both federal and state statutes.
I am wondering how this case got to the Supremes in the first place?
I hope you are wrong, Ben. If you cannot criminalize lies, how do you prosecute fraud?
I was under the impression that First Amendment protection was intended to protect the truth when spoken, so that truth was not suppressed by the sovereign, nor the government/state.
Have we in America come so far away from our first principles that this has been forgotten?
We shall see.
I suppose I need to look into the details of this case to understand what's going on.
@Cain: sorry, that's a violation of XIV amendment.
As the U.S. Supreme Court said unanimously in a 1971 libel case, "It can hardly be doubted that the constitutional guarantee [of free speech] has its fullest and most urgent application precisely to the conduct of campaigns for political office."
So states have found it hard to enact laws against false political advertising — and even harder to make them work.
I find that premise, of nine judges, to be flawed. But I think I understand the problem they were trying to address, wherein differences of opinion will be attempted to be suppressed as errors in fact ... not a trivial issue, when I consider what I have seen in political noise over the past thirty years.
This helps me understand the Washington State court comments on the problem.
Washington State Supreme Court: Instead of relying on the State to silence false political speech, the First Amendment requires our dependence on even more speech to bring forth truth. … The First Amendment exists precisely to protect against laws such as [the Washington state truth-in-advertising law] which suppress ideas and inhibit free discussion of governmental affairs.
