Lies and the Law
Concern over the role that lies and deception of all kinds play in public life in the United States has reached new heights in the last few years, raising important questions about the meaning of freedom of speech. Among those questions is whether one of the foundational assumptions of modern First Amendment law still holds, that the best remedy for harmful speech—including harmfully false or misleading speech—is more speech.
This blog channel highlights the Institute’s examination of those questions and features posts related to our Lies and the Law series of public conversations and essays.
-
Deep Dive: Lies and the Law
Symposium Suggests Large-Scale Societal Changes Are Needed to Lessen Impact of Harmful Lies
By A. Adam GlennInstitute’s “Lies, Free Speech, and the Law” event featured research from a diverse range of scholars on how to address the problem of falsehoods
-
Institute Update: Lies and the Law
Are We Climbing in or out of the Hole?
Artist Piotr Szyhalski on the making of the “Lies and the Law” series
By Kushal Dev -
Deep Dive: Lies and the Law
Freedom From the Marketplace of Speech
Four ways to render speech less susceptible to private coercion
By Amy Kapczynski -
Deep Dive: Lies and the Law
Of Noisy Songs and Mighty Rivers
Why the framework of “marketplace of ideas” is a fairy tale
By Yochai Benkler -
Deep Dive: Lies and the Law
“Truth Drives Out Lies” and Other Misinformation
Justice Kennedy, free speech fabulist
By David Pozen -
Institute Update: Lies and the Law
Knight Institute Symposium on “Lies, Free Speech, and the Law” to Feature Scholars in Law, Social Science, History, and Technology
Public event to be held April 8, 2022, at Columbia University, and online
By Katy Glenn Bass -
Deep Dive: Lies and the Law
Thoughts on Government Lies
Mapping the varieties of lies governments tell, with some help from Hannah Arendt
By David Luban -
Deep Dive: Lies and the Law
The Most Troubling Government Lie? The "Presumptive" One
The problem is less the obviously false statement than the obscure “fact” that allows the government to bias or distort critical information
By Wendy Wagner -
Deep Dive: Lies and the Law
What the Constitution Can—and Can’t—Do About the Government’s Lies
Litigation is one remedy; laws that constrain the speech of governmental bodies are another; counterspeech and politics are still more
By Helen Norton -
Deep Dive: Lies and the Law
The Media will be All Right
A plaintiff’s lawyer’s lament on how anti-SLAPP will be an obstacle for defendants with or without Sullivan
By Carrie Goldberg
Litigation
Lawsuit
Wikimedia v. NSA
A lawsuit challenging the NSA’s “Upstream” surveillance
Learn MoreResearch
Essays and Scholarship
Privacy, Autonomy, and the Dissolution of Markets
Pathways from platform capitalism
Learn MoreBlog
Deep Dive
Rereading the First Amendment
Exposing the false assumptions that underlie contemporary First Amendment debates
Learn MoreLitigation
Amicus Brief
NetChoice, LLC v. Paxton
Fifth Circuit case challenging new laws regulating social media platforms
Learn More