Bartnicki et al. v. Vopper, Aka Williams, et al. (532 U.S. 514)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided May 21, 2001 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 532 U.S. 514 · 121 S. Ct. 1753
- Decided
- May 21, 2001
- Term
- October Term 2000
- Vote
- 6–3
- Majority author
- Justice Stevens
- Issue area
- First Amendment
- Disposition
- Affirmed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party lost
- Ideological direction
- Liberal
- Constitutional ruling
- State/territorial law held unconstitutional
Opinion excerpt
Justice Stevens delivered the opinion of the Court. These cases raise an important question concerning what degree of protection, if any, the First Amendment provides to speech that discloses the contents of an illegally intercepted communication. That question is both novel and narrow. Despite the fact that federal law has prohibited such disclosures since 1934, this is the first time that we have confronted such an issue. The suit at hand involves the repeated intentional disclosure of an illegally intercepted cellular telephone conversation about a public issue. The persons who made the disclosures did not participate in the interception, but they did know — or at least had reason to know — that the interception was unlawful. Accordingly, these eases present a conflict between interests of the highest order — on the one hand, the interest in the full and free dissemination of information concerning public issues, and, on the other hand, the interest in individual privacy and, more specifically, in fostering private speech. The Framers of the First Amendment surely did not foresee the advances in science that produced the conversation, the interception, or the conflict that gave rise to this action. It is therefore not surprising that Circuit judges, as well as the Members of this Court, have come to differing conclusions about the First Amendment’s application to this…
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