*256Mr. Justice Brennan

delivered the opinion of the Court.

We are required in this case to determine for the first time the extent to which the constitutional protections for speech and press limit a State’s power to award damages in a libel action brought by a public official against critics of his official conduct.

Respondent L. B. Sullivan is one of the three elected Commissioners of the City of Montgomery, Alabama. He testified that he was “Commissioner of Public Affairs and the duties are supervision of the Police Department, Fire Department, Department of Cemetery and Department of Scales.” He brought this civil libel action against the four individual petitioners, who are Negroes and Alabama clergymen, and against petitioner the New York Times Company, a New York corporation which publishes the New York Times, a daily newspaper. A jury in the Circuit Court of Montgomery County awarded him damages of $500,000, the full amount claimed, against all the petitioners, and the Supreme Court of Alabama affirmed. 273 Ala. 656, 144 So. 2d 25.

Respondent’s complaint alleged that he had been libeled by statements in a full-page advertisement that was carried in the New York Times on March 29, I960.1 Entitled “Heed Their Rising Voices,” the advertisement began by stating that “As the whole world knows by now, thousands of Southern Negro students are engaged in widespread non-violent demonstrations in positive affirmation of the right to live in human dignity as guaranteed by the U. S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights.” It went on to charge that “in their efforts to uphold these guarantees, they are being met by an unprecedented wave of terror by those who would deny and negate that document which the whole world looks upon as setting the pattern for modern freedom. . . .” Succeeding *257paragraphs purported to illustrate the “wave of terror” by describing certain alleged events. The text concluded with an appeal for funds for three purposes: support of the student movement, “the struggle for the right-to-vote,” and the legal defense of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., leader of the movement, against a perjury indictment then pending in Montgomery.

The text appeared over the names of 64 persons, many widely known for their activities in public affairs, religion, trade unions, and the performing arts. Below these names, and under a line reading “We in the south who are struggling daily for dignity and freedom warmly endorse this appeal,” appeared the names of the four individual petitioners and of 16 other persons, all but two of whom were identified as clergymen in various Southern cities. The advertisement was signed at the bottom of the page by the “Committee to Defend Martin Luther King and the Struggle for Freedom in the South,” and the officers of the Committee were listed.

Of the 10 paragraphs of text in the advertisement, the third and a portion of the sixth were the basis of respondent’s claim of libel. They read as follows:

Third paragraph:

“In Montgomery, Alabama, after students sang ‘My Country, ’Tis of Thee’ on the State Capitol steps, their leaders were expelled from school, and truckloads of police armed with shotguns and tear-gas ringed the Alabama State College Campus. When the entire student body protested to state authorities by refusing to re-register, their dining hall was padlocked in an attempt to starve them into submission.”

Sixth paragraph:

“Again and again the Southern violators have answered Dr. King’s peaceful protests with intimidation and violence. They have bombed his home almost killing his wife and child. They have *258assaulted his person. They have arrested him seven times — for ‘speeding,’ ‘loitering’ and similar ‘offenses.’ And now they have charged him with ‘perjury’ — a felony under which they could imprison him for ten years. . . .”

Although neither of these statements mentions respondent by name, he contended that the word “police” in the third paragraph referred to him as the Montgomery Commissioner who supervised the Police Department, so that he was being accused of “ringing” the campus with police. He further claimed that the paragraph would be read as imputing to the police, and hence to him, the padlocking of the dining hall in order to starve the students into submission.2 As to the sixth paragraph, he contended that since arrests are ordinarily made by the police, the statement “They have arrested [Dr. King] seven times” would be read as referring to him; he further contended that the “They” who did the arresting would be equated with the “They” who committed the other described acts and with the “Southern violators.” Thus, he argued, the paragraph would be read as accusing the Montgomery police, and hence him, of answering Dr. King’s protests with “intimidation and violence,” bombing his home, assaulting his person, and charging him with perjury. Respondent and six other Montgomery residents testified that they read some or all of the statements as referring to him in his capacity as Commissioner.

It is uncontroverted that some of the statements contained in the two paragraphs were not accurate descriptions of events which occurred in Montgomery. Although Negro students staged a demonstration on the State Capitol steps, they sang the National Anthem and not “My *259Country, ’Tis of Thee.” Although nine students were expelled by the State Board of Education, this was not for leading the demonstration at the Capitol, but for demanding service at a lunch counter in the Montgomery County Courthouse on another day. Not the entire student body, but most of it, had protested the expulsion, not by refusing to register, but by boycotting classes on a single day; virtually all the students did register for the ensuing semester. The campus dining hall was not padlocked on any occasion, and the only students who may have been barred from eating there were the few who had neither signed a preregistration application nor requested temporary meal tickets. Although the police were deployed near the campus in large numbers on three occasions, they did not at any time “ring” the campus, and they were not called to the campus in connection with the demonstration on the State Capitol steps, as the third paragraph implied. Dr. King had not been arrested seven times, but only four; and although he claimed to have been assaulted some years earlier in connection with his arrest for loitering outside a courtroom, one of the officers who made the arrest denied that there was such an assault.

On the premise that the charges in the sixth paragraph could be read as referring to him, respondent was allowed to prove that he had not participated in the events described. Although Dr. King’s home had in fact been bombed twice when his wife and child were there, both of these occasions antedated respondent’s tenure as Commissioner, and the police were not only not implicated in the bombings, but had made every effort to apprehend those who were. Three of Dr. King’s four arrests took place before respondent became Commissioner. Although Dr. King had in fact been indicted (he was subsequently acquitted) on two counts of perjury, each of which carried a possible five-year sentence, respondent had nothing to do with procuring the indictment.

*260Respondent made no effort to prove that he suffered actual pecuniary loss as a result of the alleged libel.3 One of his witnesses, a former employer, testified that if he had believed the statements, he doubted whether he “would want to be associated with anybody who would be a party to such things that are stated in that ad,” and that he would not re-employ respondent if he believed “that he allowed the Police Department to do the things that the paper say he did.” But neither this witness nor any of the others testified that he had actually believed the statements in their supposed reference to respondent.

The cost of the advertisement was approximately $4800, and it was published by the Times upon an order from a New York advertising agency acting for the signatory Committee. The agency submitted the advertisement with a letter from A. Philip Randolph, Chairman of the Committee, certifying that the persons whose names appeared on the advertisement had given their permission. Mr. Randolph was known to the Times’ Advertising Acceptability Department as a responsible person, and in accepting the letter as sufficient proof of authorization it followed its established practice. There was testimony that the copy of the advertisement which accompanied the letter listed only the 64 names appearing under the text, and that the statement, “We in the south . . . warmly endorse this appeal,” and the list of names thereunder, which included those of the individual petitioners, were subsequently added when the first proof of the advertisement was received. Each of the individual petitioners testified that he had not authorized the use of his name, and that he had been unaware of its use until receipt of respondent’s demand for a retraction. The manager of the Advertising Ac*261ceptability Department testified that he had approved the advertisement for publication because he knew nothing to cause him to believe that anything in it was false, and because it bore the endorsement of “a number of people who are well known and whose reputation” he “had no reason to question.” Neither he nor anyone else at the Times made an effort to confirm the accuracy of the advertisement, either by checking it against recent Times news stories relating to some of the described events or by any other means.

Alabama law denies a public officer recovery of punitive damages in a libel action brought on account of a publication concerning his official conduct unless he first makes a written demand for a public retraction and the defendant fails or refuses to comply. Alabama Code, Tit. 7, § 914. Respondent served such a demand upon each of the petitioners. None of the individual petitioners responded to the demand, primarily because each took the position that he had not authorized the use of his name on the advertisement and therefore had not published the statements that respondent alleged had libeled him. The Times did not publish a retraction in response to the demand, but wrote respondent a letter stating, among other things, that “we . . . are somewhat puzzled as to how you think the statements in any way reflect on you,” and “you might, if you desire, let us know in what respect you claim that the statements in the advertisement reflect on you.” Respondent filed this suit a few days later without answering the letter. The Times did, however, subsequently publish a retraction of the advertisement upon the demand of Governor John Patterson of Alabama, who asserted that the publication charged him with “grave misconduct and . . . improper actions and omissions as Governor of Alabama and Ex-Officio Chairman of the State Board of Education of Alabama.” When asked to explain why there had been a retraction for the Governor but not for respondent, the *262Secretary of the Times testified: “We did that because we didn’t want anything that was published by The Times to be a reflection on the State of Alabama and the Governor was, as far as we could see, the embodiment of the State of Alabama and the proper representative of the State and, furthermore, we had by that time learned more of the actual facts which the ad purported to recite and, finally, the ad did refer to the action of the State authorities and the Board of Education presumably of which the Governor is the ex-officio chairman . . . .” On the other hand, he testified that he did not think that “any of the language in there referred to Mr. Sullivan.”

The trial judge submitted the case to the jury under instructions that the statements in the advertisement were “libelous per se” and were not privileged, so that petitioners might be held liable if the jury found that they had published the advertisement and that the statements were made “of and concerning” respondent. The jury was instructed that, because the statements were libelous per se, “the law . . . implies legal injury from the bare fact of publication itself,” “falsity and malice are presumed,” “general damages need not be alleged or proved but are presumed,” and “punitive damages may be awarded by the jury even though the amount of actual damages is neither found nor shown.” An award of punitive damages — as distinguished from “general” damages, which are compensatory in nature — -apparently requires proof of actual malice under Alabama law, and the judge charged that “mere negligence or carelessness is not evidence of actual malice or malice in fact, and does not justify an award of exemplary or punitive damages.” He refused to charge, however, that the jury must be “convinced” of malice, in the sense of “actual intent” to harm or “gross negligence and recklessness,” to make such an award, and he also refused to require that a verdict for respondent differentiate between compensatory and punitive damages. The judge rejected petitioners’ con*263tention that his rulings abridged the freedoms of speech and of the press that are guaranteed by the First and Fourteenth Amendments.

In affirming the judgment, the Supreme Court of Alabama sustained the trial judge’s rulings and instructions in all respects. 273 Ala. 656, 144 So. 2d 25. It held that “where the words published tend to injure a person libeled by them in his reputation, profession, trade or business, or charge him with an indictable offense, or tend to bring the individual into public contempt,” they are “libelous per se”; that “the matter complained of is, under the above doctrine, libelous per se, if it was published of and concerning the plaintiff”; and that it was actionable without “proof of pecuniary injury . . . , such injury being implied.” Id., at 673, 676, 144 So. 2d, at 37, 41. It approved the trial court’s ruling that the jury could find the statements to have been made “of and concerning” respondent, stating: “We think it common knowledge that the average person knows that municipal agents, such as police and firemen, and others, are under the control and direction of the city governing body, and more particularly under the direction and control of a single commissioner. In measuring the performance or deficiencies of such groups, praise or criticism is usually attached to the official in complete control of the body.” Id., at 674-675, 144 So. 2d, at 39. In sustaining the trial court’s determination that the verdict was not excessive, the court said that malice could be inferred from the Times’ “irresponsibility” in printing the advertisement while “the Times in its own files had articles already published which would have demonstrated the falsity of the allegations in the advertisement”; from the Times’ failure to retract for respondent while retracting for the Governor, whereas the falsity of some of the allegations was then known to the Times and “the matter contained in the advertisement was equally false as to both parties” ; and from the testimony of the Times’ Secretary that, *264apart from the statement that the dining hall was padlocked, he thought the two paragraphs were “substantially correct.” Id., at 686-687, 144 So. 2d, at 50-51. The court reaffirmed a statement in an earlier opinion that “There is no legal measure of damages in cases of this character.” Id., at 686, 144 So. 2d, at 50. It rejected petitioners’ constitutional contentions with the brief statements that “The First Amendment of the U. S. Constitution does not protect libelous publications” and “The Fourteenth Amendment is directed against State action and not private action.” Id., at 676, 144 So. 2d, at 40.

Because of the importance of the constitutional issues involved, we granted the separate petitions for certiorari of the individual petitioners and of the Times. 371 U. S. 946. We reverse the judgment. We hold that the rule of law applied by the Alabama courts is constitutionally deficient for failure to provide the safeguards for freedom of speech and of the press that are required by the First and Fourteenth Amendments in a libel action brought by a public official against critics of his official conduct.4 We *265further hold that under the proper safeguards the evidence presented in this case is constitutionally insufficient to support the judgment for respondent.

I.

We may dispose at the outset of two grounds asserted to insulate the judgment of the Alabama courts from constitutional scrutiny. The first is the proposition relied on by the State Supreme Court — that “The Fourteenth Amendment is directed against State action and not private action.” That proposition has no application to this case. Although this is a civil lawsuit between private parties, the Alabama courts have applied a state rule of law which petitioners claim to impose invalid restrictions on their constitutional freedoms of speech and press. It matters not that that law has been applied in a civil action and that it is common law only, though supplemented by statute. See, e. g., Alabama Code, Tit. 7, §§ 908-917. The test is not the form in which state power has been applied but, whatever the form, whether such power has in fact been exercised. See Ex parte Virginia, 100 U. S. 339, 346-347; American Federation of Labor v. Swing, 312 U. S. 321.

The second contention is that the constitutional guarantees of freedom of speech and of the press are inapplicable here, at least so far as the Times is concerned, because the allegedly libelous statements were published as part of a paid, “commercial” advertisement. The argument relies on Valentine v. Chrestensen, 316 U. S. 52, where the Court held that a city ordinance forbidding street distribution of commercial and business advertising matter did not abridge the First Amendment freedoms, even as applied to a handbill having a commercial message on one side but a protest against certain official action on the other. The reliance is wholly misplaced. The Court in Chrestensen reaffirmed the constitutional protection for “the freedom of communicating *266information and disseminating opinion”; its holding was based upon the factual conclusions that the handbill was “purely commercial advertising” and that the protest against official action had been added only to evade the ordinance.

The publication here was not a “commercial” advertisement in the sense in which the word was used in Chrestensen. It communicated information, expressed opinion, recited grievances, protested claimed abuses, and sought financial support on behalf of a movement whose existence and objectives are matters of the highest public interest and concern. See N. A. A. C. P. v. Button, 371 U. S. 416, 435. That the Times was paid for publishing the advertisement is as immaterial in this connection as is the fact that newspapers and books are sold. Smith v. California, 361 U. S. 147, 150; cf. Bantam Books, Inc., v. Sullivan, 372 U. S. 58, 64, n. 6. Any other conclusion would discourage newspapers from carrying “editorial advertisements” of this type, and so might shut off an important outlet for the promulgation of information and ideas by persons who do not themselves have access to publishing facilities — who wish to exercise their freedom of speech even though they are not members of the press. Cf. Lovell v. Griffin, 303 U. S. 444, 452; Schneider v. State, 308 U. S. 147, 164. The effect would be to shackle the First Amendment in its attempt to secure “the widest possible dissemination of information from diverse and antagonistic sources.” Associated Press v. United States, 326 U. S. 1, 20. To avoid placing such a handicap upon the freedoms of expression, we hold that if the allegedly libelous statements would otherwise be constitutionally protected from the present judgment, they do not forfeit that protection because they were published in the form of a paid advertisement.5

*267II.

Under Alabama law as applied in this case, a publication is “libelous per se” if the words “tend to injure a person ... in his reputation” or to “bring [him] into public contempt”; the trial court stated that the standard was met if the words are such as to “injure him in his public office, or impute misconduct to him in his office, or want of official integrity, or want of fidelity to a public trust . . . .” The jury must find that the words were published “of and concerning” the plaintiff, but where the plaintiff is a public official his place in the governmental hierarchy is sufficient evidence to support a finding that his reputation has been affected by statements that reflect upon the agency of which he is in charge. Once “libel per se” has been established, the defendant has no defense as to stated facts unless he can persuade the jury that they were true in all their particulars. Alabama Ride Co. v. Vance, 235 Ala. 263, 178 So. 438 (1938); Johnson Publishing Co. v. Davis, 271 Ala. 474, 494-495, 124 So. 2d 441, 457-458 (1960). His privilege of “fair comment” for expressions of opinion depends on the truth of the facts upon which the comment is based. Parsons v. Age-Herald Publishing Co., 181 Ala. 439, 450, 61 So. 345, 350 (1913). Unless he can discharge the burden of proving truth, general damages are presumed, and may be awarded without proof of pecuniary injury. A showing of actual malice is apparently a prerequisite to recovery of punitive damages, and the defendant may in any event forestall a punitive award by a retraction meeting the statutory requirements. Good motives and belief in truth do not negate an inference of malice, but are relevant only in mitigation of punitive damages if the jury chooses to accord them weight. Johnson Publishing Co. v. Davis, supra, 271 Ala., at 495, 124 So. 2d, at 458.

*268The question before us is whether this rule of liability, as applied to an action brought by a public official against critics of his official conduct, abridges the freedom of speech and of the press that is guaranteed by the First and Fourteenth Amendments.

Respondent relies heavily, as did the Alabama courts, on statements of this Court to the effect that the Constitution does not protect libelous publications.6 Those statements do not foreclose our inquiry here. None of the cases sustained the use of libel laws to impose sanctions upon expression critical of the official conduct of public officials. The dictum in Pennekamp v. Florida, 328 U. S. 331, 348-349, that “when the statements amount to defamation,-a judge has such remedy in damages for libel as do other public servants,” implied no view as to what remedy might constitutionally be afforded to public officials. In Beauharnais v. Illinois, 343 U. S. 250, the Court sustained an Illinois criminal libel statute as applied to a publication held to be both defamatory of a racial group and “liable to cause violence and disorder.” But the Court was careful to note that it “retains and exercises authority to nullify action which encroaches on freedom of utterance under the guise of punishing libel” ; for “public men, are, as it were, public property,” and “discussion cannot be denied and the right, as well as the duty, of criticism must not be stifled.” Id., at 263-264, and n. 18. In the only previous case that did present the question of constitutional limitations upon the power to award damages for libel of a public official, the Court was equally divided and the question was not decided. Schenectady Union Pub. Co. v. Sweeney, 316 U. S. 642. *269In deciding the question now, we are compelled by neither precedent nor policy to give any more weight to the epithet “libel” than we have to other “mere labels” of state law. N. A. A. C. P. v. Button, 371 U. S. 415, 429. Like insurrection,7 contempt,8 advocacy of unlawful acts,9 breach of the peace,10 obscenity,11 solicitation of legal business,12 and the various other formulae for the repression of expression that have been challenged in this Court, libel can claim no talismanic immunity from constitutional limitations. It must be measured by standards that satisfy the First Amendment.

The general proposition that freedom of expression upon public questions is secured by the First Amendment has long been settled by our decisions. The constitutional safeguard, we have said, “was fashioned to assure unfettered interchange of ideas for the bringing about of political and social changes desired by the people.” Both v. United States, 354 U. S. 476, 484. “The maintenance of the opportunity for free political discussion to the end that government may be responsive to the will of the people and that changes may be obtained by lawful means, an opportunity essential to the security of the Republic, is a fundamental principle of our constitutional system.” Stromberg v. California, 283 U. S. 359, 369. “[I]t is a prized American privilege to speak one’s mind, although not always with perfect good taste, on all public institutions,” Bridges v. California, 314 U. S. 252, 270, and this opportunity is to be afforded for “vigorous advocacy” no less than “abstract discussion.” N. A. A. C. P. v. Button, 371 U. S. 415, 429. *270The First Amendment, said Judge Learned Hand, “presupposes that right conclusions are more likely to be gathered out of a multitude of tongues, than through any kind of authoritative selection. To many this is, and always will be, folly; but we have staked upon it our all.” United States v. Associated Press, 52 F. Supp. 362, 372 (D. C. S. D. N. Y. 1943). Mr. Justice Brandéis, in his concurring opinion in Whitney v. California, 274 U. S. 357, 375-376, gave the principle its classic formulation:

“Those who won our independence believed . . . that public discussion is a political duty; and that this should be a fundamental principle of the American government. They recognized the risks to which all human institutions are subject. But they knew that order cannot be secured merely through fear of punishment for its infraction; that it is hazardous to discourage thought, hope and imagination; that fear breeds repression; that repression breeds hate; that hate menaces stable government; that the path of safety lies in the opportunity to discuss freely supposed grievances and proposed remedies; and that the fitting remedy for evil counsels is good ones. Believing in the power of reason as applied through public discussion, they eschewed silence coerced by law — the argument of force in its worst form. Recognizing the occasional tyrannies of governing majorities, they amended the Constitution so that free speech and assembly should be guaranteed.”

Thus we consider this case against the background of a profound national commitment to the principle that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open, and that it may well include vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials. See Terminiello v. Chicago, 337 U. S. 1, 4; De Jonge v. Oregon, 299 U. S. 353, *271365. The present advertisement, as an expression of grievance and protest on one of the major public issues of our time, would seem clearly to qualify for the constitutional protection. The question is whether it forfeits that protection by the falsity of some of its factual statements and by its alleged defamation of respondent.

Authoritative interpretations of the First Amendment guarantees have consistently refused to recognize an exception for any test of truth — whether administered by judges, juries, or administrative officials — and especially one that puts the burden of proving truth on the speaker. Cf. Speiser v. Randall, 357 U. S. 513, 525-526. The constitutional protection does not turn upon “the truth, popularity, or social utility of the ideas and beliefs which are offered.” N. A. A. C. P. v. Button, 371 U. S. 415, 445. As Madison said, “Some degree of abuse is inseparable from the proper use of every thing; and in no instance is this more true than in that of the press.” 4 Elliot’s Debates on the Federal Constitution (1876), p. 571. In Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U. S. 296, 310, the Court declared:

“In the realm of religious faith, and in that of political belief, sharp differences arise. In both fields the tenets of one man may seem the rankest error to his neighbor. To persuade others to his own point of view, the pleader, as we know, at times, resorts to exaggeration, to vilification of men who have been, or are, prominent in church or state, and even to false statement. But the people of this nation have ordained in the light of history, that, in spite of the probability of excesses and abuses, these liberties are, in the long view, essential to enlightened opinion and right conduct on the part of the citizens of a democracy.”

That erroneous statement is inevitable in free debate, and that it must be protected if the freedoms of ex*272pression are to have the “breathing space” that they “need ... to survive,” N. A. A. C. P. v. Button, 371 U. S. 415, 433, was also recognized by the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in Sweeney v. Patterson, 76 U. S. App. D. C. 23, 24, 128 F. 2d 457, 458 (1942), cert. denied, 317 U. S. 678. Judge Edgerton spoke for a unanimous court which affirmed the dismissal of a Congressman’s libel suit based upon a newspaper article charging him with anti-Semitism in opposing a judicial appointment. He said:

“Cases which impose liability for erroneous reports of the political conduct of officials reflect the obsolete doctrine that the governed must not criticize their governors. . . . The interest of the public here outweighs the interest of appellant or any other individual. The protection of the public requires not merely discussion, but information. Political conduct and views which some respectable people approve, and others condemn, are constantly imputed to Congressmen. Errors of fact, particularly in regard to a man’s mental states and processes, are inevitable. . . . Whatever is added to the field of libel is taken from the field of free debate.” 13

Injury to official reputation affords no more warrant for repressing speech that would otherwise be free than does factual error-. Where judicial officers are involved, this Court has held that concern for the dignity and *273reputation of the courts does not justify the punishment as criminal contempt of criticism of the judge or his decision. Bridges v. California, 314 U. S. 252. This is true even though the utterance contains “half-truths” and “misinformation.” Pennekamp v. Florida, 328 U. S. 331, 342, 343, n. 5, 345. Such repression can be justified, if at all, only by a clear and present danger of the obstruction of justice. See also Craig v. Harney, 331 U. S. 367; Wood v. Georgia, 370 U. S. 375. If judges are to be treated as “men of fortitude, able to thrive in a hardy climate,” Craig v. Harney, supra, 331 U. S., at 376, surely the same must be true of other government officials, such as elected city commissioners.14 Criticism of their official conduct does not lose its constitutional protection merely because it is effective criticism and hence diminishes their official reputations.

If neither factual error nor defamatory content suffices to remove the constitutional shield from criticism of official conduct, the combination of the two elements is no less inadequate. This is the lesson to be drawn from the great controversy over the Sedition Act of 1798, 1 Stat. 596, which first crystallized a national awareness of the central meaning of the First Amendment. See Levy, Legacy of Suppression (1960), at 258 et seq.; Smith, Freedom’s Fetters (1956), at 426, 431, and passim. That statute made it a crime, punishable by a $5,000 fine and five years in prison, “if any person shall write, print, utter or publish . . . any false, scandalous and malicious *274writing or writings against the government of the United States, or either house of the Congress ... , or the President . . . , with intent to defame ... or to bring them, or either of them, into contempt or disrepute; or to excite against them, or either or any of them, the hatred of the good people of the United States.” The Act allowed the defendant the defense of truth, and provided that the jury were to be judges both of the law and the facts. Despite these qualifications, the Act was vigorously condemned as unconstitutional in an attack joined in by Jefferson and Madison. In the famous Virginia Resolutions of 1798, the General Assembly of Virginia resolved that it

“doth particularly protest against the palpable and alarming infractions of the Constitution, in the two late cases of the 'Alien and Sedition Acts/ passed at the last session of Congress .... [The Sedition Act] exercises ... a power not delegated by the Constitution, but, on the contrary, expressly and positively forbidden by one of the amendments thereto — a power which, more than any other, ought to produce universal alarm, because it is levelled against the right of freely examining public characters and measures, and of free communication among the people thereon, which has ever been justly deemed the only effectual guardian of every other right.” 4 Elliot’s Debates, supra, pp. 553-554.

Madison prepared the Report in support of the protest. His premise was that the Constitution created a form of government under which “The people, not the government, possess the absolute sovereignty.” The structure of the government dispersed power in reflection of the people’s distrust of concentrated power, and of power itself at all levels. This form of government was “altogether different” from the British form, under which the Crown was sovereign and the people were subjects. “Is *275it not natural and necessary, under such different circumstances,” he asked, “that a different degree of freedom in the use of the press should be contemplated?” Id., pp. 569-570. Earlier, in a debate in the House of Representatives, Madison had said: “If we advert to the nature of Republican Government, we shall find that the censorial power is in the people over the Government, and not in the Government over the people.” 4 Annals of Congress, p. 934 (1794). Of the exercise of that power by the press, his Report said: “In every state, probably, in the Union, the press has exerted a freedom in canvassing the merits and measures of public men, of every description, which has not been confined to the strict limits of the common law. On this footing the freedom of the press has stood; on this foundation it yet stands . . . .” 4 Elliot’s Debates, supra, p. 570. The right of free public discussion of the stewardship of public officials was thus, in Madison’s view, a fundamental principle of the American form of government.15

*276Although the Sedition Act was never tested in this Court,16 the attack upon its validity has carried the day in the court of history. Fines levied in its prosecution were repaid by Act of Congress on the ground that it was unconstitutional. See, e. g., Act of July 4, 1840, e. 45, 6 Stat. 802, accompanied by H. R. Rep. No. 86, 26th Cong., 1st Sess. (1840). Calhoun, reporting to the Senate on February 4, 1836, assumed that its invalidity was a matter “which no one now doubts.” Report with Senate bill No. 122, 24th Cong., 1st Sess., p. 3. Jefferson, as President, pardoned those who had been convicted and sentenced under the Act and remitted their fines, stating: “I discharged every person under punishment or prosecution under the sedition law, because I considered, and now consider, that law to be a nullity, as absolute and as palpable as if Congress had ordered us to fall down and worship a golden image.” Letter to Mrs. Adams, July 22, 1804, 4 Jefferson's Works (Washington ed.), pp. 555, 556. The invalidity of the Act has also been assumed by Justices of this Court. See Holmes, J., dissenting and joined by Brandéis, J., in Abrams v. United States, 250 U. S. 616, 630; Jackson, J., dissenting in Beauharnais v. Illinois, 343 U. S. 250, 288-289; Douglas, The Right of the People (1958), p. 47. See also Cooley, Constitutional Limitations(8th ed., Carrington, 1927), pp. 899-900; Chafee, Free Speech in the United States (1942), pp. 27-28. These views reflect a broad consensus that the Act, because of the restraint it imposed upon criticism of government and public officials, was inconsistent with the First Amendment.

There is no force in respondent's argument that the constitutional limitations implicit in the history of the Sedition Act apply only to Congress and not to the States. It is true that the First Amendment was originally addressed only to action by the Federal Government, and *277that Jefferson, for one, while denying the power of Congress “to controul the freedom of the press,” recognized such a power in the States. See the 1804 Letter to Abigail Adams quoted in Dennis v. United States, 341 U. S. 494, 522, n. 4 (concurring opinion). But this distinction was eliminated with the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment and the application to the States of the First Amendment’s restrictions. See, e. g., Gitlow v. New York, 268 U. S. 652, 666; Schneider v. State, 308 U. S. 147, 160; Bridges v. California, 314 U. S. 252, 268; Edwards v. South Carolina, 372 U. S. 229, 235.

What a State may not constitutionally bring about by means of a criminal statute is likewise beyond the reach of its civil law of libel.17 The fear of damage awards under a rule such as that invoked by the Alabama courts here may be markedly more inhibiting than the fear of prosecution under a criminal statute. See City of Chicago v. Tribune Co., 307 Ill. 595, 607, 139 N. E. 86, 90 (1923). Alabama, for example, has a criminal libel law which subjects to prosecution “any person who speaks, writes, or prints of and concerning another any accusation falsely and maliciously importing the commission by such person of a felony, or any other indictable offense involving moral turpitude,” and which allows as punishment upon conviction a fine not exceeding $500 and a prison sentence of six months. Alabama Code, Tit. 14, § 350. Presumably a person charged with violation of this statute enjoys ordinary criminal-law safeguards such as the requirements of an indictment and of proof beyond a reasonable doubt. These safeguards are not available to the defendant in a civil action. The judgment awarded in this case — without the need for any proof of actual pecuniary loss — was one thousand times greater than the maximum fine provided by the Alabama criminal statute, and one hundred times greater than that provided by the Sedition Act. *278And since there is no double-jeopardy limitation applicable to civil lawsuits, this is not the only judgment that may be awarded against petitioners for the same publication.18 Whether or not a newspaper can survive a succession of such judgments, the pall of fear and timidity imposed upon those who would give voice to public criticism is an atmosphere in which the First Amendment freedoms cannot survive. Plainly the Alabama law of civil libel is “a form of regulation that creates hazards to protected freedoms markedly greater than those that attend reliance upon the criminal law.” Bantam Books, Inc., v. Sullivan, 372 U. S. 58, 70.

The state rule of law is not saved by its allowance of the defense of truth. A defense for erroneous statements honestly made is no less essential here than was the requirement of proof of guilty knowledge which, in Smith v. California, 361 U. S. 147, we held indispensable to a valid conviction of a bookseller for possessing obscene writings for sale. We said:

“For if the bookseller is criminally liable without knowledge of the contents, ... he will tend to restrict the books he sells to those he has inspected; and thus the State will have imposed a restriction upon the distribution of constitutionally protected as well as obscene literature. . . . And the bookseller’s burden would become the public’s burden, for by restricting him the public’s access to reading matter would be restricted. . . . [¶] is timidity in the face of his absolute criminal liability, thus would tend to restrict the public’s access to forms of the printed word which the State could not constitu*279tionally suppress directly. The bookseller’s self-censorship, compelled by the State, would be a censorship affecting the whole public, hardly less virulent for being privately administered. Through it, the distribution of all books, both obscene and not obscene, would be impeded.” (361 U. S. 147, 153-154.)

A rule compelling the critic of official conduct to guaran-teé the truth of all his factual assertions — and to do so on pain of libel judgments virtually unlimited in amount— leads to a comparable “self-censorship.” Allowance of the defense of truth, with the burden of proving it on the defendant, does not mean that only false speech will be deterred.19 Even courts accepting this defense as an adequate safeguard have recognized the difficulties of adducing legal proofs that the alleged libel was true in all its factual particulars. See, e. g., Post Publishing Co. v. Hallam, 59 F. 530, 540 (C. A. 6th Cir. 1893); see also Noel, Defamation of Public Officers and Candidates, 49 Col. L. Rev. 875, 892 (1949). Under such a rule, would-be critics of official conduct may be deterred from voicing their criticism, even though it is believed to be true and even though it is in fact true, because of doubt whether it can be proved in court or fear of the expense oí having to do so. They tend to make only statements which “steer far wider of the unlawful zone.” Speiser v. Randall, supra, 357 U. S., at 526. The rule thus dampens the vigor and limits the variety of public debate. It is inconsistent with the First and Fourteenth Amendments.

The constitutional guarantees require, we think, a federal rule that prohibits a public official from recovering damages for a defamatory falsehood relating to his official conduct unless he proves that the statement was made *280with “actual malice” — that is, with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not. An oft-cited statement of a like rule, which has been adopted by a number of state courts,20 is found in the Kansas case of Coleman v. MacLennan, 78 Kan. 711, 98 P. 281 (1908). The State Attorney General, a candidate for re-election and a member of the commission charged with the management and control of the state school fund, sued a newspaper publisher for alleged libel in an article purporting to state facts relating to his official conduct in connection with a school-fund transaction. The defendant pleaded privilege and the trial judge, over the plaintiff’s objection, instructed the jury that

“where an article is published and circulated among voters for the sole purpose of giving what the de*281fendant believes to be truthful information concerning a candidate for public office and for the purpose of enabling such voters to cast their ballot more intelligently, and the whole thing is done in good faith and without malice, the article is privileged, although the principal matters contained in the article may be untrue in fact and derogatory to the character of the plaintiff; and in such a case the burden is on the plaintiff to show actual malice in the publication of the article.”

In answer to a special question, the jury found that the plaintiff had not proved actual malice, and a general verdict was returned for the defendant. On appeal the Supreme Court of Kansas, in an opinion by Justice Burch, reasoned as follows (78 Kan., at 724, 98 P., at 286):

“It is of the utmost consequence that the people should discuss the character and qualifications of candidates for their suffrages. The importance to the state and to society of such discussions is so vast, and the advantages derived are so great, that they more than counterbalance the inconvenience of private persons whose conduct may be involved, and occasional injury to the reputations of individuals must yield to the public welfare, although at times such injury may be great. The public benefit from publicity is so great, and the chance of injury to private character so small, that such discussion must be privileged.”

The court thus sustained the trial court’s instruction as a correct statement of the law, saying:

“In such a case the occasion gives rise to a privilege, qualified to this extent: any one claiming to be defamed by the communication must show actual malice or go remediless. This privilege extends to a great variety of subjects, and includes matters of *282public concern, public men, and candidates for office.” 78 Kan., at 723, 98 P., at 285.

Such a privilege for criticism of official conduct21 is appropriately analogous to the protection accorded a public official when he is sued for libel by a private citizen. In Barr v. Matteo, 360 U. S. 564, 575, this Court held the utterance of a federal official to be absolutely privileged if made “within the outer perimeter” of his duties. The States accord the same immunity to statements of their highest officers, although some differentiate their lesser officials and qualify the privilege they enjoy.22 But all hold that all officials are protected unless actual malice can be proved. The reason for the official privilege is said to be that the threat of damage suits would otherwise “inhibit the fearless, vigorous, and effective administration of policies of government” and “dampen the ardor of all but the most resolute, or the most irresponsible, in the unflinching discharge of their duties.” Barr v. Matteo, supra, 360 U. S., at 571. Analogous considerations support the privilege for the citizen-critic of government. It is as much his duty to criticize as it is the official’s duty to administer. See Whitney v. California, 274 U. S. 357, 375 (concurring opinion of Mr. Justice Brandéis), quoted supra, p. 270. As Madison said, see supra, p. 275, “the censorial power is in the people over the Government, and not in the Government over the people.” It would give public servants an unjustified preference over the public they serve, if critics of official conduct *283did not have a fair equivalent of the immunity granted to the officials themselves.

We conclude that such a privilege is required by the First and Fourteenth Amendments.

III.

We hold today that the Constitution delimits a State’s power to award damages for libel in actions brought by public officials against critics of their official conduct. Since this is such an action,23 the rule requiring proof of actual malice is applicable. While Alabama law apparently requires proof of actual malice for an award of punitive damages,24 where general damages are concerned malice is “presumed.” Such a presumption is inconsistent *284with the federal rule. “The power to create presumptions is not a means of escape from constitutional restrictions,” Bailey v. Alabama, 219 U. S. 219, 239; “the showing of malice required for the forfeiture of the privilege is not presumed but is a matter for proof by the plaintiff . . . .” Lawrence v. Fox, 357 Mich. 134, 146, 97 N. W. 2d 719, 725 (1959).25 Since the trial judge did not instruct the jury to differentiate between general and punitive damages, it may be that the verdict was wholly an award of one or the other. But it is impossible to know, in view of the general verdict returned. Because of this uncertainty, the judgment must be reversed and the case remanded. Stromberg v. California, 283 U. S. 359, 367-368; Williams v. North Carolina, 317 U. S. 287, 291-292; see Yates v. United States, 354 U. S. 298, 311-312; Cramer v. United States, 325 U. S. 1, 36, n. 45.

Since respondent may seek a new trial, we deem that considerations of effective judicial administration require us to review the evidence in the present record to deter*285mine whether it could constitutionally support a judgment for respondent. This Court’s duty is not limited to the elaboration of constitutional principles; we must also in proper cases review the evidence to make certain that those principles have been constitutionally applied. This is such a case, particularly since the question is one of alleged trespass across “the line between speech unconditionally guaranteed and speech which may legitimately be regulated.” Speiser v. Randall, 357 U. S. 513, 525. In cases where that line must be drawn, the rule is that we “examine for ourselves the statements in issue and the circumstances under which they were made to see . . . whether they are of a character which the principles of the First Amendment, as adopted by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, protect.” Penne-kamp v. Florida, 328 U. S. 331, 335; see also One, Inc., v. Olesen, 355 U. S. 371; Sunshine Book Co. v. Summerfield, 355 U. S. 372. We must “make an independent examination of the whole record,” Edwards v. South Carolina, 372 U. S. 229, 235, so as to assure ourselves that the judgment does not constitute a forbidden intrusion on the field of free expression.26

Applying these standards, we consider that the proof presented to show actual malice lacks the convincing *286clarity which the constitutional standard demands, and hence that it would not constitutionally sustain the judgment for respondent under the proper rule of law. The case of the individual petitioners requires little discussion. Even assuming that they could constitutionally be found to have authorized the use of their names on the advertisement, there was no evidence whatever that they were aware of any erroneous statements or were in any way reckless in that regard. The judgment against them is thus without constitutional support.

As to the Times, we similarly conclude that the facts do not support a finding of actual malice. The statement by the Times’ Secretary that, apart from the padlocking allegation, he thought the advertisement was “substantially correct,” affords no constitutional warrant for the Alabama Supreme Court’s conclusion that it was a “cavalier ignoring of the falsity of the advertisement [from which] the jury could not have but been impressed with the bad faith of The Times, and its maliciousness inferable therefrom.” The statement does not indicate malice at the time of the publication; even if the advertisement was not “substantially correct” — although respondent’s own proofs tend to show that it was — that opinion was at least a reasonable one, and there was no evidence to impeach the witness’ good faith in holding it. The Times’ failure to retract upon respondent’s demand, although it later retracted upon the demand of Governor Patterson, is likewise not adequate evidence of malice for constitutional purposes. Whether or not a failure to retract may ever constitute such evidence, there are two reasons why it does not here. First, the letter written by the Times reflected a reasonable doubt on its part as to whether the advertisement could reasonably be taken to refer to respondent at all. Second, it was not a final refusal, since it asked for an explanation on this point— a request that respondent chose to ignore. Nor does the retraction upon the demand of the Governor supply the *287necessary proof. It may be doubted that a failure to retract which is not itself evidence of malice can retroactively become such by virtue of a retraction subsequently made to another party. But in any event that did not happen here, since the explanation given by the Times’ Secretary for the distinction drawn between respondent and the Governor was a reasonable one, the good faith of which was not impeached.

Finally, there is evidence that the Times published the advertisement without checking its accuracy against the news stories in the Times’ own files. The mere presence of the stories in the files does not, of course, establish that the Times “knew” the advertisement was false, since the state of mind required for actual malice would have to be brought home to the persons in the Times’ organization having responsibility for the publication of the advertisement. With respect to the failure of those persons to make the check, the record shows that they relied upon their knowledge of the good reputation of many of those whose names were listed as sponsors of the advertisement, and upon the letter from A. Philip Randolph, known to them as a responsible individual, certifying that the use of the names was authorized. There was testimony that the persons handling the advertisement saw nothing in it that would render it unacceptable under the Times’ policy of rejecting advertisements containing “attacks of a personal character”;27 their failure to reject it on this ground was not unreasonable. We think *288the evidence against the Times supports at most a finding of negligence in failing to discover the misstatements, and is constitutionally insufficient to show the recklessness that is required for a finding of actual malice. Cf. Charles Parker Co. v. Silver City Crystal Co., 142 Conn. 605, 618, 116 A. 2d 440, 446 (1955); Phoenix Newspapers, Inc., v. Choisser, 82 Ariz. 271, 277-278, 312 P. 2d 150, 154-155 (1957).

We also think the evidence was constitutionally defective in another respect: it was incapable of supporting the jury’s finding that the allegedly libelous statements were made “of and concerning” respondent. Respondent relies on the words of the advertisement and the testimony of six witnesses to establish a connection between it and himself. Thus, in his brief to this Court, he states:

“The reference to respondent as police commissioner is clear from the ad. In addition, the jury heard the testimony of a newspaper editor ... ; a real estate and insurance man . . . ; the sales manager of a men’s clothing store . . . ; a food equipment man ... ; a service station operator . . . ; and the operator of a truck line for whom respondent had formerly worked .... Each of these witnesses stated that he associated the statements with respondent . . . .” (Citations to record omitted.)

There was no reference to respondent in the advertisement, either by name or official position. A number of the allegedly libelous statements — the charges that the dining hall was padlocked and that Dr. King’s home was bombed, his person assaulted, and a perjury prosecution instituted against him — did not even concern the police; despite the ingenuity of the arguments which would attach this significance to the word “They,” it is plain that these statements could not reasonably be read as accusing respondent of personal involvement in the acts *289in question. The statements upon which respondent principally relies as referring to him are the two allegations that did concern the police or police functions: that “truckloads of police . . . ringed the Alabama State College Campus” after the demonstration on the State Capitol steps, and that Dr. King had been “arrested . . . seven times.” These statements were false only in that the police had been “deployed near” the campus but had not actually “ringed” it and had not gone there in connection with the State Capitol demonstration, and in that Dr. King had been arrested only four times. The ruling that these discrepancies between what was true and what was asserted were sufficient to injure respondent’s reputation may itself raise constitutional problems, but we need not consider them here. Although the statements may be taken as referring to the police, they did not on their face make even an oblique reference to respondent as an individual. Support for the asserted reference must, therefore, be sought in the testimony of respondent’s witnesses. But none of them suggested any basis for the belief that respondent himself was attacked in the advertisement beyond the bare fact that he was in overall charge of the Police Department and thus bore official responsibility for police conduct; to the extent that some of the witnesses thought respondent to have been charged with ordering or approving the conduct or otherwise being personally involved in it, they based this notion not on any statements in the advertisement, and not on any evidence that he had in fact been so involved, but solely on the unsupported assumption that, because of his official position, he must have been.28 This reliance on the-bare *290fact of respondent’s official position29 was made explicit by the Supreme Court of Alabama. That court, in holding that the trial court “did not err in overruling the demurrer [of the Times] in the aspect that the libelous *291matter was not of and concerning the [plaintiff,]” based its ruling on the proposition that:

“We think it common knowledge that the average person knows that municipal agents, such as police and firemen, and others, are under the control and direction of the city governing body, and more particularly under the direction and control of a single commissioner. In measuring the performance or deficiencies of such groups, praise or criticism is usually attached to the official in complete control of the body.” 273 Ala., at 674-675, 144 So. 2d, at 39.

This proposition has disquieting implications for criticism of governmental conduct. For good reason, “no court of last resort in this country has ever held, or even suggested, that prosecutions for libel on government have any place in the American system of jurisprudence.” City of Chicago v. Tribune Co., 307 Ill. 595, 601,139 N. E. *29286, 88 (1923). The present proposition would sidestep this obstacle by transmuting criticism of government, however impersonal it may seem on its face, into personal criticism, and hence potential libel, of the officials of whom the government is composed. There is no legal alchemy by which a State may thus create the cause of action that would otherwise be denied for a publication which, as respondent himself said of the advertisement, “reflects not .only on me but on the other Commissioners and the community.” Raising as it does the possibility that a good-faith critic of government will be penalized for his criticism, the proposition relied on by the Alabama courts strikes at the very center of the constitutionally protected area of free expression.30 We hold that such a proposition may not constitutionally be utilized to establish that an otherwise impersonal attack on governmental operations was a libel of an official responsible for those operations. Since it was relied on exclusively here, and there was no other evidence to connect the statements with respondent, the evidence was constitutionally insufficient to support a finding that the statements referred to respondent.

The judgment of the Supreme Court of Alabama is reversed and the case is remanded to that court for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.

Reversed and remanded,.

*0THE NEW YORK TIMES, TUESDAY, MARCH 29, 1960. L 25 [APPENDIX.] ^The growing movement of peaceful mass demonstrations by Negroes is something new in the South, something understandable.... Let Congress heed their rising voices, for they will be heard.^ —New York Times editorial Saturday, March 19, 1960 /AS the whole world knows by now, thousands of JL X Southern Negro students are engaged in widespread non-violent demonstrations in positive affirmation of the right to live in human dignity as guaranteed by the U. S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights. In their efforts to uphold these guarantees, they are being met by an unprecedented wave of terror by those who would deny and negate that document which the whole world looks upon as setting the pattern for modem freedom.... In Orangeburg, South Carolina, when 400 students peacefully sought to buy doughnuts and coffee at lunch counters in the business district, they were forcibly ejected, tear-gassed, soaked to the skin in freezing weather with fire hoses, arrested en masse and herded into an open barbed-wire stockade to stand for hours in the bitter cold. In Montgomery, Alabama, after students sang “My Country, Tis of Thee” on the State Capitol steps, their leaders were expelled from school, and truckloads of police armed with shotguns and tear-gas ringed the Alabama State College Campus. When the entire student body protested to state authorities by refusing to re-register, their dining hall was padlocked in an attempt to starve them into submission. In Tallahassee, Atlanta, Nashville, Savannah, Greensboro, Memphis, Richmond, Charlotte, and a host of other cities in the South, young American teenagers, in face of the entire weight of official state apparatus and police power, have boldly stepped forth as protagonists of democracy. Their courage and amazing restraint have inspired millions and given a new dignity to the cause of freedom. Small wonder that the Southern violators of the Constitution fear this new, non-violent brand of freedom fighter .. . even as they fear the upswelling right-to-vote movement. Small wonder that they are determined to destroy the one man who, more than any other, symbolizes the new spirit now sweeping the South — the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., world-famous leader of the Montgomery Bus Protest. For it is his doctrine of non-violence which has inspired and guided the students in their widening wave of sit-ins; and it this same Dr. King who founded and is president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference — the organization which is spearheading the surging right-to-vote movement. Under Dr. King’s direction the Leadership Conference conducts Student Workshops and Seminars in the philosophy and technique of non-violent resistance. Again and again the Southern violators have answered Dr. King’s peaceful protests with intimidation and violence. They have bombed his home almost killing his wife and child. They have assaulted his person. They have arrested him seven times — for “speeding.” “loitering” and similar “offenses.” And now they have charged him with “perjury” — a felony under which they could imprison him for ten years. Obviously, their real purpose is to remove him physically as the leader to whom the students and millions of others — look for guidance and support, and thereby to intimidate all leaders who may rise in the South. Their strategy is to behead this affirmative movement, and thus to demoralize Negro Americans and weaken their will to struggle. The defense of Martin Luther King, spiritual leader of the student sit-in movement, clearly, therefore, is an integral part of the total struggle for freedom in the South. Decent-minded Americans cannot help but applaud the creative daring of the students and the quiet heroism of Dr. King. But this is one of those moments in the stormy history of Freedom when men and women of good will must do more than applaud the rising-to-glory of others. The America whose good name hangs in the balance before a watchful world, the America whose heritage of Liberty these Southern Upholders of the Constitution are defending, is our America as well as theirs ... We must heed their rising voices — yes—but we must add our own. We must extend ourselves above and beyond moral support and render the material help so urgently needed by those who are taking the risks, facing jail, and even death in a glorious re-affirmation of our Constitution and its Bill of Rights. We urge you to join hands with our fellow Americans in the South by supporting, with your dollars, this Combined Appeal for all three needs — the defense of Martin Luther King — the support of the embattled students — and the struggle for the right-to-vote. Your Help Is Urgently Needed . . . NOW!! Stella Adler Raymond Pace Alexander Harry Van Andale Harry Belafonte Julie Belafonte Dr. Algernon Black Marc Blitztein William Branch Marlon Brando Mrs. Ralph Bunche Diahann Carroll Dr. Alan Knight Chalmers Richard Coe Nat King Cole Cheryl Crawford Dorothy Dandridge Ossie Davis Sammy Davis, Jr. Ruby Dee Dr. Philip Elliott Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick Anthony Franciosa Lorraine Hansbury Rev. Donald Harrington Nat Hentoff James Hicks Mary Hinkson Van Heflin Langston Hughes Morris lushewitz Mahalia Jackson Mordecai Johnson John Killens Eartha Kitt Rabbi Edward Klein Hope Lange John Lewis Viveca Lindfors Carl Murphy Don Murray John Murray A. J. Muste Frederick O'Neal L. Joseph Overton Clarence Pickett Shad Polier Sidney Poiticr A. Philip Randolph John Raitt Elmer Rice Jackie Robinson Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt Bayard Rustin Robert Ryan Maureen Stapleton Frank Silvera Hope Stevens George Tabori Rev. Gardner C. Taylor Norman Thomas Kenneth Tynan Charles White Shelley Winters Max Youngstein We in the south who are struggling daily for dignity and freedom warmly endorse this appeal Rev. Ralph D. Abernathy (Montgomery, Ala.) Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth (Birmingham, Ala.) Rev. Kelley Miller Smith (Nashville, Tenn.) Rev. W. A. Dennis (Chattanooga, Tenn.) Rev. C. K. Steele [Tallahassee, Fla.) Rev. Matthew D. McCollom [Orangeburg, S. C.) Rev. William Holmes Borders (Atlanta, Ga.) Rev. Douglas Moore (Durham, N. C.) Rev. Wyatt Tee Walker (Petersburg, Va.) Rev. Walter L. Hamilton [Norfolk, Va.) I. S. Levy (Columbia, S. C.) Rev. Martin Luther King, Sr. (Atlanta, Ga.) Rev. Henry C. Bunton (Memphis, Tenn.) Rev. S. S. Seay, Sr. (Montgomery, Ala.) Rev. Samuel W. Williams [Atlanta, Ga.) Rev. A. L. Davis (New Orleans, La.) Mrs. Katie E. Whickham (New Orleans, La.) Rev. W. H. Hall (Hattiesburg, Miss.) Rev. J. E. Lowery (Mobile, Ala.) Rev. T. J. Jemison (Baton Rouge, La.) COMMITTEE TO DEFEND MARTIN LUTHER KING AND THE STRUGGLE FOR FREEDOM IN THE SOUTH 312 West 125th Street, New York 27, N. Y. UNiversity 6-1700 Chairmen: A. Philip Randolph, Dr. Gardner C. Taylor; Chairmen of Cultural Division: Harry Belafonte, Sidney Poiticr; Treasurer: Nat King Cole; Executive Director: Bayard Rustin; Chairmen of Church Division: Father George B. Ford, Rev. Harry Emerson Fosdick, Rev. Thomas Kilgore, Jr., Rabbi Edward E. Klein; Chairman of Labor Division: Morris lushewitz Please mail this coupon TODAY! Committee To Defend Martin Luther King and The Struggle For Freedom in The South 312 West 125th Street, New York 27, N. Y. UNiversity 6-1700 / am enclosing my contribution of $_ for the work of the Committee. Nam«_ (PLEAS* PRINT) Clty_ JZone _State_ U I want to help Please send further information Please make checks payable to: Committee To Defend Martin Luther King

*293Mr. Justice Black,

with whom

I concur in reversing this half-million-dollar judgment against the New York Times Company and the four individual defendants. In reversing the Court holds that “the Constitution delimits a State’s power to award damages for libel in actions brought by public officials against critics of their official conduct.” Ante, p. 283. I base my vote to reverse on the belief that the First and Fourteenth Amendments not merely “delimit” a State’s power to award damages to “public officials against critics of their official conduct” but completely prohibit a State from exercising such a power. The Court goes on to hold that a State can subject such critics to damages if “actual malice” can be proved against them. “Malice,” even as defined by the Court, is an elusive, abstract concept, hard to prove and hard to disprove. The requirement that malice be proved provides at best an evanescent protection for the right critically to discuss public affairs and certainly does not measure up to the sturdy safeguard embodied in the First Amendment. Unlike the Court, therefore, I vote to reverse exclusively on the ground that the Times and the individual defendants had an absolute, unconditional constitutional right to publish in the Times advertisement their criticisms of the Montgomery agencies and officials. I do not base my vote to reverse on any failure to prove that these individual defendants signed the advertisement or that their criticism of the Police Department was aimed at the plaintiff Sullivan, who was then the Montgomery City Commissioner having supervision of the city’s police; for present purposes I assume these things were proved. Nor is my reason for reversal the size of the half-million-dollar judgment, large as it is. If Alabama has constitutional power to use its civil libel law to impose damages on the press for criticizing the way public officials perform or fail *294to perform their duties, I know of no provision in the Federal Constitution which either expressly or impliedly bars the State from fixing the amount of damages.

The half-million-dollar verdict does give dramatic proof,- however, that state libel laws threaten the very existence of an American press virile enough to publish unpopular views on public affairs and bold enough to criticize the conduct of public officials. The factual background of this case emphasizes the imminence and enormity of that threat; One of the acute and highly emotional issues in this country arises out of efforts of many people, even including some public officials, to continue state-commanded segregation of races in the public schools and other public places, despite our several holdings that such a state practice is forbidden by the Fourteenth Amendment. Montgomery is one of the localities in which widespread hostility to desegregation has been manifested. This hostility has sometimes extended itself to persons who favor desegregation, particularly to so-called “outside agitators,” a term which can be made to fit papers like the Times, which is published in New York. The scarcity of testimony to show that Commissioner Sullivan suffered any actual damages at all suggests that these feelings of hostility had at least as much to do with rendition of this half-million-dollar verdict as did an appraisal of damages. Viewed realistically, this record lends support to an inference that instead of being damaged Commissioner Sullivan’s political, social, and financial prestige has likely been enhanced by the Times’ publication. Moreover, a second half-million-dollar libel verdict against the Times based on the same advertisement has already been awarded to another Commissioner. There a jury again gave the full amount claimed. There is no reason to believe that there are not more such huge verdicts lurking just around the corner for the Times or any other newspaper or broadcaster which *295might dare to criticize public officials. In fact, briefs before us show that in Alabama there are now pending eleven libel suits by local and state officials against the Times seeking $5,600,000, and five such suits against the Columbia Broadcasting System seeking $1,700,000. Moreover, this technique for harassing and punishing a free press — now that it has been shown to be possible — is by no means limited to cases with racial overtones; it can be used in other fields where public feelings may make local as well as out-of-state newspapers easy prey for libel verdict seekers.

In my opinion the Federal Constitution has dealt with this deadly danger to the press in the only way possible without leaving the free press open to destruction — by granting the press an absolute immunity for criticism of the way public officials do their public duty. Compare Barr v. Matteo, 360 U. S. 564. Stopgap measures like those the Court adopts are in my judgment not enough. This record certainly does not indicate that any different verdict would have been rendered here whatever the Court had charged the jury about “malice,” “truth,” “good motives,” “justifiable ends,” or any other legal formulas which in theory would protect the press. Nor does the record indicate that any of these legalistic words would have caused the courts below to set aside or to reduce the half-million-dollar verdict in any amount.

I agree with the Court that the Fourteenth Amendment made the First applicable to the States.1 This means to me that since the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment a State has no more power than the Federal Government to use a civil libel law or any other law to impose damages for merely discussing public affairs and criticizing public officials. The power of the United *296States to do that is, in my judgment, precisely nil. Such was the general view held when the First Amendment was adopted and ever since.2 Congress never has sought to challenge this viewpoint by passing any civil libel law. It did pass the Sedition Act in 1798,3 which made it a crime — “seditious libel” — to criticize federal officials or the Federal Government. As the Court’s opinion correctly points out, however, ante, pp. 273-276, that Act came to an ignominious end and by common consent has generally been treated as having been a wholly unjustifiable and much to be regretted violation of the First Amendment. Since the First Amendment is now made applicable to the States by the Fourteenth, it no more permits the States to impose damages for libel than it does the Federal Government.

We would, I think, more faithfully interpret the First Amendment by holding that at the very least it leaves the people and the press free to criticize officials and discuss public affairs with impunity. This Nation of ours elects many of its important officials; so do the States, the municipalities, the counties, and even many precincts. These officials are responsible to the people for the way they perform their duties. While our Court has held that some kinds of speech and writings, such as “obscenity,” Roth v. United States, 354 U. S. 476, and “fighting words,” Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, 315 U. S. 568, are not expression within the protection of the First Amendment,4 freedom to discuss public affairs and public officials *297is unquestionably, as the Court today holds, the kind of speech the First Amendment was primarily designed to keep within the area of free discussion. To punish the exercise of this right to discuss public affairs or to penalize it through libel judgments is to abridge or shut off discussion of the very kind most needed. This Nation, I suspect, can live in peace without libel suits based on public discussions of public affairs and public officials. But I doubt that a country can live in freedom where its people can be made to suffer physically or financially for criticizing their government, its actions, or its officials. “For a representative democracy ceases to exist the moment that the public functionaries are by any means absolved from their responsibility to their constituents; and this happens whenever the constituent can be restrained in any manner from speaking, writing, or publishing his opinions upon any public measure, or upon the conduct of those who may advise or execute it.” 5 An unconditional right to say what one pleases about public affairs is what I consider to be the' minimum guarantee of the First Amendment.6

I regret that the Court has stopped short of this holding indispensable to preserve our free press from destruction.

Mr. Justice Goldberg,

Douglas joins, concurring in the result.

The Court today announces a constitutional standard which prohibits “a public official from recovering damages for a defamatory falsehood relating to his official conduct unless he proves that the statement was made with *298‘actual malice’ — that is, with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not.” Ante, at 279-280. The Court thus rules that the Constitution gives citizens and newspapers a “conditional privilege” immunizing nonmalicious misstatements of fact regarding the official conduct of a government officer. The impressive array of history1 and precedent marshaled by the Court, however, confirms my belief that the Constitution affords greater protection than that provided by the Court’s standard to citizen and press in exercising the right of public criticism.

In my view, the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution afford to the citizen and to the press an absolute, unconditional privilege to criticize official conduct despite the harm which may flow from excesses and abuses. The prized American right “to speak one’s mind,” cf. Bridges v. California, 314 U. S. 252, 270, about public officials and affairs needs “breathing space to survive,” N. A. A. C. P. v. Button, 371 U. S. 415, 433. The right should not depend upon a probing by the jury of the motivation 2 of the citizen or press. The theory *299of our Constitution is that every citizen may speak his mind and every newspaper express its view on matters of public concern and may not be barred from speaking or publishing because those in control of government think that what is said or written is unwise, unfair, false, or malicious. In a democratic society, one who assumes to act for the citizens in an executive, legislative, or judicial capacity must expect that his official acts will be commented upon and criticized. Such criticism cannot, in my opinion, be muzzled or deterred by the courts at the instance of public officials under the label of libel.

It has been recognized that “prosecutions for libel on government have [no] place in the American system of jurisprudence.” City of Chicago v. Tribune Co., 307 Ill. 595, 601, 139 N. E. 86, 88. I fully agree. Government, however, is not an abstraction; it is made, up of individuals — of governors responsible to the governed. In a democratic society where men are free by ballots to remove those in power, any statement critical of governmental action is necessarily “of and concerning” the governors and any statement critical of the governors’ official conduct is necessarily “of and concerning” the government. If the rule that libel on government has no place in our Constitution is to have real meaning, then libel on the official conduct of the governors likewise can have no place in our Constitution.

We must recognize that we are writing upon a clean slate.3 As the Court notes, although there have been *300“statements of this Court to the effect that the Constitution does not protect libelous publications . . . [n]one of the cases sustained the use of libel laws to impose sanctions upon expression critical of the official conduct of public officials.” Ante, at 268. We should be particularly careful, therefore, adequately to protect the liberties which are embodied in the First and Fourteenth Amendments. It may be urged that deliberately and maliciously false statements have no conceivable value as free speech. That argument, however, is not responsive to the real issue presented by this case, which is whether that freedom of speech which all agree is constitutionally protected can be effectively safeguarded by a rule allowing the imposition of liability upon a jury’s evaluation of the speaker’s state of mind. If individual citizens may be held liable in damages for strong words, which a jury finds false and maliciously motivated, there can be little doubt that public debate and advocacy will be constrained. And if newspapers, publishing advertisements dealing with public issues, thereby risk liability, there can also be little doubt that the ability of minority groups to secure publication of their views on public affairs and to seek support for their causes will be greatly diminished. Cf. Farmers Educational & Coop. Union v. WDAY, Inc., 360 U. S. 525, 530. The opinion of the Court conclusively demonstrates the chilling effect of the Alabama libel laws on First Amendment freedoms *301in the area of race relations. The American Colonists were not willing, nor should we be, to take the risk that “[m]en who injure and oppress the people under their administration [and] provoke them to cry out and complain” will also be empowered to “make that very complaint the foundation for new oppressions and prosecutions.” The Trial of John Peter Zenger, 17 Howell’s St. Tr. 675, 721-722 (1735) (argument of counsel to the jury). To impose liability for critical, albeit erroneous or even malicious, comments on official conduct would effectively resurrect “the obsolete doctrine that the governed must not criticize their governors.” Cf. Sweeney v. Patterson, 76 U. S. App. D. C. 23, 24, 128 F. 2d 457, 458.

Our national experience teaches that repressions breed hate and “that hate menaces stable government.” Whitney v. California, 274 U. S. 357, 375 (Brandéis, J., concurring). We should be ever mindful of the wise counsel of Chief Justice Hughes:

“[I]mperative is the need to preserve inviolate the constitutional rights of free speech, free press and free assembly in order to maintain the opportunity for free political discussion, to the end that government may be responsive to the will of the people and that changes, if desired, may be obtained by peaceful means. Therein lies the security of the Republic, the very foundation of constitutional government.” De Jonge v. Oregon, 299 U. S. 353, 365.

This is not to say that the Constitution protects defamatory statements directed against the private conduct of a public official or private citizen. Freedom of press and of speech insures that government will respond to the will of the people and that changes may be obtained by peaceful means. Purely private defamation has little to do with the political ends of a self-governing society. The imposition of liability for private defamation does not *302abridge the freedom of public speech or any other freedom protected by the First Amendment.4 This, of course, cannot be said “where public officials are concerned or where public matters are involved. ... [0]ne main function of the First Amendment is to ensure ample opportunity for the people to determine and resolve public issues. Where public matters are involved, the doubts should be resolved in favor of freedom of expression rather than against it.” Douglas, The Right of the People (1958), p. 41.

In many jurisdictions, legislators, judges and executive officers are clothed with absolute immunity against liability for defamatory words uttered in the discharge of their public duties. See, e. g., Barr v. Matteo, 360 U. S. 564; City of Chicago v. Tribune Co., 307 Ill., at 610, 139 N. E., at 91. Judge Learned Hand ably summarized the policies underlying the rule:

“It does indeed go without saying that an official, who is in fact guilty of using his powers to vent his spleen upon others, or for any other personal motive not connected with the public good, should not escape liability for the injuries he may so cause; and, if it were possible in practice to confine such complaints to the guilty, it would be monstrous to deny recovery. The justification for doing so is that it is impossible to know whether the claim is well founded until the *303case has been tried, and that to submit all officials, the innocent as well as the guilty, to the burden of a trial and to the inevitable danger of its outcome, would dampen the ardor of all but the most resolute, or the most irresponsible, in the unflinching discharge of their duties. Again and again the public interest calls for action which may turn out to be founded on a mistake, in the face of which an official may later find himself hard put to it to satisfy a jury of his good faith. There must indeed be means of punishing public officers who have been truant to their duties; but that is quite another matter from exposing such as have been honestly mistaken to suit by anyone who has suffered from their errors. As is so often the case, the answer must be found in a balance between the evils inevitable in either alternative. In this instance it has been thought in the end better to leave unredressed the wrongs done by dishonest officers than to subject those who try to do their duty to the constant dread of retaliation. . . .

“The decisions have, indeed, always imposed as a limitation upon the immunity that the official’s act must have been within the scope of his powers; and it can be argued that official powers, since they exist only for the public good, never cover occasions where the public good is not their aim, and hence that to exercise a power dishonestly is necessarily to overstep its bounds. A moment’s reflection shows, however, that that cannot be the meaning of the limitation without defeating the whole doctrine. What is meant by saying that the officer must be acting within his power cannot be more than that the occasion must be such as would have justified the act, if he had been using his power for any of the purposes on whose account it was vested in him. . . .” Gregoire v. Biddle, 177 F. 2d 579, 581.

*304If the government official should be immune from libel actions so that his ardor to serve the public will not be dampened and “fearless, vigorous, and effective administration of policies of government” not be inhibited, Barr v. Matteo, supra, at 571, then the citizen and the press should likewise be immune from libel actions for their criticism of official conduct. Their ardor as citizens will thus not be dampened and they will be free “to applaud or to criticize the way public employees do their jobs, from the least to the most important.” 5 If liability can attach to political criticism because it damages the reputation of a public official as a public official, then no critical citizen can safely utter anything but faint praise about the government or its officials. The vigorous criticism by press and citizen of the conduct of the government of the day by the officials of the day will soon yield to silence if officials in control of government agencies, instead of answering criticisms, can resort to friendly juries to forestall criticism of their official conduct.6

The conclusion that the Constitution affords the citizen and the press an absolute privilege for criticism of official conduct does not leave the public official without defenses against unsubstantiated opinions or deliberate misstatements. “Under our system of government, counterargument and education are the weapons available to expose these matters, not abridgment ... of free speech . . . .” Wood v. Georgia, 370 U. S. 375, 389. The public *305official certainly has equal if not greater access than most private citizens to media of communication. In any event, despite the possibility that some excesses and abuses may go unremedied, we must recognize that “the people of this nation have ordained in the light of history, that, in spite of the probability of excesses and abuses, [certain] liberties are, in the long view, essential to enlightened opinion and right conduct on the part of the citizens of & democracy.” Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U. S. 296, 310. As Mr. Justice Brandéis correctly observed, “sunlight is the most powerful of all disinfectants.” 7

For these reasons, I strongly believe that the Constitution accords citizens and press an unconditional freedom to criticize official conduct. It necessarily follows that in a case such as this, where all agree that the allegedly defamatory statements related to official conduct, the judgments for libel cannot constitutionally be sustained.

Chief Justice Rehnquist

delivered the opinion of the Court.

Petitioner Hustler Magazine, Inc., is a magazine of nationwide circulation. Respondent Jerry Falwell, a nationally known minister who has been active as a commentator on politics and public affairs, sued petitioner and its publisher, petitioner Larry Flynt, to recover damages for invasion of *48privacy, libel, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. The District Court directed a verdict against respondent on the privacy claim, and submitted the other two claims to a jury. The jury found for petitioners on the defamation claim, but found for respondent on the claim for intentional infliction of emotional distress and awarded damages. We now consider whether this award is consistent with the First and Fourteenth Amendments- of the United States Constitution.

The inside front cover of the November 1983 issue of Hustler Magazine featured a “parody” of an advertisement for Campari Liqueur that contained the name and picture of respondent and was entitled “Jerry Falwell talks about his first time.” This parody was modeled after actual Campari ads that included interviews with various celebrities about their “first times.” Although it was apparent by the end of each interview that this meant the first time they sampled Campari, the ads clearly played on the sexual double entendre of the general subject of “first times.” Copying the form and layout of these Campari ads, Hustler’s editors chose respondent as the featured celebrity and drafted an alleged “interview” with him in which he states that his “first time” was during a drunken incestuous rendezvous with his mother in an outhouse. The Hustler parody portrays respondent and his mother as drunk and immoral, and suggests that respondent is a hypocrite who preaches only when he is drunk. In small print at the bottom of the page, the ad contains the disclaimer, “ad parody — not to be taken seriously.” The magazine’s table of contents also lists the ad as “Fiction; Ad and Personality Parody.”

Soon after the November issue of Hustler became available to the public, respondent brought this diversity action in the United States District Court for the Western District of Virginia against Hustler Magazine, Inc., Larry C. Flynt, and Flynt Distributing Co., Inc. Respondent stated in his complaint that publication of the ad parody in Hustler entitled *49him to recover damages for libel, invasion of privacy, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. The case proceeded to trial.1 At the close of the evidence, the District Court granted a directed verdict for petitioners on the invasion of privacy claim. The jury then found against respondent on the libel claim, specifically finding that the ad parody could not “reasonably be understood as describing actual facts about [respondent] or actual events in which [he] participated.” App. to Pet. for Cert. Cl. The jury ruled for respondent on the intentional infliction of emotional distress claim, however, and stated that he should be awarded $100,000 in compensatory damages, as well as $50,000 each in punitive damages from petitioners.2 Petitioners’ motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict was denied.

On appeal, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit affirmed the judgment against petitioners. Falwell v. Flynt, 797 F. 2d 1270 (1986). The court rejected petitioners’ argument that the “actual malice” standard of New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254 (1964), must be met before respondent can recover for emotional distress. The court agreed that because respondent is concededly a public figure, petitioners are “entitled to the same level of first amendment protection in the claim for intentional infliction of emotional distress that they received in [respondent’s] claim for libel.” 797 F. 2d, at 1274. But this does not mean that a literal application of the actual malice rule is appropriate in the context of an emotional distress claim. In the court’s view, the New York Times decision emphasized the constitutional importance not of the falsity of the statement or the defendant’s disregard for the truth, but of the heightened level of culpability embodied in the requirement of “knowing ... or reckless” conduct. Here, the New York *50Times standard is satisfied by the state-law requirement, and the jury’s finding, that the defendants have acted intentionally or recklessly.3 The Court of Appeals then went on to reject the contention that because the jury found that the ad parody did not describe actual facts about respondent, the ad was an opinion that is protected by the First Amendment. As the court put it, this was “irrelevant,” as the issue is “whether [the ad’s] publication was sufficiently outrageous to constitute intentional infliction of emotional distress.” Id., at 1276.4 Petitioners then filed a petition for rehearing en banc, but this was denied by a divided court. Given the importance of the constitutional issues involved, we granted certiorari. 480 U. S. 945 (1987).

This case presents us with a novel question involving First Amendment limitations upon a State’s authority to protect its citizens from the intentional infliction of emotional distress. We must decide whether a public figure may recover damages for emotional harm caused by the publication of an ad parody offensive to him, and doubtless gross and repugnant in the eyes of most. Respondent would have us find that a State’s interest in protecting public figures from emotional distress is sufficient to deny First Amendment protection to speech that is patently offensive and is intended to inflict emotional injury, even when that speech could not reasonably have been interpreted as stating actual facts about the public figure involved. This we decline to do.

At the heart of the First Amendment is the recognition of the fundamental importance of the free flow of ideas and opinions on matters of public interest and concern. “[T]he *51freedom to speak one’s mind is not only an aspect of individual liberty — and thus a good unto itself — but also is essential to the common quest for truth and the vitality of society as a whole.” Bose Corp. v. Consumers Union of United States, Inc., 466 U. S. 485, 503-504 (1984). We have therefore been particularly vigilant to ensure that individual expressions of ideas remain free from governmentally imposed sanctions. The First Amendment recognizes no such thing as a “false” idea. Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U. S. 323, 339 (1974). As Justice Holmes wrote, “when men have realized that time has upset many fighting faiths, they may come to believe even more than they believe the very foundations of their own conduct that the ultimate good desired is better reached by free trade in ideas — that the best test of truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market . . . .” Abrams v. United States, 250 U. S. 616, 630 (1919) (dissenting opinion).

The sort of robust political debate encouraged by the First Amendment is bound to produce speech that is critical of those who hold public office or those public figures who are “intimately involved in the resolution of important public questions or, by reason of their fame, shape events in areas of concern to society at large.” Associated Press v. Walker, decided with Curtis Publishing Co. v. Butts, 388 U. S. 130, 164 (1967) (Warren, C. J., concurring in result). Justice Frankfurter put it succinctly in Baumgartner v. United States, 322 U. S. 665, 673-674 (1944), when he said that “[o]ne of the prerogatives of American citizenship is the fight to criticize public men and measures.” Such criticism, inevitably, will not always be reasoned or moderate; public figures as well as public officials will be subject to “vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks,” New York Times, supra, at 270. “[T]he candidate who vaunts his spotless record and sterling integrity cannot convincingly cry ‘Foul!’ when an opponent or an industrious reporter attempts *52to demonstrate the contrary.” Monitor Patriot Co. v. Roy, 401 U. S. 265, 274 (1971).

Of course, this does not mean that any speech about a public figure is immune from sanction in the form of damages. Since New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254 (1964), we have consistently ruled that a public figure may hold a speaker liable for the damage to reputation caused by publication of a defamatory falsehood, but only if the statement was made “with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not.” Id., at 279-280. False statements of fact are particularly valueless; they interfere with the truth-seeking function of the marketplace of ideas, and they cause damage to an individual’s reputation that cannot easily be repaired by counterspeech, however persuasive or effective. See Gertz, 418 U. S., at 340, 344, n. 9. But even though falsehoods have little value in and of themselves, they are “nevertheless inevitable in free debate,” id., at 340, and a rule that would impose strict liability on a publisher for false factual assertions would have an undoubted “chilling” effect on speech relating to public figures that does have constitutional value. “Freedoms of expression require “‘breathing space.’” Philadelphia Newspapers, Inc. v. Hepps, 475 U. S. 767, 772 (1986) (quoting New York Times, supra, at 272). This breathing space is provided by a constitutional rule that allows public figures to recover for libel or defamation only when they can prove both that the statement was false and that the statement was made with the requisite level of culpability.

Respondent argues, however, that a different standard should apply in this case because here the State seeks to prevent not reputational damage, but the severe emotional distress suffered by the person who is the subject of an offensive publication. Cf. Zacchini v. Scripps-Howard Broadcasting Co., 433 U. S. 562 (1977) (ruling that the “actual malice” standard does not apply to the tort of appropriation of a right of publicity). In respondent’s view, and in the view of the *53Court of Appeals, so long as the utterance was intended to inflict emotional distress, was outrageous, and did in fact inflict serious emotional distress, it is of no constitutional import whether the statement was a fact or an opinion, or whether it was true or false. It is the intent to cause injury that is the gravamen of the tort, and the State’s interest in preventing emotional harm simply outweighs whatever interest a speaker may have in speech of this type.

Generally speaking the law does not regard the intent to inflict emotional distress as one which should receive much solicitude, and it is quite understandable that most if not all jurisdictions have chosen to make it civilly culpable where the conduct in question is sufficiently “outrageous.” But in the world of debate about public affairs, many things done with motives that are less than admirable are protected by the First Amendment. In Garrison v. Louisiana, 379 U. S. 64 (1964), we held that even when a speaker or writer is motivated by hatred or ill will his expression was protected by the First Amendment:

“Debate on public issues will not be uninhibited if the speaker must run the risk that it will be proved in court that he spoke out of hatred; even if he did speak out of hatred, utterances honestly believed contribute to the free interchange of ideas and the ascertainment of truth.” Id., at 73.

Thus while such a bad motive may be deemed controlling for purposes of tort liability in other areas of the law, we think the First Amendment prohibits such a result in the area of public debate about public figures.

Were we to hold otherwise, there can be little doubt that political cartoonists and satirists would be subjected to damages awards without any showing that their work falsely defamed its subject. Webster’s defines a caricature as “the deliberately distorted picturing or imitating of a person, literary style, etc. by exaggerating features or mannerisms for satirical effect.” Webster’s New Unabridged Twentieth *54Century Dictionary of the English Language 275 (2d ed. 1979). The appeal of the political cartoon or caricature is often based on exploitation of unfortunate physical traits or politically embarrassing events — an exploitation often calculated to injure the feelings of the subject of the portrayal. The art of the cartoonist is often not reasoned or evenhanded, but slashing and one-sided. One cartoonist expressed the nature of the art in these words:

“The political cartoon is a weapon of attack, of scorn and ridicule and satire; it is least effective when it tries to pat some politician on the back. It is usually as welcome as a bee sting and is always controversial in some quarters.” Long, The Political Cartoon: Journalism’s Strongest Weapon, The Quill 56, 57 (Nov. 1962).

Several famous examples of this type of intentionally injurious speech were drawn by Thomas Nast, probably the greatest American cartoonist to date, who was associated for many years during the post-Civil War era with Harper’s Weekly. In the pages of that publication Nast conducted a graphic vendetta against William M. “Boss” Tweed and his corrupt associates in New York City’s “Tweed Ring.” It has been described by one historian of the subject as “a sustained attack which in its passion and effectiveness stands alone in the history of American graphic art.” M. Keller, The Art and Politics of Thomas Nast 177 (1968). Another writer explains that the success of the Nast cartoon was achieved “because of the emotional impact of its presentation. It continuously goes beyond the bounds of good taste and conventional manners.” C. Press, The Political Cartoon 251 (1981).

Despite their sometimes caustic nature, from the early cartoon portraying George Washington as an ass down to the present day, graphic depictions and satirical cartoons have played a prominent role in public and political debate. Nast’s castigation of the Tweed Ring, Walt McDougall’s characterization of Presidential candidate James G. Blaine’s banquet with the millionaires at Delmonico’s as “The Royal *55Feast of Belshazzar,” and numerous other efforts have undoubtedly had an effect on the course and outcome of contemporaneous debate. Lincoln’s tall, gangling posture, Teddy Roosevelt’s glasses and teeth, and Franklin D. Roosevelt’s jutting jaw and cigarette holder have been memorialized by political cartoons with an effect that could not have been obtained by the photographer or the portrait artist. From the viewpoint of history it is clear that our political discourse would have been considerably poorer without them.

Respondent contends, however, that the caricature in question here was so “outrageous” as to distinguish it from more traditional political cartoons. There is no doubt that the caricature of respondent and his mother published in Hustler is at best a distant cousin of the political cartoons described above, and a rather poor relation at that. If it were possible by laying down a principled standard to separate the one from the other, public discourse would probably suffer little or no harm. But we doubt that there is any such standard, and we are quite sure that the pejorative description “outrageous” does not supply one. “Outrageousness” in the area of political and social discourse has an inherent subjectiveness about it which would allow a jury to impose liability on the basis of the jurors’ tastes or views, or perhaps on the basis of their dislike of a particular expression. An “outrageousness” standard thus runs afoul of our longstanding refusal to allow damages to be awarded because the speech in question may have an adverse emotional impact on the audience. See NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware Co., 458 U. S. 886, 910 (1982) (“Speech does not lose its protected character . . . simply because it may embarrass others or coerce them into action”). And, as we stated in FCC v. Pacifica Foundation, 438 U. S. 726 (1978):

“[T]he fact that society may find speech offensive is not a sufficient reason for suppressing it. Indeed, if it is the speaker’s opinion that gives offense, that consequence is a reason for according it constitutional protection. *56For it is a central tenet of the First Amendment that the government must remain neutral in the marketplace of ideas.” Id., at 745-746.

See also Street v. New York, 394 U. S. 576, 592 (1969) (“It is firmly settled that . . . the public expression of ideas may not be prohibited merely because the ideas are themselves offensive to some of their hearers”).

Admittedly, these oft-repeated First Amendment principles, like other principles, are subject to limitations. We recognized in Pacifica Foundation, that speech that is “ ‘vulgar,’ ‘offensive,’ and ‘shocking’” is “not entitled to absolute constitutional protection under all circumstances. ” 438 U. S., at 747. In Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, 315 U. S. 568 (1942), we held that a State could lawfully punish an individual for the use of insulting “‘fighting’ words — those which by their very utterance inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace.” Id., at 571-572. These limitations are but recognition of the observation in Dun & Bradstreet, Inc. v. Greenmoss Builders, Inc., 472 U. S. 749, 758 (1985), that this Court has “long recognized that not all speech is of equal First Amendment importance.” But the sort of expression involved in this case does not seem to us to be governed by any exception to the general First Amendment principles stated above.

We conclude that public figures and public officials may not recover for the tort of intentional infliction of emotional distress by reason of publications such as the one here at issue without showing in addition that the publication contains a false statement of fact which was made with “actual malice,” i. e., with knowledge that the statement was false or with reckless disregard as to whether or not it was true. This is not' merely a “blind application” of the New York Times standard, see Time, Inc. v. Hill, 385 U. S. 374, 390 (1967), it reflects our considered judgment that such a standard is necessary to give adequate “breathing space” to the freedoms protected by the First Amendment.

*57Here it is clear that respondent Falwell is a “public figure” for purposes of First Amendment law.5 The jury found against respondent on his libel claim when it decided that the Hustler ad parody could not “reasonably be understood as describing actual facts about [respondent] or actual events in which [he] participated.” App. to Pet. for Cert. Cl. The Court of Appeals interpreted the jury’s finding to be that the ad parody “was not reasonably believable,” 797 F. 2d, at 1278, and in accordance with our custom we accept this finding. Respondent is thus relegated to his claim for damages awarded by the jury for the intentional infliction of emotional distress by “outrageous” conduct. But for reasons heretofore stated this claim cannot, consistently with the First Amendment, form a basis for the award of damages when the conduct in question is the publication of a caricature such as the ad parody involved here. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is accordingly

Reversed.

Justice White,

concurring in the judgment.

As I see it, the decision in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254 (1964), has little to do with this case, for here the jury found that the ad contained no assertion of fact. But I agree with the Court that the judgment below, which penalized the publication of the parody, cannot be squared with the First Amendment.

*701Mr. Chief Justice Hughes

delivered the opinion of the Court.

Chapter 285 of the Session Laws of Minnesota for the year 19251 provides for the abatement, as a public nuisance, of a “ malicious, scandalous and defamatory news*702paper, magazine or other periodical.” Section one of the Act is as follows:

“ Section 1. Any person who, as an individual, or as a member or employee of a firm, or association or organization, or as an officer, director, member or employee of a corporation, shall be engaged in the business of regularly or customarily producing, publishing or circulating, having in possession, selling or giving away.

(a) an obscene, lewd and lascivious newspaper, magazine, or other periodical, or

(b) a malicious, scandalous and defamatory newspaper, magazine or other periodical,

is guilty of a nuisance, and all persons guilty of such nuisance may be enjoined, as hereinafter provided.

“ Participation in such business shall constitute a commission of such nuisance and render the participant liable and subject to the proceedings, orders and judgments provided for in this Act. Ownership, in whole or in part, directly or indirectly, of any such periodical, or of any stock or interest in any corporation or organization which owns the same in whole or in part, or which publishes the same, shall constitute such participation.

“In actions brought under (b) above, there shall be available the defense that the truth was published with good motives and for justifiable ends and in such actions the plaintiff shall not have the right to report (sic) to issues or editions of periodicals taking place more than three months before the commencement of the action.”

Section two provides that whenever any such nuisance is committed or exists, the County Attorney of any county where any such periodical is published or circulated, or, in case of his failure or refusal to proceed upon written request in good faith of a reputable citizen, the Attorney General, or upon like failure or refusal of the latter, any citizen of the county, may maintain an action in the district court of the county in the name of the State to enjoin *703perpetually the persons committing or maintaining any such nuisance from further committing or maintaining it. Upon such evidence as the court shall deem sufficient, a temporary injunction may be granted. The defendants have the right to plead by demurrer or answer, and the plaintiff may demur or reply as in other cases.

The action, by section three, is to be “ governed by the practice and procedure applicable to civil actions for injunctions,” and after trial the court may enter judgment permanently enjoining the defendants found guilty of violating the Act from continuing the violation and, “ in and by such judgment, such nuisance may be wholly abated.” The court is empowered, as in other cases of contempt, to punish disobedience to a temporary or permanent injunction by fine of not more than $1,000 or by imprisonment in the county jail for not more than twelve months.

Under this statute, clause (b), the County Attorney of Hennepin County brought this action to enjoin the publication of what was described as a “ malicious, scandalous and defamatory newspaper, magazine and periodical,” known as “The Saturday Press,” published by the defendants in the city of Minneapolis. The complaint alleged that the defendants, on September 24, 1927, and on eight subsequent dates in October and November, 1927, published and circulated editions of that periodical which were “largely devoted to malicious, scandalous and defamatory articles” concerning Charles G. Davis, Frank W. Brunskill, the Minneapolis Tribune, the Minneapolis Journal, Melvin C. Passolt, George E. Leach, the Jewish Race, the members of the Grand Jury of Hennepin County impaneled in November, 1927, and then holding office, and other persons, as more fully appeared in exhibits annexed to the complaint, consisting of copies of the articles described and constituting 327 pages of the record. While the complaint did not so allege, it *704appears from the briefs of both parties that Charles G. Davis was a special law enforcement officer employed by a civic organization, that George E. Leach was Mayor of Minneapolis, that Frank W. Brunskill was its Chief of Police, and that Floyd B. Olson • (the relator in this action) was County Attorney.

Without attempting to summarize the contents of the voluminous exhibits attached to the complaint, we deem it sufficient to say that the articles charged in substance that a Jewish gangster was in control of gambling, bootlegging and racketeering in Minneapolis, and that law enforcing officers and agencies were not energetically performing their duties. Most of the charges were directed against the Chief of Police; he was charged with gross neglect of duty, illicit relations with gangsters, and with participation in graft. The County Attorney was charged with knowing the existing conditions and with failure to take adequate measures to remedy them. The Mayor was accused of inefficiency and dereliction. One member of the grand jury was stated to be in sympathy with the gangsters. A special grand jury and a special prosecutor were demanded to deal with the situation in general, and, in particular, to investigate an attempt to assassinate one Guilford, one of the original defendants, who, it appears from the articles, was shot by gangsters after the first issue of the periodical had been published. There is no question but that the articles made serious accusations against the public officers named and others in connection with the prevalence of crimes and the failure to expose and punish them.

At the beginning of the action, on November 22, 1927, and upon the verified complaint, an order was made directing the defendants to show cause why a temporary injunction should not issue and meanwhile forbidding the defendants to publish, circulate or have in their possession any editions of the periodical from September *70524, 1927, to November 19, 1927, inclusive, and from publishing, circulating, or having in their possession, “any future editions of said The Saturday Press” and “any publication, known by any other name whatsoever containing malicious, scandalous and defamatory matter of the kind alleged in plaintiff’s complaint herein or otherwise.”

The defendants demurred to the complaint upon the ground that it did not state facts sufficient to constitute a cause of action, and on this demurrer challenged the constitutionality of the statute. The District Court overruled the demurrer and certified the question of constitutionality to the Supreme Court of the State. The Supreme Court sustained the statute (174 Minn. 457; 219 N. W. 770), and it is conceded by the appellee that the Act was thus held to be valid over the objection that it violated not only the state constitution but also the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States.

Thereupon, the defendant Near, the present appellant, answered the complaint. He averred that he was the sole owner and proprietor of the publication in question. He admitted the publication of the articles in the issues described in the complaint but denied that they were malicious, scandalous or defamatory as alleged. He expressly invoked the protection of the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The case then came on for trial. The plaintiff offered in evidence the verified complaint, together with the issues of the publication in question, which were attached to the complaint as exhibits. The defendant objected to the introduction of the evidence, invoking the constitutional provisions to which his answer referred. The objection was overruled, no further evidence was presented, and the plaintiff rested. The defendant then rested, without offering evidence. The plaintiff moved that the court direct the issue of a permanent injunction, and this was done,

*706The District Court made findings of fact, which followed the allegations of the complaint and found in general terms that the editions in question were “ chiefly devoted to malicious, scandalous and defamatory articles,” concerning the individuals named. The court further found that the defendants through these publications “ did engage in the business of regularly and customarily producing, publishing and circulating a malicious, scandalous and defamatory newspaper,” and that “the said publication” “under said name of The Saturday Press, or any other name, constitutes a public nuisance under the laws of the State.” Judgment was thereupon entered adjudging that “the newspaper, magazine and periodical known as The Saturday Press,” as a public nuisance, “ be and is hereby abated.” The judgment perpetually enjoined the defendants “ from producing, editing, publishing, circulating, having in their possession, selling or giving away any publication whatsoever which is a malicious, scandalous or defamatory newspaper, as defined by law,” and also “from further conducting said nuisance under the name and title of said The Saturday Press or any other name or title.”

The defendant Near appealed from this judgment to the Supreme Court of the State, again asserting his right under the Federal Constitution, and the judgment was affirmed upon the authority of the former decision. 179 Minn. 40; 228 N.. W. 326. With respect to the contention that the judgment went too far, and prevented the defendants from publishing any kind of a newspaper, the court observed that the assignments of error did not go to the form of the judgment and that the lower court had not been asked to modify it. The court added that it saw no reason “ for defendants to construe the judgment as restraining them from operating a newspaper in harmony with the public welfare, to which all must yield,” that the allegations of the complaint had been *707found to be true, and, though this was an equitable action, defendants had not indicated a desire “ to conduct their business in the usual and legitimate manner.”

From the judgment as thus affirmed, the defendant Near appeals to this Court.

This statute, for the suppression as a public nuisance of a newspaper or periodical, is unusual, - if not unique, and raises questions of grave importance transcending the local interests involved in the particular action. It is no longer open to doubt that the liberty of the press, and of speech, is within the liberty safeguarded by the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment from invasion by state action. It was found impossible to conclude that this essential personal liberty of the citizen was left unprotected by the general guaranty of fundamental rights of person and property. Gitlow v. New York, 268 U. S. 652, 666; Whitney v. California, 274 U. S. 357, 362, 373; Fiske v. Kansas, 274 U. S. 380, 382; Stromberg v. California, ante, p. 359. In maintaining this guaranty, the authority of the State to enact laws to promote the health, safety, morals and general welfare of its people is necessarily admitted. The limits of this sovereign power must always be determined with appropriate regard to the particular subject of its exercise. Thus, while recognizing the broad discretion of the legislature in fixing rates to be charged by those ündertaking a public service, this Court has decided that the owner cannot constitutionally be deprived of his right to a fair return, because that is deemed to be of the essence of ownership. Railroad Commission Cases, 116 U. S. 307, 331; Northern Pacific Ry. Co. v. North Dakota, 236 U. S. 585, 596. So, while liberty of contract is not an absolute right, and the wide field of activity in the making of contracts is subject to legislative supervision (Frisbie v. United States, 157 U. S. 161, 165), this Court has held that the power of the State stops short of interference with what are deemed *708to be certain indispensable requirements of the liberty-assured, notably with respect to the fixing of prices and wages. Tyson Bros. v. Banton, 273 U. S. 418; Ribnik v. McBride, 277 U. S. 350; Adkins v. Children's Hospital, 261 U. S. 525, 560, 561. Liberty of speech, and of the press, is also not an absolute right, and the State may punish its abuse. Whitney v. California,, supra,; Stromberg v. California, supra. Liberty, in each of its phases, has its history and connotation and, in the present instance, the inquiry is as to the historic conception of the liberty of the press and whether the statute under review violates the essential attributes of that liberty.

The appellee insists that the questions of the application of the statute to appellant’s periodical, and of the construction of the judgment of the trial court, are not presented for review; that appellant’s sole attack was upon the constitutionality of the statute, however it might be applied. The appellee contends that no question either of motive in the publication, or whether the decree goes beyond the direction of the statute, is before us. The appellant replies that, in his view, the plain terms of the statute were not departed from in this case and that, even if they were, the statute is nevertheless unconstitutional under any reasonable construction of its terms. The appellant states that he has not argued that .the temporary and permanent injunctions were broader than were warranted by the statute; he insists that what was done was properly done if the statute is valid, and that the action taken under the statute is a fair indication of its scope.

With respect to these contentions it is enough to say that in passing upon constitutional questions the court has regard to substance and not to mere matters of form, and that, in accordance with familiar principles, the statute must be tested by its operation and effect. Henderson v. Mayor, 92 U. S. 259, 268; Bailey v. Alabama, 219 *709U. S. 219, 244; United States v. Reynolds, 235 U. S. 133, 148, 149; St. Louis Southwestern Ry. Co. v. Arkansas, 235 U. S. 350, 362; Mountain Timber Co. v. Washington, 243 U. S. 219, 237. That operation and effect we think is clearly shown by the record in this case. We are not concerned with mere errors of the trial court, if there be such, in going beyond the direction of the statute as construed by the Supreme Court of the State. It is thus important to note precisely the purpose and effect of the statute as the state court has construed it.

First. The statute is not .aimed at the redress of individual or private wrongs. Remedies for libel remain available and unaffected. The statute, said the state court, “ is not directed at threatened libel but at an existing business which, generally speaking, involves more than libel.” It is aimed at the distribution of scandalous matter as “ detrimental to public morals and to the general welfare,” tending “ to disturb the peace of the community” and “to provoke assaults and the commission of crime.” In order to obtain an injunction to suppress the future publication of the newspaper or periodical, it is not necessary to prove the falsity of the charges that have been made in the publication condemned. In the present action there was no allegation that the matter published was not true. It is alleged, and the statute requires the allegation, that the publication was “ malicious.” But, as in prosecutions for libel, there is no requirement of proof by the State of malice in fact as distinguished from malice inferred from the mere publication of the defamatory matter.2 The judgment in this case proceeded upon the mere proof of publication. The statute permits the defense, not of the truth alone, but only that the truth was published with good motives and *710for justifiable ends. It is apparent that under the statute the publication is to be regarded as defamatory if it injures reputation, and that it is scandalous if it circulates charges of reprehensible conduct, whether criminal or otherwise, and the publication is thus deemed to invite public reprobation and to constitute a public scandal. The court sharply defined the purpose of the statute, bringing out the precise point, in these words: “ There is no constitutional right to publish a fact merely because it is true. It is a matter of common knowledge that prosecutions under the criminal libel statutes do not result in efficient repression or suppression of the evils of scandal. Men who are the victims of such assaults seldom resort to the courts. This is especially true if their sins are exposed and the only question relates to whether it was done with good motives and for justifiable ends. This law is not for the protection of the person attacked nor to punish the wrongdoer. It is for the protection of the public welfare.”

Second. The statute is directed not simply at the circulation of scandalous and defamatory statements with regard to private citizens, but at the continued publication by newspapers and periodicals of charges against public officers of corruption, malfeasance in office, or serious neglect of duty. Such charges by their very nature create a public scandal. They are scandalous and defamatory within the meaning of the statute, which has its normal operation in relation to publications dealing prominently and chiefly with the alleged derelictions of public officers.3

*711Third. The object of the statute is not punishment, in the ordinary sense, but suppression of the offending newspaper or periodical. The reason for the enactment, as the state court has said, is that prosecutions to enforce penal statutes for libel do not result in “ efficient repression or suppression of the evils of scandal.” Describing the business of publication as a public nuisance, does not obscure the substance of the proceeding which the statute authorizes. It is the continued publication of scandalous and defamatory matter that constitutes the business and the declared nuisance. In the case of public officers, it is the reiteration of charges of official misconduct, and the fact that the newspaper or periodical is principally devoted to that purpose, that exposes it to suppression. In the present instance, the proof was that nine editions of the newspaper or periodical in question were published on successive dates, and that they were chiefly devoted to charges against public officers and in relation to the prevalence and protection of crime. In such a case, these officers are not left to their ordinary remedy in a suit for libel, or the authorities to a prosecution for criminal libel. Under this statute, a publisher of a newspaper or periodical, undertaking to conduct a campaign to expose and to censure official derelictions, and devoting his publication principally to that purpose, must face not simply the possibility of a verdict against him in a suit or prosecution for libel, but a determination that his newspaper or periodical is a public nuisance to be abated, and that this abatement and suppression will follow unless he is prepared with legal evidence to prove the truth of the charges and also to satisfy the court that, in *712addition to being true, the matter was published with good motives and for justifiable ends.

This suppression is accomplished by enjoining publication and that restraint is the object and effect of the statute.

Fourth. The statute not only operates to suppress the offending newspaper or periodical but to put the publisher under an effective censorship. When a newspaper or periodical is found to be “ malicious, scandalous and defamatory,” and is suppressed as such, resumption of publication is punishable as a contempt of court by fine or imprisonment. Thus, where a newspaper or periodical has been suppressed because of the circulation of charges against public officers , of official misconduct, it would seem to be clear that the renewal of the publication of such charges would constitute a contempt and that the judgment would lay a permanent restraint upon the publisher, to escape which he must satisfy the court as to the character of a new publication. Whether he would be permitted again to publish matter deemed to be derogatory to the same or other public officers would depend upon the court’s ruling. In the present instance the judgment restrained the defendants from “publishing, circulating, having in their possession, selling or giving away any publication whatsoever which is a malicious, scandalous or defamatory newspaper, as defined by law.” The law gives no definition except that covered by the words “ scandalous and defamatory,” and publications charging official misconduct are of that class. • While the court, answering the objection that the judgment was too broad, saw no reason for construing it as restraining the defendants “from operating a newspaper in harmony with the public welfare to which all must yield,” and said that the defendants had not indicated' “ any desire to conduct their business in the usual and legitimate manner,” the manifest inference is that, at least with respect to a *713new publication directed against official misconduct, the defendant would be held, under penalty of punishment for contempt as provided in the statute, to a manner of publication which the court considered to be “ usual and legitimate ” and consistent with the public welfare.

If we cut through mere details of procedure, the operation and effect of the statute in substance is that public authorities may bring the owner or publisher of a newspaper or periodical before a judge upon a charge of conducting a business of publishing scandalous and defamatory matter—in particular that the matter consists of charges against public officers of official dereliction—and unless the owner or publisher is able and disposed to bring competent evidence to satisfy the judge that the charges are true and are published with good motives and for justifiable ends, his newspaper or periodical is suppressed and further publication is made punishable as a contempt. This is of the essence of censorship.

The question is whether a statute authorizing such proceedings in restraint of publication is consistent with the conception of the liberty of the press as historically conceived and guaranteed. In determining the extent of the constitutional protection, it has been generally, if not universally, considered that it is the chief purpose of the guaranty to prevent previous restraints upon publication. The struggle in England, directed against the legislative power of the licenser, resulted in renunciation of the censorship of the press.4 The liberty deemed to be established was thus described by Blackstone: “ The liberty of the press is indeed essential to the nature of a free state; but this consists in laying no previous restraints upon publications, and not in freedom from censure for criminal matter when published. Every freeman has an *714undoubted right to lay what sentiments he pleases before the public; to forbid' this, is to destroy the freedom of the press; but if he publishes what is improper, mischievous or illegal, he must take the consequence of his own temerity.” 4 Bl. Com. 151, 152; see Story on the Constitution, §§ 1884, 1889. The distinction was early pointed out between the extent of the freedom with respect to censorship under our constitutional system and that enjoyed in England. Here, as Madison said, “ the great and essential rights of the people are secured against legislative as well as against executive ambition. They are secured, not by laws paramount to prerogative, but by constitutions paramount to laws. This security of the freedom of . the press requires that it should be exempt not only from previous restraint by the Executive, as in Great Britain, but from legislative restraint also.” Report on the Virginia Resolutions, Madison’s Works, vol. IV, p. 543. This Court said, in Patterson v. Colorado, 205 U. S. 454, 462: “ In the first place, the main purpose of such constitutional provisions is ‘ to prevent all such previous restraints upon publications as had been practiced by other governments,’ and they do not prevent the subsequent punishment of such as may be deemed contrary to the public welfare. Commonwealth v. Blanding, 3 Pick. 304, 313, 314; Respublica v. Oswald, 1 Dallas, 319, 325. The preliminary freedom extends as well to the false as to the true; the subsequent punishment may extend as well to the true as to the false. This was the law of criminal libel apart from statute in most cases, if not in all. Commonwealth v. Blanding, ubi sup.; 4 Bl. Com. 150.”

The criticism upon Blackstone’s statement has not been because immunity from previous restraint upon publication has not been regarded as deserving of special emphasis, but chiefly because that immunity cannot be deemed to exhaust the conception of the liberty guaranteed by *715state and federal constitutions. The point of criticism has been “that the mere exemption from previous restraints cannot be all that is secured by the constitutional provisions ”; and that “ the liberty of the press might be rendered a mockery and a delusion, and the phrase itself a by-word, if, while every man was at liberty to publish what he pleased, the public authorities might nevertheless punish him for harmless publications.” 2 Cooley, Const. Lim., 8th ed., p. 885. But it is recognized that punishment for the abuse of the liberty accorded to the press is essential to the protection of the public, and that the common law rules that subject the libeler to responsibility- for the public offense, as well as for the private injury, are not abolished by the protection extended in our constitutions, id. pp. 883, 884. The law of criminal libel rests upon that secure foundation. There is also the conceded authority of courts to punish for contempt when publications directly tend to prevent the proper discharge of judicial functions. Patterson v. Colorado, supra; Toledo Newspaper Co. v. United States, 247 U. S. 402, 419.5 In the present case, we have no occasion to inquire as to the permissible scope of subsequent punishment. For whatever wrong the appellant has committed or may commit, by his publications, the State appropriately affords both public and private redress by its libel laws. As has been noted, the statute in question does not deal with punishments; it provides for no punishment, except in case of contempt for violation of the court’s order, but for suppression and injunction, that is, for restraint upon publication.

The objection has also been made that the principle as to immunity from previous restraint is stated too *716broadly, if every such restraint is deemed to be prohibited. That is undoubtedly true; the protection even as to previous restraint is not absolutely unlimited. But the limitation has been recognized only in exceptional cases: “ When a nation is at war many things that might be said in time of peace are such a hindrance to its effort that their utterance will not be endured so long as men fight and that no Court could regard them as protected by any constitutional right.” Schenck v. United States, 249 U. S. 47, 52. No one would question but that a government might prevent actual obstruction to its recruiting service or the publication of the sailing dates of transports or the number and location of troops.6 Ón similar grounds, the primary requirements of decency may be enforced against obscene publications. The security of the. community life may be protected against incitements to. acts of violence and the overthrow by force of orderly government. The constitutional guaranty of free speech does not “ protect a man from an injunction against uttering words that may have all the effect of force. Gompers v. Buck Stove & Range Co., 221 U. S. 418, 439.” Schenck v. United States, supra. These limitations are not applicable here. Nor are we now concerned with questions as to the extent of authority to prevent publications in order to protect private rights according to the principles governing the exercise of the jurisdiction of courts of equity.7

The exceptional nature of its limitations places in a strong light the general conception that liberty of the press, historically considered and taken up by the Federal Constitution, has meant, principally although not exclusively, immunity from previous restraints or censorship. The conception of theuFerty of the press in this country had broadened with the exigencies of the colonial *717period and with the efforts to secure freedom from oppressive administration.8 That liberty was especially cherished for the immunity it afforded from previous restraint of the publication of censure of public officers and charges of official misconduct. As was said by Chief Justice Parker, in Commonwealth v. Blanding, 3 Pick. 304, 313, with respect to the constitution of Massachusetts: “ Besides, it is well understood, and received as a commentary on this provision for the liberty of the press, that it was intended to prevent all such previous restraints upon publications as had been practiced by other governments, and in early times here, to stifle the efforts of patriots towards enlightening their fellow subjects upon their rights and the duties of rulers. The liberty of the press was to be unrestrained, but he who used it was to be responsible in case of its abuse.” In the letter sent by the Continental Congress (October 26, 1774) to the Inhabitants of Quebec, referring to the “ five great rights ” it was said:9 “ The last right we shall mention, regards the freedom of the press. The importance of this consists, besides the advancement of truth, science, morality, and arts in general, in .its diffusion of liberal sentiments on the administration of Government, its ready communication of thoughts between subjects, and its consequential promotion of union among them, whereby oppressive officers are shamed or intimidated, into more honourable and just modes of conducting affairs.” Madison, who was the leading spirit in the preparation of the First Amendment of the Federal Constitution, thus described the practice and sentiment which led to the guaranties of liberty of the press in state constitutions:10

*718“ In every State, probably, in the Union, the press has exerted a freedom in canvassing the merits and measures of public men of every description which has not been confined to the strict limits of the common law. On this footing the freedom of the press has stood; on this footing it yet stands. . . . Some degree of abuse is inseparable from the proper use of everything, and in no instance is this more true than in that of the press. It has accordingly been decided by the practice of the States, that it is better to leave a few of its noxious branches to their luxuriant growth, than, by pruning them away, to injure the vigour of those yielding the proper fruits. And can the wisdom of this policy be doubted by any who reflect that to the press alone, chequered as it is with abuses, the world is indebted for all the triumphs which have been gained by reason and humanity over error and oppression; who reflect that to the same beneficent source the United States owe much of the lights which conducted them to the ranks of a free and independent nation, and which have improved their political system into a shape so auspicious to their happiness? Had * Sedition Acts,’ forbidding every publication that might bring the constituted agents into contempt or disrepute, or that might excite the hatred of the people against the authors of unjust or pernicious measures, been uniformly enforced against the press, might not the United States have been languishing at this day under the infirmities of a sickly Confederation? Might they not, possibly, be miserable colonies, groaning under a foreign yoke? ”

The fact that for approximately one hundred and fifty years there has been almost an entire absence of attempts to impose previous restraints upon publications relating to the malfeasance of public officers is significant of the deep-seated conviction that such restraints would violate constitutional right'. Public officers, whose character and *719conduct remain open to debate and free discussion in the press, find their remedies for false accusations in actions under libel laws providing for redress and punishment, and not in proceedings to restrain the publication of newspapers and periodicals.^ The general principle that the constitutional guaranty of the liberty of the press gives immunity from previous restraints has been approved in many decisions under the provisions of state constitutions.11

The importance of this immunity has not lessened. While reckless assaults upon public men, and efforts to bring obloquy upon those who are endeavoring faithfully to discharge official duties, exert a baleful influence and deserve the severest condemnation in public opinion, it cannot be said that this abuse is greater, and it is believed to be less, than that which characterized the period in which our institutions took shape. Meanwhile, the administration of government has become more complex, the opportunities for malfeasance and corruption have multiplied, crime has grown to most serious proportions, and the danger of its protection by unfaithful officials and of the impairment of the fundamental security of life and *720property by criminal alliances and official neglect, emphasizes the primary need of a vigilant and courageous press, especially in great cities. The fact that the liberty of the press may be abused by miscreant purveyors of scandal does not make any the less necessary the immunity of the press from previous restraint in dealing with official misconduct. Subsequent punishment for such abuses as may exist is the appropriate remedy* consistent with constitutional privilege.

In attempted justification of the statute, it is said that it deals not with publication per se, but with the “ business ” of publishing defamation. If, however, the publisher has a constitutional right to publish, without previous restraint, an edition of his newspaper charging official derelictions, it cannot be denied that he may publish subsequent editions for the same purpose. He does not lose his right by exercising it. . If his right exists, it may be exercised in publishing nine editions, as in this case, as well as in one edition. If previous restraint is permissible, it may be imposed at once; indeed, the wrong may be as serious in one publication as in several. Characterizing the publication as a business, and the business as a nuisance, does not permit an invasion of the constitutional immunity against restraint. Similarly, it does not matter that the newspaper or periodical is found to be “largely” or “chiefly” devoted to the publication of such. derelictions. If the publisher has a right, without previous restraint, to publish them, his right cannot be deemed to be dependent upon his publishing something else, more or less, with the matter to which objection is made.

Nor can it be said that the constitutional freedom from previous restraint is lost because charges are made of derelictions which constitute crimes. With the multiplying provisions of penal codes, and of municipal charters and ordinances carrying penal sanctions, the conduct of *721public officers is very largely within the purview of criminal statutes. The freedom of the press from previous restraint has never been regarded as limited to such animadversions as lay outside the range of penal enactments. Historically, there is no such limitation; it is inconsistent with the reason which underlies the privilege, as the privilege so limited would be of slight value for the purposes for which it came to be established.

The statute in question cannot be justified by reason of the fact that the publisher is permitted to show, before injunction issues, that the matter published is true and is published with good motives and for justifiable ends. If such a statute, authorizing suppression and injunction on such a basis, is constitutionally valid, it would be equally permissible for the legislature to provide that at any time the publisher of any newspaper could be brought before a court, or even an administrative officer (as the constitutional protection may not be regarded as resting on mere procedural details) and required to produce proof of the truth of his publication, or of what he intended to publish, and of his motives, or stand enjoined. If this can be. done, the legislature may provide machinery for determining in the complete exercise of its discretion what are justifiable ends and restrain publication accordingly. And it would be but a step to a complete system of censorship. The recognition of authority to impose previous restraint upon publication in order to protect the community against the circulation of charges of misconduct, and especially of official misconduct, necessarily would carry with it the admission of the authority of the censor against which the constitutional barrier was erected. The preliminary freedom, by virtue of the very reason for its existence, does not depend, as this Court has said, on proof of truth. Patterson v. Colorado, supra.

Equally unavailing is the insistence that the statute is designed to prevent the circulation of scandal which tends *722to disturb the public peace and to provoke assaults and the commission of crime. Charges of reprehensible conduct, and in particular of official malfeasance, unquestionably create a public scandal, but the theory of the constitutional guaranty is that even a more serious public evil would be caused by authority to prevent publication. “ To prohibit the intent to excite those unfavorable sentiments against those who administer the Government, is equivalent to a prohibition of the actual excitement of them; and to prohibit the actual excitement of them is equivalent to a prohibition of discussions having that tendency and effect; which, again, is equivalent to a protection of those who administer the Government, if they should at any time deserve the contempt or hatred of the people, against being exposed to it by free animadversions on their characters and conduct.”12 There is nothing new in the fact that charges of reprehensible conduct may create resentment and the disposition to resort to violent means of redress, but this well-understood tendency did not alter the determination to protect the press against censorship and restraint upon publication. As was said in New Yorker Staats-Zeitung v. Nolan, 89 N. J. Eq. 387, 388; 105 Atl. 72: “ If the township may prevent the circulation of a newspaper for no reason other than that some of its inhabitants may violently disagree with it, and resent its circulation by resorting to physical violence, there is no limit to what may be prohibited.” The danger of violent reactions becomes greater with effective organization of defiant groups resenting exposure, and if this consideration warranted legislative interference with the initial freedom of publication, the constitutional protection would be reduced to a mere form of words.

For these reasons we hold the statute, so far as it authorized the proceedings in this action under clause (b) *723of section one, to be an infringement of the liberty of the press guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment. We should add that this decision rests upon the operation and effect of the statute, without regard to the question of the truth of the charges contained in the particular periodical. The fact that the public officers named in this case, and those associated with the charges of official dereliction, may be deemed to be impeccable, cannot affect the conclusion that the statute imposes an unconstitutional restraint upon publication.

Judgment reversed.

Mb. Justice Butler,

dissenting.

The decision of the Court in this case declares Minnesota and every other State powerless to restrain by injunction the business of publishing and circulating among the people malicious, scandalous and defamatory periodicals that in due course of judicial procedure has been adjudged to be a public nuisance. It gives to freedom of the press a meaning and a scope not heretofore recognized and construes “ liberty ” in the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to put upon the States a federal restriction that is without precedent.

. Confessedly, the Federal Constitution prior to 1868, when the Fourteenth Amendment was adopted, did not protect the right of free speech or press against state action. Barron v. Baltimore, 7 Pet. 243, 250. Fox v. Ohio, 5 How. 410, 434. Smith v. Maryland, 18 How. 71, 76. Withers v. Buckley, 20 How. 84, 89-91. Up to that time the right was safeguarded solely by the constitutions ¡and laws of the States and, it may be added, they operated .'adequately to protect it. This Court was not called on until 1925 to decide whether the “ liberty ” protected by the Fourteenth Amendment includes the right of free speech and press. That question has been finally an*724swered in the affirmative. Cf. Patterson v. Colorado, 205 U. S. 454, 462. Prudential Ins. Co. v. Cheek, 259 U. S. 530, 538, 543. See Gitlow v. New York, 268 U. S. 652. Fiske v. Kansas, 274 U. S. 380. Stromberg v. California, ante, p. 359.

The record shows, and it is conceded, that defendants’ regular business was the publication of malicious, scandalous and defamatory articles concerning the principal public officers, leading newspapers of the city, many private persons and the Jewish race. It also shows that it was their purpose at all hazards to continue to carry on the business. In every edition slanderous and defamatory matter predominates to the practical exclusion of all else. Many of the statements are so highly improbable as to compel a finding that they are false. The articles themselves show malice.1

*725The defendant here has no standing to assert that the statute is invalid because it might be construed so as to violate the Constitution. His right is limited solely to *726the inquiry whether, having regard to the points properly raised in his case, the effect of applying the statute is to ! deprive him of his liberty without due process of law. *727This Court should not reverse the judgment below upon the ground that in some other case the statute may be applied in a way that is repugnant to the freedom of the press protected by the Fourteenth Amendment. Castillo v. McConnico, 168 U. S. 674, 680. Williams v. Mississippi, 170 U. S. 213, 225. Yazoo & Miss. R. Co. v. Jackson Vinegar Co., 226 U. S. 217, 219-220. Plymouth Coal Co. v. Pennsylvania, 232 U. S. 531, 544-546.

This record requires the Court to consider the statute as applied to the business of publishing articles that are in fact malicious, scandalous and defamatory.

The statute provides that any person who “ shall be engaged in the business of regularly or customarily producing, publishing or circulating” a newspaper, magazine or other periodical that is (a) “obscene, lewd and lascivious” or (b) “malicious, scandalous and defama*728tory ” is guilty of a nuisance and may be enjoined as provided in the Act. It will be observed that the qualifying words are used conjunctively. In actions brought under (b) “ there shall be available the defense that the truth was published with good motives and for justifiable ends.”

The complaint charges that defendants were engaged in the business of regularly and customarily publishing “ malicious, scandalous and defamatory newspapers ” known as the Saturday Press, anil nine editions dated respectively on each Saturday commencing September 25 and ending November 19, 1927, were made a part of the complaint. These are all that were published.

On appeal from the order of the district court overruling defendants’ demurrer to the complaint the state supreme court said (174 Minn. 457, 461; 219 N. W. 770): “ The constituent elements of the declared nuisance are the customary and regular dissemination by means of a newspaper which finds its way into families, reaching the young as well as the mature, of a selection of scandalous and defamatory articles treated in such a way as to excite attention and interest so as to command circulation. . . . The statute is not directed at threatened libel but at an existing business which, generally speaking, involves more than libel. The distribution of scandalous matter is detrimental to public morals and to the general welfare. It tends to disturb the peace of the community. Being defamatory and malicious, it tends to provoke assaults and the commission of crime. It has no concern with the publication of the truth, with good motives and for justifiable ends. ... In Minnesota no ■ agency can hush the sincere and honest voice of the press; ■ but our constitution was never intended to protect malice, .scandal and defamation when untrue or published with bad motives or without justifiable ends. ... It was never the intention of the constitution to afford protec*729tion to a publication devoted to scandal and defamation. . . . Defendants stand before us upon the record as being regularly and customarily engaged in a business of conducting a newspaper sending to the public malicious, scandalous and defamatory printed matter.”

The case was remanded to the district court.

Near’s answer made no allegations to excuse or justify the business or the articles complained of. It formally denied that the publications were malicious,, scandalous or defamatory, admitted that they were made as alleged, and attacked the statute as unconstitutional. At the trial the plaintiff introduced evidence unquestionably sufficient to support the complaint. The defendant offered none. The court found the facts as alleged in the complaint and specifically that each edition “was chiefly devoted to malicious, scandalous and defamatory articles ” and that the last edition was chiefly devoted to malicious, scandalous and defamatory articles concerning Leach (mayor of Minneapolis), Davis (representative of the law enforcement league of citizens), Brunskill (chief of police), Olson (county attorney), the Jewish race and members of the grand jury then serving in that court; that defendants in and through the several publications “ did thereby engage in the business of regularly and customarily producing, publishing and circulating a malicious, scandalous and defamatory newspaper.”

Defendant Near again appealed to the supreme court. In its opinion (179 Minn. 40; 228 N. W. 326) the court said: “ No claim is advanced that the method and character of the operation of the newspaper in question was not a nuisance if the statute is constitutional. It was regularly and customarily devoted largely to malicious, scandalous and defamatory matter. . . . The record presents the same questions, upon which we have already passed.”

*730Defendant concedes that the editions of the newspaper complained of are “defamatory per se.” And he says: “ It has been asserted that the constitution was never intended to be a shield for malice, scandal, and defamation when untrue, or published with bad motives, or for unjustifiable ends. . . . The contrary is true; every person does have a constitutional right to publish malicious, scandalous, and defamatory matter though untrue, and with bad motives, and for-unjustifiable ends, in the first instance, though he is subject to responsibility therefor afterwards.” The record, when the substance of the articles is regarded, requires that concession here. And this Court is required to pass on the validity of the state law on that basis.

No question was raised below and there is none here ■concerning the relevancy or weight of evidence, burden of proof, justification or other matters of defense, the scope of the judgment or proceedings to enforce it or the character of the publications that may be made notwithstanding the injunction.

There is no basis for the suggestion that defendants may not interpose any defense or introduce any evidence that would be open to them in a libel case, or that malice may not be negatived by showing that the publication was made in good faith in belief of its truth, or that at the time and under the circumstances it was justified as a fair comment on public affairs or upon the conduct of public officers in respect of their duties as such. See Mason's Minnesota Statutes, §§ 10112, 10113.

The scope of the judgment is not reviewable here. The opinion of the state supreme court shows that it was not reviewable there, because defendants' assignments of error in that court did not go to the form of the judgment, and because the lower court had not been asked to modify the judgment.

*731The Act was passed in the exertion of the State’s power of police, and this court is by well established rule required to assume, until the contrary is clearly made to appear, that there exists in Minnesota a state of affairs that justifies this measure for the preservation of the peace and good order of the State. Lindsley v. Natural Carbonic Gas Co., 220 U. S. 61, 79. Gitlow v. Néiv York, supra, 668-669. Corporation Commission v. Lowe, 281 U. S. 431, 438. O’Gorman & Young v. Hartford Ins. Co., 282 U. S. 251, 257-258.

The publications themselves disclose the need and propriety of the legislation. They show:

In 1913 one Guilford, originally a defendant in this suit, commenced the publication of a scandal sheet called the Twin City Reporter; in 1916 Near joined him in the enterprise, later bought him out and engaged the services of one Bevans. In 1919 Bevans acquired Near’s interest, and has since, alone or with others, continued the publication. Defendants admit that they published some reprehensible articlés in the Twin City Reporter, deny that they personally used it for blackmailing purposes, admit that by reason of their connection with the paper their reputation did become tainted and state that Bevans, while so associated with Near, did use the paper for blackmailing purposes. And Near says it was for that reason he sold his interest to Bevans.

In a number of the editions defendants charge that, ever since Near sold his interest to Bevans in 1919, the Twin City Reporter has been used for blackmail, to dominate public gambling and other criminal activities and as well to exert a kind of control over public officers and the government of the city.

The articles in question also state that, when defendants announced their intention to publish the Saturday Press, they were threatened, and that soon after the first pub*732lication Guilford was waylaid and shot down before he could use the firearm which he had at hand for the purpose of defending himself against anticipated assaults. It also appears that Near apprehended violence and was not unprepared to repel it. There is much more of like significance.

The long criminal career of the Twin City Reporter— if it is in fact as described.by defendants—and the arming and shooting arising out of the publication of the Saturday Press, serve to illustrate the kind of conditions, in respect of the business of publishing malicious, scandalous and defamatory periodicals, by which the state legislature presumably was moved to enact the law in question. It must be deemed appropriate to deal with conditions existing in Minnesota.

It is of the greatest importance that the States shall bo untrammeled and free to employ all just and appropriate measures to prevent abuses of the liberty of the press.

In his work on the Constitution (5th ed.) Justice Story, expounding the First Amendment which declares: “ Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech or of the press,” said (•§ 1880):

“ That this amendment was intended to secure to every citizen an absolute right to speak, or write, or print whatever he might please, without any responsibility, public or private, therefor, is a supposition too wild to be indulged by any rational man. This would be to allow to every citizen a right to destroy at his pleasure the reputation, the peace, the property, and even the personal safety of every other citizen. A man might, out of mere "malice and revenge, accuse another of the most infamous crimes; might excite against him the indignation of all his fellow-citizens by the most atrocious calumnies; might disturb, nay, overturn, all his domestic peace, and embitter his parental affections; might inflict the most distressing punishments upon the weak, the timid, and the inno*733cent; might prejudice all a man’s civil, and political, and private rights; and might stir up sedition, rebellion, and treason even against the government itself, in the wantonness of his passions or the corruption of his heart. Civil society could not go on under such circumstances. Men would then be obliged to resort to private vengeance to make up for the deficiencies of the law; and assassination and savage cruelties would be perpetrated with all the frequency belonging to barbarous and brutal communities. It is plain, then, that the language of this amendment imports no more than that every man shall have a right to speak, write, and print his opinions upon any subject whatsoever, without any prior restraint, so always that he does not injure any other person in his rights, person, property, or reputation; and so always that he does not thereby disturb the public peace, or attempt to subvert the government. It is neither more nor less than an expansion of the great doctrine recently brought into operation in the law of libel, that every man shall be at liberty to publish what is true, with good motives and for justifiable ends. And with this reasonable limitation it is not only right in itself, but it is an inestimable privilege in a free government. Without such a limitation, it might become the scourge of the republic, first denouncing the principles of liberty, and then, by rendering the most virtuous patriots odious through .the terrors of the press, introducing despotism in its worst form.” (Italicizing added.)

The Court quotes Blackstone in support of its condemnation of the statute as imposing a previous restraint upon publication. But the previous restraints referred to by him subjected the press to the arbitrary will of an administrative officer. He describes the practice (Book IV, p. 152): “To subject the press to the restrictive power of a licenser, as was formerly done, both before and since the revolution [of 1688], is to subject all free*734dom of sentiment to the prejudices of one man, and make him the arbitrary and infallible judge of all controverted points in learning, religion, and government."2

Story gives the history alluded to by Blackstone (§ 1882):

“The art of printing soon after its introduction, we are told, was looked upon, as well in England as in other .countries, as merely a matter of state, and subject to the coercion of the crown. It was, therefore, regulated in England by the king’s proclamations, prohibitions, charters of privilege, and licenses, and finally by the decrees of the Court of Star-Chamber, which limited the number of printers and of presses which each should employ, and prohibited new publications, unless previously approved by proper licensers. On the demolition of this odious jurisdiction, in 1641, the Long Parliament of Charles the Eirst, after their rupture with that prince, assumed the same powers which the Star-Chamber exercised with respect to licensing books; and during the Commonwealth (such is human frailty and the love of power even in republics!) they issued their ordinances for that purpose, founded principally upon a Star-Chamber decree of 1637. After the restoration of Charles the Second, a statute on the same subject was passed, copied, with some few alterations, from the parliamentary ordinances. The act expired in 1679, and was revived and continued for a few years after the revolution of 1688. Many attempts were made by the government to keep it in force; but it was *735so strongly resisted by Parliament that it expired in 1694, and has never since been revived.”

It is plain that Blackstone taught that under the common law liberty of the press means simply the absence of restraint upon publication in advance as distinguished from liability, civil or criminal, for libelous or improper matter so published. And, as above shown, Story defined freedom of the press guaranteed by the First Amendment to mean that “ every man shall be at liberty to publish what is true, with good motives and for justifiable ends.” His statement concerned the definite declaration of the First Amendment. It is not suggested that the freedom of press included in the liberty protected by the Fourteenth Amendment, which was adopted after Story’s definition, is greater than that protected against congressional action. And see 2 Cooley’s Constitutional Limitations, 8th ed., p. 886. 2 Kent’s Commentaries (14th ed.) Lect. XXIV, p. 17.

The Minnesota statute does not operate as a previous restraint on publication within the proper meaning of that phrase. It does not authorize administrative control in advance such as was formerly exercised by the licensers and censors but prescribes a remedy to be enforced by a suit in equity. In this case there was previous publication made in the course of the business of regularly producing malicious, scandalous and defamatory periodicals. The business and publications unquestionably constitute an abuse of the right of free press. The statute denounces the things done as a nuisance on the ground, as stated by the state supreme court, that they threaten morals, peace and good order. There is no question of the power' of the State to denounce such transgressions. The restraint authorized is only in respect of continuing to do what has been duly adjudged to constitute a nuisance. The controlling words are “All persons guilty of such nuisance may be enjoined, as here*736inafter provided. . . . Whenever any such nuisance is committed ... an action in the name of the State ” may be brought “ to perpetually enjoin the person or persons committing, conducting, or maintaining any such nuisance, from further committing, conducting or maintaining any such nuisance. . . . The court may make its order and judgment permanently enjoining . . . defendants found guilty . . . from committing or continuing the acts prohibited hereby, and in and by such judgment, such nuisance may be wholly abated. . . .” There is (nothing in the statute3 purporting to prohibit publications that have not been adjudged to constitute a nuisance. It is fanciful to suggest similarity between the granting or enforcement of the decree authorized by this statute to prevent further publication of malicious, scandalous and defamatory articles and the previous restraint upon the press by licensers as referred to by Blackstone and described in the history of the times to which he alludes.

*737The opinion seems to concede that under clause (a) of the Minnesota law the business of regularly publishing and circulating an obscene periodical may be enjoined as a nuisance. It is difficult' to perceive any distinction, having any relation to constitutionality, between clause (a) and clause (b) under which this action was brought. Both nuisances are offensive to morals, order and good government. As that resulting from lewd publications constitutionally may be enjoined it is hard to understand why the one resulting from a regular business of malicious defamation may not.

It is well known, as found by the state supreme court, that existing libel laws are inadequate effectively to suppress evils resulting from the kind of business and publications that are shown in this case. The doctrine that measures such as the one before us are invalid because they operate as previous restraints to infringe freedom of press exposes the peace and good order of every community and the business and private affairs of every individual to the constant and protracted false and malicious *738assaults of any insolvent publisher who may have purpose and sufficient capacity to contrive and put into effect a scheme or program for oppression, blackmail or extortion.

The judgment should be affirmed.

*714Pee Curiam.

We granted certiorari in- these cases in which the United Státes seeks to enjoin the New York Times and the Washington Post .'from publishing the contents of a classified study entitled “History of U. S. Decision-Making Process on Viet Nam Policy.” Post, pp. 942, 943.

“Any system of prior restraints of expression comes to this Court bearing a heavy presumption against its constitutional validity.” Bantam Books, Inc. v. Sullivan, 372 U. S. 58, 70 (1963); see also Near v. Minnesota, 283 U. S. 697 (1931). The Government “thus carries a heavy burden of showing justification for the imposition of such a restraint.” Organization for a Better Austin v. Keefe, 402 U. S. 415, 419 (1971). The District Court for the Southern District of New York in the New York Times case and the District Court for' the District of Columbia and the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in the Washington Post case held that the Government had not met that burden. We agree.

The judgment of the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit is therefore affirmed. The order of the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit is reversed and the case is remanded with directions to enter a judgment affirming the judgment of the District Court for the Southern District of New York. The stays entered June 25, 1971, by the Court are vacated. The judgments shall issue forthwith.

So ordered.

Mr. Justice Black,

concurring.

I adhere to the view that the Government's case against the Washington Post should have been dismissed and that-the injunction against the New York Time's should have been vacated without oral argument when the cases were first presented to this Court. I beljéve *715that every moment’s continuance of the injunctions against these newspapers amounts to a flagrant, indefensible, and continuing violation of the First Amendment. Furthermore, after oral argument, I agree completely that we must affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit for the reasons stated by my Brothers Douglas and Brennan. In my view it is unfortunate that some of my Brethren are apparently willing to hold -that the publication of news may sometimes be enjoined. Such a holding would make a shambles of. the First Amendment.

Our Government was launched in 1789 with the adoption of the Constitution. The Bill of Rights, including the First Amendment, followed in 1791. Now, for the first time in the 182 years since the founding of' the Republic, the federal courts are asked to hold that the First Amendment does not mean what it says, but rather means that the Government , can halt the publication of current news of vital importance to the people of this country.

In seeking injunctions against these newspapers and in its presentation to the Court, the. Executive Branch seems to have forgotten the essential purpose and history of the First Amendment. When the Constitution was adopted, many .people strongly opposed it because the document contained no Bill of Rights to safeguard certain basic freedoms.1 They especially feared, that the *716new powers granted to a central government might be interpreted to permit the government to curtail freedom of religion, press, assembly, and speech. In response to an overwhelming public 'clamor, James'Madison offered a series of amendments to satisfy citizens that these great liberties would remain safe and beyond the power of government to abridge. Madison proposed what later became the First Amendment in three parts, two of which are set out below, and one of which proclaimed: “The people shall not be deprived or abridged of their right to speak, to write, or to publish their sentiments; and the freedom of the press, as one of the great bulwarks of liberty, shall be inviolable.”2 (Emphasis added.)' The amendments were offered to curtail and restrict the general powers granted to the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial Branches two years before in the original Constitution. The Bill of Rights changed the original Constitution into a new charter under which no branch- of government could abridge the people’s freedoms of press, speech, religion, and assembly. Yet the Solicitor General argues and some members of -the Court appear to agree that the general powers of the Government adopted in the original Constitution should be interpreted to limit and restrict the specific and emphatic guarantees of the Bill of Rights adopted later. I can imagine no greater perversion of history. Madison and the other Framers of the First Amendment, able men *717that they were, wrote in language they earnestly believed could never be misunderstood: “Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom ... of the press . . . Both the history and language of the First Amendment support the view that the press must be left free to publish news, whatever the- source, without censorship, injunctions, or prior restraints.

In the First Amendment the Founding Fathers gave the free press the protection it must have to fulfill its essential role in our democracy. The press was to serve the governed, not the governors. The Government’s power to censor the press was abolished so that the press would remain forever free to censure the Government. The press was protected so that it could bare the secr,ets of government and inform the people. Only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government. And paramount among the responsibilities of a free press is the dúty to prevent a,ny part of the government from deceiving the people and sending them off to distant lands to die of foreign fevers and foreign shot and shell. In my view, far from deserving condemnation for their courageous reporting, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and other newspapers should be commended for serving the purpose that the Founding Fathers saw so clearly. In revealing the workings of government that led to the Vietnam war, the newspapers nobly did precisely that which the Founders hoped and trusted they would do.

The Government’s case here is based on premises entirely different from those, that guided the Framers of the First Amendment. The Solicitor General has carefully and emphatically stated:

“Now, Mr. Justice [Black], your construction of . . . [the First Amendment] is well known, and I certainly respect it. You say that no law means no law, and that should be obvious. I can only *718say, Mr. Justice, that to me it is. equally obvious that ‘no law’ does not mean ‘no law’, and I would seek to persuade-the Court that that is true. . . . [T]here are other parts of the Constitution that grant powers and responsibilities to the Executive, and . . .. the First Amendment was not intended to make it impossible for the Executive to function or to protect the security of the United States.” 3

And the Government argues in its brief that in spite of the First Amendment, “[t]he authority of the Executive Department to protect the nation against publication of information whose disclosure would endanger the national security stems from two interrelated sources: the constitutional power of the President over the conduct of foreign affairs arid his authority as Commander-in-Chief.” 4

, In other words, we are asked to hold that despite the First Amendment’s emphatic command, the Executive Branch, the Congress, and the Judiciary can make laws enjoining publication of current news and abridging freedom- of the. press in thé name of “national security.” The Government does not even attempt to rely on any act of Congress. Instead it makes the bold and dangerously far-reaching contention that the courts should take it upon themselves to “make” a law abridging freedom, of the press in the name of equity, presidential power and national security, even when the representatives of the people in Congress have adhered to the command of the First Amendment and refused to make such a law.5 See concurring opinion of Mr. Justice Douglas, *719post, at 721-722. To find that the President has “inherent power” to halt the publication of news by resort to the courts would wipe out the First Amendment and destroy the fundamental liberty and security of the very people the Government hopes to make “secure.” No one can read the history of the adoption of the First Amendment without being convinced beyond any doubt that it was injunctions like those sought here that Madison and his collaborators intended to outlaw in this Nation for all time.

The word “security” is a broad, vague generality whose contours should not be invoked to abrogate the fundamental law embodied in the First Amendment. The guarding of military and diplomatic'secrets at the expense of informed representative government provides no real security for our Republic. The Framers of the First Amendment, fully aware of both the need to defend a new nation and the abuses of the English and Colonial governments, sought to give this new society strength and security by providing that freedom of speech, press, religion, and assembly should not be abridged. This thought was eloquently expressed in 1937 by Mr. Chief Justice Hughes — great man and great Chief Justice that he was — when-the Court held a man could not be punished for attending a meeting run by Communists.

“The greater the importance of safeguarding the community from incitements to the overthrow of our institutions by force and violence, the more imperative is the need to preserve inviolate the constitutional rights of free speech, free press and free *720assembly in order to maintain the opportunity for free political discussion, to the end that government may be responsive to the will of the people and that changes, if desired, may be obtained by peaceful means.- Therein lies the security of the Republic, . the very foundation of constitutional government.” 6

Me. Justice Douglas,

concurring.

While I join the opinion of the Court I believe it necessary to express my views more fully.

It should be noted at the outset that the First Amendment provides that “Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.” That leaves, in my view, no room for governmental restraint on the press.1

There is, moreover, no statute barring the publication by the press of the material which the Times and the Post seek to use. Title 18 U. S. C. § 793 (e) provides that “[wjhoever having unauthorized possession of, access to, or control over any document, writing ... or information relating to the national defense which information the possessor has reason to believe could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation, willfully communicates . . . the same to any person not entitled to receive it.. . . [s] hall be fined *721not more than $10,000 or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both.”

The Government suggests that the word “communicates” is broad enough to encompass publication.

There are eight sections in the chapter on espionage, and censorship, §§ 792-799. In three of those eight “publish” is specifically mentioned: § 794 (b) applies to “Whoever, in time of war, with intent that the same shall be communicated to the enemy, collects, records, publishes, or communicates . . . [the disposition of armed forces].”

Section 797 applies to whoever “reproduces, publishes, sells, or gives away” photographs of defense installations.

Section 798 relating to cryptography applies to whoever: “communicates, furnishes, transmits, or otherwise makes available ... or publishes” the described material.2 (Emphasis added.).

Thus it is apparent that Congress was capable of and did distinguish between publishing and communication in the various sections of the Espionage Act.

The other evidence that § 793 does not apply to the press is a rejected version of § 793. That version read: “During any national emergency resulting from a war to which the United States is a party, or from threat of such a war, the President may, by proclamation, declare the existence of such emergency and, by proclamation, prohibit the publishing or communicating of, or the attempting to publish or communicate any information relating to the national defense which, in his 'judgment, is of such character that it is or might be useful to the *722enemy.” 55 Cong. Rec. 1763. During the debates in the Senate the First Amendment was specifically cited and that provision was defeated. 55 Cong. Rec. 2167.

Judge Gurfein’s holding in the Times case that this Act does not apply to this case was therefore preeminently sound. Moreover, the Act of September 23, 1950, in amending 18 U. S. C. § 793 states in § 1 (b) that:

“Nothing in this Act shall be construed to authorize, require, or establish military or civilian censorship or in any way to limit or infringe upon freedom of the press or of speech as guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States and no regulation shall be promulgated hereunder having that effect.” 64 Stat. 987.

Thus Congress has been faithful to the command of the First Amendment in this area.

So any power that the Government possesses must come from its “inherent power.”

The power to wage war is “the power to wage war successfully.” See Hirabayashi v. United States, 320 U. S. 81, 93. But the war power stems from a declaration of war. The Constitution by Art. I, § 8, gives Congress, not the President, power “[t]o declare War.” Nowhere are presidential wars authorized. We need not decide therefore what leveling effect the war power of Congress might have.

These disclosures3 may have a serious impact. But that is no basis for sanctioning a previous restraint on *723the press. As stated by Chief. Justice Hughes in Near v. Minnesota, 283 U. S. 697, 719-720:

“While reckless assaults upon public men, and efforts to bring obloquy upon those who are endeavoring faithfully to discharge official duties, exert a baleful influence and deserve the severest condemnation in public opinion, it cannot be said that this abuse is greater, and it is believed to be less, than that which characterized the period in which our institutions took shape. Meanwhile, the administration of government has become more complex, the opportunities for malfeasance and corruption have multiplied, crime has grown to most serious proportions, and the danger of its protection by unfaithful officials and of the impairment of the fundamental security of life and property by criminal alliances and official neglect, emphasizes the primary need of a vigilant and courageous press, especially in great.cities. The. fact that the liberty of the press may be abused by miscreant purveyors of scandal does not make any the léss necessary the immunity of the press from previous restraint in dealing with official misconduct.”

As we stated only the other day in Organization for a Better Austin v. Keefe, 402 U. S. 415, 419, “[a]ny prior restraint on expression comes to this Court with a ‘heavy presumption’ against its constitutional validity.”

The Government says that it has -inherent powers to go into court and obtain an injunction to protect the national interest, which in this case is alleged to be national security.

Near v. Minnesota, 283 U. S. 697, repudiated that expansive doctrine in no uncertain terms.

-The dominant purpose of the First Amendment was to prohibit the widespread practice of governmental sup*724pression of embarrassing information. It is common knowledge that the First Amendment was adopted against the widespread use of the common law of seditious libel to-punish the dissemination of material that is embarrassing to the powers-that-be. See T. Emerson, The System. of Freedom of Expression, c. V (1970); Z. Chafee, Free Speech in the United States, c. XIII (1941). The present cases will, I think, go down in history as the most dramatic illustration of that, principle. A debate of large proportions goes on in the Nation over our posture in Vietnam. That debate antedated the disclosure of the contents of the present documents. The latter are highly relevant to the debate in progress.

Secrecy in government is fundamentally anti-democratic, perpetuating bureaucratic errors. Open debate and discussion of public issues are vital to our national health. On public .questions there should be “uninhibited, robust, and wide-open” debate. New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254, 269-270.

I would affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals in the Post .case, vacate the stay of the Court of Appeals in the Times case and direct that it affirm the District Court.

The stays in these cases that have been in effect for more than a week constitute a flouting of the principles of the First Amendment as interpreted in Near vMinnesota.

Me. Justice Brennan,

concurring.

I

I write separately in these cases only to emphasize what should be apparent: that our judgments in the pres- . ent cases may not be taken to indicate the propriety, in the future, of issuing temporary stays and restraining *725orders to block the publication of material sought to be suppressed by the Government. So far as I can determine, never before has the United States sought to enjoin a newspaper from publishing information in its possession. The relative novelty of the questions presented, the necessary haste with which decisions were reached, the magnitude of the interests asserted, and the fact that all the parties have concentrated their arguments upon the question whether permanent restraints were proper may have justified at least some of the restraints heretofore imposed in these cases. Certainly it is difficult to fault the several courts below for seeking to assure that the issues here involved were preserved for ultimate review by this Court. But even if it be assumed that some of the interim restraints were proper in the two cases before us, that assumption has ho bearing upon the propriety of similar judicial action in the future. To begin with, there has now been ample time for reflection and judgment; whatever values there may be in the preservation of novel questions for appellate review may not support any restraints in the future.. More important, the First Amendment stands as an absolute bar to the imposition of judicial restraints in circumstances of the kind presented by these cases.

II

The error that has pervaded these cases from the outset was the granting of any injunctive relief whatsoever, interim or otherwise. The entire thrust of the Government’s claim throughout these cases has been that publication of the material sought to be enjoined “could,” or “might,” or “may” prejudice the national interest in various ways. But the First Amendment tolerates absolutely no prior judicial restraints of the press predicated upon surmise or conjecture that untoward consequences *726may result.* Our cases, it is true, have indicated that there is a single, extremely narrow class of cases in which the First Amendment's ban on prior judicial restraint may be overridden. Our cases have thus far indicated that such cases may arise only when the Nation “is at war,” Schenck v. United States, 249 U. S. 47, 52 (1919), during which times “[n]o one would question but that a government might prevent actual obstruction to its recruiting service or the publication of the sailing dates of transports or the number and location of troops.” Near v. Minnesota, 283 U. S. 697, 716 (1931). Even if the present world situation were assumed to be tantamount to a time of war, or if the power of presently available armaments would justify even in peacetime the suppression of information that would set in motion a nuclear holocaust, in neither of these actions has the Government presented or even alleged that publication of items from or based upon the material at issue would cause the happening of an event of that nature. “[T]he chief purpose of [the First Amendment’s] guaranty [is] to prevent previous restraints, upon publication.” Near v. Minnesota, supra, at 713. Thus, only governmental allegation and proof that publication must inevitably, di*727rectly, and immediately cause the occurrence of an event kindred to imperiling the safety of a transport already at sea can support even the issuance of an interim restraining order. In no event may mere conclusions be sufficient: for if the Executive Branch seeks judicial aid in preventing publication, it must inevitably submit the basis upon which that aid is sought to scrutiny by the judiciary. And therefore, every restraint issued in this case, whatever its form, has violated the First Amendment — and not less so because that restraint was justified as necessary to afford the courts an opportunity to examine the claim more thoroughly. Unless and until the Government has clearly made out its case, the First Amendment commands that no injunction may issue.

Mr. Justice Stewart,

concurring.

In the governmental structure created by our Constitution, the Executive is endowed with enormous power in the two related areas of national defense and international relations. This power, largely unchecked by the Legislative1 and Judicial2 branches, has been pressed to the very hilt since the advent of the nuclear missile age. For better or for worse, the simple fact is that a *728President of the United States possesses vastly greater constitutional independence in these two vital areas of power than does, say, a prime minister of a country with a parliamentary form of government.

In' the absence of the governmental checks and balances present in other areas of our national life, the only effective restraint upon executive policy and power in the areas of national defense and international affairs may lie in an enlightened citizenry — in an informed arid critical public opinion which alone can here protect the values of democratic government. For this reason, it is perhaps here that a press that is alert, aware, and free most vitally serves the basic purpose of the First Amendment. For without an informed and free press there cannot be an enlightened people. ~

Yet it .is elementary that the successful conduct of international diplomacy and the maintenance of an effective national defense require both confidentiality and secrecy. Other nations can hardly deal with this Nation in an atmosphere of mutual trust unless they can be assured that their confidences will be kept. And within our own executive departments, the development of cori-sidered and intelligent international policies would be impossible if those charged with their formulation could not communicate with each other freely, frankly, and in confidence. In the area of basic national defense the frequent need for absolute secrecy is, of course, self-evident.

I think there can be but one answer to this dilemma, if dilemma it be. The responsibility must be where the power is.3 If the Constitution gives the Executive *729a large degree of unshared power in. the conduct of foreign affairs and the maintenance of our national defense, then under the Constitution the Executive must have the largely unshared duty to determine and preserve the degree of internal security necessary to exercise that power successfully. It is an awesome responsibility, requiring judgment and wisdom of a high order. I should suppose that moral, political, and practical considerations would dictate that a very first principle of that wisdom would be an insistence upon avoiding secrecy for its own sake. For when everything is classified, then nothing is classified, and the system becomes one to be disregarded by the cynical or the careless, and to be manipulated by those intent on self-protection or self-promotion. I should suppose, in short, that the hallmark of a truly effective internal security system would be the maximum possible disclosure, recognizing that secrecy can best be preserved only when credibility is truly maintained. But be that as it may, it is dear to me that it is the constitutional duty of the Executive— as a matter of sovereign prerogative and not as a matter of law as the courts know law — through the promulgation and enforcement of executive regulations, to protect *730the confidentiality necessary to carry out .its responsibilities in the fields of international relations and national defense.

This is not to say that Congress and the courts have no role to play. Undoubtedly Congress has the power to enact specific and appropriate criminal laws to protect government property and preserve government secrets. Congress has passed such laws, and several of them are of very colorable relevance to the apparent circumstances of these cases. And if a criminal prosecution is instituted, it will be the responsibility of the courts to decide the applicability of the criminal law under which the charge, is brought. Moreover, if Congress should pass a specific law authorizing civil proceedings in this field, the courts would likewise have the duty to decide the constitutionality of such a law as well as its applicability to the facts proved.

But in the cases before us we are asked neither to construe specific regulations nor to apply specific laws. We are asked, instead, to perform a function that the Constitution gave to the Executive; not the Judiciary. We are asked, quite simply, to prevent the publication by two newspapers of material that the Executive Branch insists should not, in the national interest, be published. I am convinced that the Executive is correct with respect to some of the documents involved. But:I cannot say that disclosure of any of them will surely result in direct, immediate, and irreparable damage to our Nation or its people. That being so, there can under the First Amendment be but one judicial resolution of the issues before us. I join the judgments of the Court.

Mr. Justice White,

concurring.

I concur in today’s judgments, but only because of the coneededly extraordinary protection against prior re*731straints enjoyed by the press under our constitutional system. I do not say that in no circumstances would the First Amendment permit an injunction against publishing information about government plans- or operations.1 Nor, after examining the materials the C overnment characterizes as the most sensitive and destructive, can I deny that revelation of these documents will do substantial damage to public. interests. Indeed, I am confident that their disclosure will have that result. . But I nevertheless agree that the United States has not satisfied the very heavy burden that it must meet to warrant an injunction against publication in these cases, at least in the absence of express and appropriately limited congressional authorization for prior restraints in circumstances such as these.

*732The Government’s position is simply stated: The responsibility of the Executive for the conduct of the foreign affairs and. for the security of the Nation is so basic that the President is entitled to an injunction against publication of a newspaper story whenever he can convince a court that the information to be revealed threatens “grave and irreparable” injury to the public interest;2 and the injunction should issue whether or not the material to be published is classified, whether. or not publication would be lawful under relevant criminal statutes enacted by Congress, and regardless of the circumstances by which the newspaper came into possession of the information.

At least in the absence of legislation by Congress, based on its own investigations and findings, I am quite unable to agree that the jnhgrent powers of the Executive and-, the courts reach so far as tp_-autherize^remediesjiaying such sweeping potential for inhibiting publications by the _pressv Much of the difficulty inheresln the^grave-abxf irreparable danger” standard suggested by the United States. If the United States were to have judgment under such a standard in these cases, our decision would be of little guidance to other courts in other cases, for the material at issue here would not be available from the Court’s opinion or from public records, nor would it be published by the press. Indeed, even today where we hold that the United- States has not met its burden, the material remains sealed in court records and it is *733properly not discussed in today’s opinions. Moreover, because the material poses substantial dangers to national interests and because of the hazards of criminal sanctions, a responsible press may choose never to publish the more sensitive materials. To sustain the Government in these cases would start the courts down a long and hazardous road that I am not willing to travel, at least without congressional guidance and direction.

It is not easy to reject the proposition urged by the United States and to deny relief on its good-faith claims in these cases that publication will work serious damage to the country. But that discomfiture is considerably dispelled by the infrequency of prior-restraint cases. Normally, publication will occur and the damage be done before the Government has either opportunity or grounds for suppression. ' So here, publication has already begun and a substantial part of the threatened damage has already occurred. The fact of a massive breakdown in security is known, access to the documents by many unauthorized people is undeniable, and the efficacy of equitable relief against these or other newspapers to avert anticipated damage is doubtful at best.

What is more, terminating the ban on publication of the relatively few sensitive documents the Government now seeks to suppress does not mean that the law either requires or invites newspapers or others to publish them or that they will be immune from criminal action if they do. Prior restraints require an unusually heavy justification under the First Amendment; but failure'by the Government to justify prior restraints does not measure its constitutional entitlement to a conviction for criminal publication. ' That the Government mistakenly chose to proceed by injunction does not mean that it could not successfully proceed in another way.

When the Espionage Act was under consideration in *7341917, Congress eliminated from the bill a provision that would have given the President broad powers in time of war to proscribe, under, threat of criminal penalty, the publication of various categories of information related to the national defense.3 Congress at that time was unwilling to clothe the President with such far-reaching powers to monitor the press, and those opposed to this paft of the legislation assumed that a necessary concomitant of such power was the power to “filter out the .news to the people through some man.” 55 Cong. Rec. 2008 (remarks of Sen. Ashurst). However, these same members of Congress appeared to have little doubt that newspapers would be subject to criminal prosecution if they insisted on publishing information of the type Congress had itself determined should not be revealed. Senator Ashurst, for example, was quite sure that, the editor of such a newspaper “should be punished if he did publish information as to the movements of the fleet, the • troops, the aircraft, the location of powder factories, the location of defense works, and all that sort of thing.” Id., at 2009.4

*735The Criminal Code contains numerous provisions potentially relevant to these cases. Section 7975 makes it a crime to publish certain photographs or drawings of military installations. Section 798,6 also in precise language, proscribes knowing and willful publication of any classified information concerning the cryptographic sys-*736terns or communication intelligence activities of the United States as well as any information obtained from communication intelligence operations.7 If any of the material here at issue is of this nature, the newspapers are presumably now on full notice of the position of the United States and must face the consequences if they *737publish. I would have no difficulty in sustaining convictions under these sections on facts that would not justify the intervention of equity and the imposition of a prior restraint.

The same would be true under those sections of the Criminal Code casting a wider net to protect the national defense. Section 793 (e) 8 makes it a criminal act for any unauthorized possessor of a document “relating to the national defense” either (1) willfully to communicate or cause to be communicated that document to any person not entitled to receive it or (2) willfully to retain the document and fail to deliver it to an officer of the United States entitled to receive it. The subsection was added in 1950 because pre-existing law provided no *738penalty for the unauthorized possessor unless demand ' for the documents was made.9 “The dangers surrounding the unauthorized possession of such items are self-*739evident, and it is deemed advisable to require their surrender in such, a case, regardless of demand, especially since their unauthorized possession may be unknown to the authorities who would otherwise make the demand.” S. Rep. No. 2369, pt. 1, 81st Cong., 2d Sess., 9 (1950). Of course, in the cases before us, the unpublished documents, have been demanded by the United States and their import has been made known at least to counsel for the newspapers involved. In Gorin v. United States, 312 U. S. 19, 28 (1941), the words “national defense” as used in a predecessor of § 793 were held by a unanimous Court to have “a well understood connotation”— a “generic concept of broad connotations, referring to the military and naval establishments and, the related activities' of national preparedness” — and to be “sufficiently definite to apprise the public of prohibited activi- *740- ties” and to be consonant with due process. 312 U. S., at 28. Also, as construed by the Court in Gorin, information “connected with the national defense” is obviously not limited to that threatening “grave and irreparable” injury to the United States.10

It is thus clear that Congress has addressed itself to the problems of protecting the security of the country and the national defense from unauthorized disclosure of potentially damaging information. Cf. YoungstowSheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U. S. 579, 585-586 (1952); see also id., at 593-628 (Frankfurter, J., concurring). It has not, however, authorized the injunc-tive remedy against threatened publication. It has apparently been satisfied to rely on criminal sanctions and their deterrent effect on the responsible as well as the irresponsible press. I am not, of course, saying that either of these newspapers has yet committed a crime or that either would commit a crime if it published all the material now in its possession. That matter must await resolution in the context of a criminal proceeding if one is instituted by the United States. In that event, the issue of guilt or innocence would be determined by procedures and standards quite different from those that have purported to govern these injunc-tive proceedings.

Me. Justice Marshall,

concurring.

The Government contends that the only- issue in these cases is whether in a suit by the United States, “the First Amendment bars a court from prohibiting a news*741paper from publishing material whose disclosure would pose a ‘grave and immediate danger to the security of the United States.’ ” Brief for the United States 7. With all due respect, I believe the ultimate issue in these cases is even more basic than the one posed by the Solicitor General. The issue is whether this Court or the Congress has the power to make law.

In these cases there is no problem concerning the President’s power to classify information as “secret” or “top secret.” Congress has specifically recognized Presidential authority, which has been formally exercised in Exec. Order 10501 (1953), to classify documents and information. See, e. g., 18 U. S. C. § 798 ; 50 U. S. C. § 783.1 Nor is there any issue here regarding the President’s power as Chief Executive and Commander in Chief to protect national security by disciplining employees who disclose information and by taking precautions to prevent leaks.

The problem here is whether in these particular cases the Executive Branch has authority to invoke the equity jurisdiction of the courts to protect what it believes to be the national interest. See In re Debs, 158 U. S. 564, 584 (1895). The Government argues that in addition to the inherent power of any government to protect itself, the President’s power to conduct foreign affairs and his position as Commander in Chief give him authority to impose censorship on the press to protect his ability to deal effectively with foreign nations and to conduct the military affairs of the country. Qf course, it is beyond cavil that the President has broad powers by virtue of his primary responsibility for the' conduct of our foreign affairs and his position as Commander in Chief. Chicago & Southern Air Lines v. Waterman S. S. Corp., 333 U. S. 103 (1948); Hirabayashi v. United States, 320 U. S. 81, 93 (1943); United States v. Curtiss-*742Wright Corp., 299 U. S. 304 (1936).2 And in some situations it may be that under whatever inherent powers the Government may have, as well as the implicit authority derived from the President’s mandate to conduct foreign affairs and to act as Commander in Chief, there is a basis for the invocation of the equity jurisdiction of this Court as an aid to prevent the publication of material damaging to “national security,” hówever that term may be defined.

It would, however, be utterly inconsistent with the concept of separation of powers for this Court to use its power of contempt to prevent behavior that Congress has specifically declined to prohibit. There would be a similar damage to the basic concept of these co-equal branches of Government if when the Executive Branch has adequate authority granted by Congress to protect “national security” it can choose instead to invoke the contempt power of a court to enjoin the threatened conduct: The Constitution provides that Congress shall make laws, the President execute laws, and courts interpret laws. Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U. S. 579 (1952). It did not provide for government by injunction in which the courts and the Executive Branch can “make law” without regard to the action of Congress. It may be more convenient for the Executive Branch if it need only convince a judge to prohibit conduct rather than ask the Congress to pass a law, and it may be more convenient to enforce a contempt order than to seek a criminal conviction in a jury trial. Moreover, it may be considered politically wise to get a court to share the responsibility for arresting those who the Executive Branch has probable cause to believe are violating the law. But convenience and political considerations of the *743moment do not justify a basic departure from the principles of our'system of government.

In these cases we are not faced with a situation where Congress has failed to provide the Executive with broad power to protect the Nation from disclosure of damaging state secrets.. Congress has on. several occasions given extensive consideration to the problem of protecting the military and strategic secrets of the United States. This consideration has resulted in the enactment of statutes making it a crime to receive, disclose, communicate, withhold, and publish certain documents, photographs, instruments, appliances, and information. The bulk of these statutes is found in chapter 37 of U. S. C., Title 18, entitled Espionage and Censorship.3 In that chapter, *744Congress has provided penalties ranging from a $10,000 fine to death for violating the various statutes.

Thus it would seem that in order for this Court to issue an injunction it would require a showing that such an injunction would enhance the already existing power of the Government to act. See Bennett v. Laman, 277 N. Y. 368, 14 N. E. 2d 439 (1938). It is a traditional axiom of equity that a court of equity will not do a useless thing just as it is a traditional axiom that equity will not enjoin the commission of a crime. See Z. Chafee & E. Re, Equity 935-954 (5th ed. 1967); 1 H. Joyce, Injunctions §§ 58-60a (1909). Here there has been no attempt to make such a showing. The Solicitor General does not even mention in his brief whether the Government considers that there is probable cause to believe a crime has been committed or whether there is á conspiracy to commit future crimes.

If the Government had attempted to show that there was no effective remedy under traditional criminal law, it would have had to show that there is no arguably applicable statute. Of course, at this stage this Court could not and cannot determine whether there has been a violation of a particular statute, or decide the constitutionality of any statute. Whether a good-faith prosecution could have been instituted under any statute could, however, be determined.

*745At least one of the many statutes in this area seems relevant to these cases. Congress has provided in 18 U. S. C. § 793 (e) that whoever “having unauthorized possession of, access to, or control over any document, writing, code book, signal book ... or note relating to the national defense, or information relating to the national defense which information the possessor has reason to believe could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation, willfully communicates, delivers, transmits ... the same to any person not entitled to receive it, or willfully retains the same and fails to deliver it to the officer or employee of the United States-entitled to receive it . . . [s]hall be fined not more than $10,000 or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both.” Congress has also made it a crime to conspire to commit any of the offenses listed in 18 U. S. C. § 793 (e).

It is true that Judge Curfein found that Congress had not made it a crime to publish the items and material specified in § 793 (e). He found that the words “communicates, delivers, transmits . . .” did not refer to' publication of newspaper stories. And that view has some support in the legislative history and conforms with the past practice of using the statute only to prosecute those charged with ordinary espionage. . But see 103 Cong. Rec. 10449 (remarks of Sen. Humphrey). Judge Gur-fein’s view of the statute is not, however, the only plausible construction that could be given. See my Brother White’s concurring opinion.

Even if it is determined that the Government could not in good faith bring criminal prosecutions against the New York Tillies and the Washington Post, it is clear that Congress has specifically rejected passing legislation that would have clearly given the President the power he seeks here and made the current activity of the newspapers unlawful. When Congress specifically declines to make conduct unlawful it is not for this Court *746to redecide those issues — to overrule Congress. See Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U. S. 579 (1952).

On at least two occasions Congress has refused to enact legislation that would have made the conduct engaged in here unlawful and given the President the power that he seeks in this case. In 1917 during the debate over the original Espionage Act, still the basic provisions of § 793, Congress rejected a proposal to give the President in time of war or threat of war authority to directly prohibit by proclamation the publication of information relating to national defense that might be useful to the enemy. The proposal provided that:

“During any national emergency resulting from a war to which the United States is a party, or from threat of such a war, the President may, by proclamation, declare the existence of such emergency and, by proclamation, prohibit the publishing or communicating of, or the attempting to publish or communicate any information relating to the national defense which, in his judgment, is of such character that it is or might be useful to the enemy. Whoever violates any such prohibition shall be punished by a fine of not more than $10,000 or by imprisonment for not more than 10 years, or both: Provided, That nothing in this section shall be construed to limit or restrict any discussion, comment, or criticism of the acts or policies of the Government or its representatives or the publication of the same.” 55 Cong. Rec. 1763.

Congress rejected this proposal after war against Germany had been declared even though many believed that there was a grave national emergency and that the threat of security leaks and espionage was serious. The Executive Branch has not gone to Congress and requested that the decision to provide such power be reconsidered. In*747stead, the Executive Braiich comes to this Court and asks that it be granted the power Congress refused to give.

In Í957 the United States Commission on Government Security found that “[ajirplane journals, scientific periodicals, and even the daily newspaper have featured articles containing information and other data which should have been deleted in whole or in part for security reasons.” In response to this problém the Commission proposed that “Congress enact legislation making it-a crime for any person willfully to disclose without proper authorization, for any purpose whatever, information classified ‘secret’ or ‘top secret,’ knowing, or having reasonable grounds to believe, such information to have been so classified.” Report of Commission on Government Security 619-620 (1957). After substantial floor discussion on the proposal, it was rejected. See 103 Cong. Rec. 10447-10450. If the proposal that Sen. Cotton championed on the floor had been enacted, the publicar tion of the documents involved here would certainly have been a crime. Congress refused, however, to make it a crime. The Government is here asking this Court to remake that decision. This Court has no such power.

Either the Government has the power under statutory grant to use traditional criminal law to protect the country or, if there is no basis for arguing that Congress has made the activity a crime, it is plain that Congress has specifically refused to grant the authority the Government seeks from this Court. In either case this Court does not have authority to grant the requested relief. It is not for this Court to fling itself into every breach perceived by some Government official nor is it for this Court to take on itself the burden of enacting law, especially a law that Congress has refused to pass.

I believe that the judgment of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit should *748be affirmed and the judgmen> of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit should be reversed insofar as it remands the case for further hearings.

Mr. Chief Justice Burger,

dissenting.

So clear are the constitutional limitations on prior restraint against expression, that from the time of Near v. Minnesota, 283 U. S. 697 (1931), until recently in Organization for a Better Austin v. Keefe, 402 U. S. 415 (1971), we have had little occasion to be concerned with cases involving prior restraints against news reporting on matters of public interest. There is, therefore, little variation among the members of the Court in terms of resistance to prior restraints against publication. Adherence to this basic -constitutional principle, however, does not make these cases simple. In these cases, the' imperative of a free and unfettered press comes into collision with another imperative, the effective functioning of a complex modern government and specifically the effective exercise of certain constitutional powers of the Executive. Only those who view the First Amendment as an absolute in all circumstances — a view I respect, but reject — can find such cases as these to be simple or easy.

These cases are not simple for another and more immediate reason. We do not know the facts of the cases. No District Judge knew all the facts. No Court of Appeals judge knew all the facts. No member of this Court knows all the facts.

Why are we in this posture, in which only those judges to whom the First Amendment is absolute and permits of no restraint in any circumstances or for any reason, are really in a position to act?

I suggest we are in this posture because these cases have been conducted in unseemly haste. Mr. Justice Harlan covers the chronology of events demonstrating the hectic pressures under which these cases have been processed and I need not restate them. The prompt *749setting of these cases reflects our universal abhorrence of prior restraint. But prompt judicial action does not mean unjudicial haste.

Here, moreover, the frenetic haste is due in large part to the manner in which the Times proceeded from the date it obtained the purloined documents. It seems reasonably clear now that the haste precluded reasonable and deliberate judicial treatment of these cases and was not warranted. The precipitate action of this Court aborting trials not yet completed is not the kind of judicial conduct that’ ought to attend the disposition of a great issue.

The newspapers make a derivative claim under the First Amendment; they denominate this right as the pubiic “right to know”; by implication, the Times asserts a sole trusteeship of that right by virtue of its journalistic “scoop.” The right is asserted as an absolute. Of course, the First Amendment right itself is not an absolute, as Justice Holmes so long ago pointed out in his aphorism concerning the right to shout “fire” in a crowded theater if there was no fire. There are other exceptions, some of which Chief Justice Hughes mentioned by way of example in Near v. Minnesota. There are no doubt other exceptions no one has had occasion to describe or discuss. Conceivably such exceptions may be lurking in these cases and would have been flushed had they been properly considered in the trial courts, free from unwarranted deadlines and frenetic pressures. An issue of this importance should be tried and heard in a judicial atmosphere conducive , to thoughtful, reflective deliberation, especially when haste, in terms of hours, is unwarranted in light of the long period the Times, by its own choice, deferred publication.1

*750It is not- disputed that the Times has had unauthorized possession of the documents for three to four months, during which it has had its expert analysts studying them, presumably digesting them and preparing the material for publication. During all of this time, the Times, presumably in its capacity as- trustee of the public’s “right to know,” has held up publication for purposes it considered proper and thus public knowledge was delayed. No doubt this was for a good reason; thé analysis of 7,000 pages of complex material drawn from a vastly greater volume of material would inevitably take time and the writing of good news stories takes time. But why should the United States Government, from whom this information was illegally acquired by someone, along with all the counsel, trial judges, and appellate judges be placed under needless pressure? After these months of deferral, the alleged “right to know” has somehow and suddenly become a right that must be vindicated instanter.

Would it have been unreasonable, since the newspaper could anticipate the Government’s objections to release of secret material, to give the Government an opportunity to review the entire collection and determine whether agreement could be reached on publication? Stolen or not, if security was not in fact jeopardized, much of the material could no doubt have been declassified, since it spans a period ending in 1968. With such an approach— one that great newspapers have in the past practiced and stated editorially to be the duty of an honorable press— the newspapers and Government might well have nar-

*753real importance in shaping the law of the future, but because of some accident of immediate overwhelming interest which appeals to the feelings and distorts the judgment. These immediate interests exercise a kind of hydraulic pressure which makes what previously was clear seem doubtful, and before which even well settled principles of law will bend.”

With all respect, I consider that the Court has been .almost irresponsibly feverish in dealing with these cases.

Both the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit rendered judgment on June 23. The New York Times’ petition for certiorari, its motion for accelerated consideration thereof, and its application for interim relief were filed in this Court on June 24 at about 11 a. m. The application of the United States for interim relief in the Post case was also filed here on June 24 at about 7:15 p. m. This Court’s order setting a hearing before us on June 26 at 11 a. m., a course which I joined only to avoid the possibility of even more peremptory action by the Coürt, was issued less than 24 hours before. The record in th.e Post case was filed with the Clerk shortly before 1 p. m. on Juné 25; the record in the Times case did not arrive until 7 or 8 o’clock that same night. The briefs of the parties were received less than two hours before argument on June 26.

This frenzied train of events took place in the name of the presumption against prior restraints created by the First Amendment. Due regard for the extraordinarily important and difficult questions involved in. these litigations should have led the' Court to shun such a precipitate timetable. In order to decide the merits of these cases properly, some or all of the following questions should have been faced:

1. Whether the Attorney General is authorized to bring these suits in the name of the United States. Com*754pare In re Debs, 158 U. S. 564 (1895), with Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U. S. 579 (1952). This question involves as well the construction and validity of a singularly opaque statute — the Espionage Act, 18 U. S. C. § 793 (e).

2. Whether the First Amendment permits the federal courts to enjoin publication of stories which would present a serious threat to national security. See Near v. Minnesota, 283 U. S. 697, 716 (1931) (dictum).

3. Whether the threat to publish highly secret documents is of itself a sufficient implication of national security to justify an injunction on the theory that regardless of the contents of the documents harm enough results simply from the demonstration of such a breach of secrecy.

4. Whether the unauthorized disclosure of any of these particular documents would seriously impair the national security.

5. What weight should be given to the opinion of high officers in the Executive Branch of the Government with respect to questions 3 and 4.

6. .Whether the newspapers are entitled to retain and use the documents notwithstanding the seemingly uncontested facts that the documents, or the originals of which they are duplicates, were purloined from the Government’s possession and that the newspapers'received them with knowledge that they had been feloniously acquired. Cf. Liberty Lobby, Inc. v. Pearson, 129 U. S. App. D. C. 74, 390 F. 2d 489 (1967, amended 1968).

7. Whether the threatened harm to the national security or the Government’s, possessory interest in the documents t justifies the issuance of an injunction against publication in light of—

a. The strong First Amendment policy against prior restraints on publication;

*755b. The doctrine against enjoining conduct in.violation of criminal statutes; and

c. The extent to which the materials at issue have apparently already been otherwise disseminated.

These are difficult questions of fact, of law, and of judgment; the potential consequences of erroneous decision are enormous. The time which has been available to us, to the lower courts,* and to the parties has been wholly inadequate for giving these cases the kind of consideration they deserve. It is a reflection on the stability of the judicial, process that these, great issues— as. important as any that have arisen during my time on the Court — should have been decided under the pressures engendered by the torrent of publicity that has attended these litigations from their inception.

Forced as I am to reach the merits of these cases, I dissent from the opinion and judgments of the Court. Within the severe limitations imposed by the tiftie- constraints under which I have been required to operate, I can only state my reasons in telescoped form, even though in different circumstances I would have felt .constrained to deal with the cases in the. fuller sweep indicated above.

It is a sufficient basis for affirming the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in the Times litigation to observe that its order must rest on the conclusion that because of the time elements the Government had not been given an adequate opportunity to present its case *756to the District Court. At the least this conclusion was not an abuse of. discretion.

In the Post litigation the Government had more time to prepare; this was apparently the basis for the refusal of the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on rehearing to conform its judgment to that of the Second Circuit. But I think there is another and more fundamental reason why this judgment cannot stand — a reason which also furnishes an additional ground for not reinstating the judgment of the District Court in the Times litigation, set aside by the Court of Appeals. It is plain to me that the scope of the judicial function in passing upon the activities of the Executive Branch of the Government in the field of foreign affairs is very narrowly restricted. This view is, I think, dictated by the concept of separation of powers upon which our constitutional system rests.

In a speech on the floor of the House of Representa-tiyes, Chief Justice John Marshall, then a member of that body, stated:

“The President is the sole organ of the nation in its external relations, and its sole representative with foreign nations.” 10 Annals of Cong. 613 (1800)..

Erom that time, shortly after the founding of the Nation, to this, there has been no substantial challenge to this description of the scope of executive power. See United States v. Curtiss-Wright Corp., 299 U. S. 304, 319-321 (1936), collecting authorities.

Prom this constitutional primacy in the field of foreign affairs, it seems to me that certain conclusions necessarily follow. Some of these were stated concisely by . President Washington, declining the request of the House of Representatives for the papers leading up to the negotiation of the .Jay Treaty:

“The nature of foreign negotiations requires caution, and their success must often depend on secrecy; *757and even when brought to a conclusion a full disclosure of all the measures, demands, or eventual concessions which may have been proposed or con-, templated would be extremely impolitic; for this might have a pernicious influence on future negotiations, or produce immediate ' inconveniences, perhaps danger and mischief, in .relation to other powers.” 1 J. Richardson, Messages and Papers of the Presidents 194-195 (1896).

The power to evaluate the “pernicious influence” of premature disclosure is not, however, lodged in . the Executive alone. I agree that, in performance of its duty to protect the values of the First Amendment against political pressures, the judiciary must review the initial Executive determination to the point of satisfying itself that the subject matter of the dispute does lie within the proper compass of the President’s foreign relations power. Constitutional considerations forbid “a complete abandonment of judicial control.” Cf. United States v. Reynolds, 345 U. S. 1, 8 (1953). Moreover, the judiciary may properly insist that the determination that disclosure of the subject matter would irreparably impair the national security be made by the head of' the Executive Department concerned — here the Secretary of State, or the Secretary of Defense — after actual personal consideration by that officer. This safeguard is required in the analogous area of executive claims of privilege for secrets of state. See id., at 8 and n. 20; Duncan v. Cammell, Laird & Co., [1942] A. C. 624, 638 (House of Lords).

But in my judgment the judiciary may not properly go beyond these two inquiries and redetermine for itself the probable impact of disclosure on the national security.

“[T]he véry nature of executive decisions as to foreign policy is political, not judicial. Such de*758cisions are wholly confided by our Constitution to the political departments of the' government, Executive and Legislative. They are delicate, complex, and involve, large elements of prophecy. They are and should be undertaken only by those directly responsible to the people whose welfare they advance or imperil. They are decisions of a kind for which the Judiciary has neither aptitude, facilities nor responsibility and which has long been held to belong in the domain of political power not subject to judicial intrusion or inquiry.” Chicago & Southern Air Lines v. Waterman Steamship Corp., 333 U. S. 103, 111 (1948) (Jackson, J.). -

Even if there is some room for the judiciary to override the executive determination, it is. plain that the scope of review must be exceedingly narrow. I can see no indication in the opinions of either the District Court or the Court of Appeals in the Post litigation that the conclusions of the Executive were given even the deference owing to an administrative agency, much less that owing to a co-equal branch of the Government operating within the field of its constitutional prerogative.

Accordingly, I would vacate the judgment of the Court. of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on this ground and- remand the case for further proceedings in the District Court. Before the commencement of such further proceedings, due opportunity should be afforded the Government for procuring from the Secretary of State or the Secretary of Defense or both an expression of their views .on the issue of national security. The ensuing review by- the District Court should be in accordance with the views expressed in this opinion. And for the reasons stated above I would affirm the judgment of the Couri of Appeals for the Second Circuit.

Pending further hearings in each case conducted under the appropriate ground rúles, I would continue the *759restraints on publication. I cannot believe that the doctrine prohibiting prior restraints reaches to the point of preventing courts from maintaining, the status quo long enough to act responsibly in matters of such national importance as those involved here.

Mb. Justice BlackmUn,

dissenting.

I join Mb. Justice Hablan in his dissent. I also am in substantial accord with much that Mb. Justice White says, by way of admonition, in the latter part of his opinion.

At this point the focus is on only the comparatively few documents specified by the Government as critical. So far as the other material — vast in amount — is concerned, let it be published and published forthwith if the newspapers, once the strain is gone and the sensationalism is eased, still feel the urge so to do.

But we are concerned here with the few documents specified from the 47 volumes. Almost 70 years ago Mr. Justice Holmes, dissenting in a celebrated case, observed:

“Great cases like hard cases make bad law. For great cases are called great, not by reason of their real importance in shaping the law of the future, but because of some accident of immediate overwhelming interest which appeals to the feelings and distorts the judgment, These immediate interests exercise a kind of hydraulic pressure . . . .” Northern Securities Co. v. United States, 193 U. S. 197, 400-401 (1904).

The. present cases, if not great, are at least unusual in their posture and implications, and the Holmes observation certainly has pertinent application.

The New York Times clandestinely devoted a period of three months to examining the 47 volumes that came into its unauthorized possession. Once it had begun publi*760cation of material from those volumes, the New York case now before us emerged. It immediately assumed, and ever since has maintained, a frenetic pace and character. Seemingly, once publication started, the material could not be made public fast enough. Seemingly, from then on, every deferral or delay, by restraint or otherwise, was abhorrent and was to be deemed violative of the First Amendment and of the public’s “right immediately to know.” Yet that newspaper stood before us at oral argument and professed criticism of the Government for not lodging its protest earlier than by a Monday telegram following the initial Sunday publication.

The District of Columbia case is much the same.

Two federal district courts, two United States courts of appeals, and this Court — within a period of less than three weeks .from inception until today — have been pressed into hurried decision of profound constitutional issues on inadequately developed and largely assumed facts without the careful deliberation that, one would hope,' should characterize the American judicial process. There has been much writing about the law and little knowledge and less digestion of the facts. In the New York case the judges, both trial and appellate, had not yet examined the basic material when the case was brought here. In the District of Columbia case, little more was done, and what was accomplished in this respect was only on required remand, with the Washington Post, on the excuse that it was trying to protect its source of information, initially refusing to reveal what material it actually possessed, and- with the District Court forced to make assumptions as to that possession.

With such respect as may be due to the contrary view, this, in my opinion, is not the way to try a lawsuit of this magnitude and asserted importance. It is not the way. for federal courts to adjudicate, and to be required to adjudicate, -issues that allegedly concern the Nation’s *761vital welfare. The country would be none the worse off were the cases tried quickly, to be sure, but in the customary and propérly deliberative manner. The most recent of the material, it is said, dates no later than 1968, ..already about three years ago, and the Times itself took three months to formulate its plan of procedure and, thus, , deprived. its public for that period.

The First Amendment, after all, is only one part of an entire. Constitution. Article II of the great document vests in the Executive .Branch primary power over the conduct of foreign affairs and places in that branch the responsibility for the Nation’s safety. Each provisionof the Constitution is important, and I cannot subscribe to a doctrine of unlimited absolutism for the First Amendment at the cost of downgrading .other provisions. First Amendment absolutism has never commanded a majority of this Court. See, for example, Near v. Minnesota, 283 U. S. 697, 708 (1931), and Schenck v. United States, 249 U. S. 47, 52 (1919). What is needed here is a weighing, upon properly developed standards, of the broad right of the press to print and of the very narrow right of the Government to prevent. Such standards are not yet developed. The parties here are in disagreement as to what those standards should be. But even the news-. . papers concede that there are situations where restraint is in order and is constitutional. Mr. Justice Holmes gave us a suggestion when he said in Schenck,

“It is a question of proximity and degree. When a nation is at war many things that might be said in time of peace are such a hindrance to its effort that their utterance will not be endured so long as men fight and that no Court could- regard them as protected by any constitutional right.” 249 U. S., at 52.

I therefore would remand These cases to be developed expeditiously, of course, but on a schedule permitting the *762orderly presentation of evidence from both sides, with the use of discovery, if necessary, as authorized by the rules, and with the preparation of briefs, oral argument, and court opinions of a quality better than has been seen to this point. In making this last statement, I criticize no lawyer or judge. I know from past personal experience the agony of time pressure in .the preparation of litigation. But these cases and. the issues involved and the courts, including this one, deserve better than has been produced thus far.

It may well be that if -these cases were allowed to develop as they should be developed, and to be tried as lawyers should try them and as courts should hear them, free of pressure and panic and sensationalism, other light would be shed on the situation and contrary considerations, for me, might prevail. But that is not the - present posture of the litigation.

The Court, however, decides the cases today the other way. I therefore add one final comment.

I strongly urge, and sincerely hope, that these two newspapers will be fully aware of their ultimate responsibilities to the United States of America. Judge Wilkey, dissenting in the District of Columbia case, after a review of only the affidavits before his court (the basic papers had not then been made available by either party), concluded that there were a number of examples of documents that, if in the possession of the Post, and if pub-' lished, “could clearly result in great, harm to the nation,” and he defined “harm” to mean “the death of soldiers, the destruction of alliances, the greatly increased difficulty of negotiation with our enemies, the inability of our diplomats to negotiate . . . .” I, for. one, have now been able to give at least some cursory study not only to the affidavits, but to the material itself. ' I regret to say that from this examination I fear that Judge Wilkey’s statements have possible foundation.- I,therefore share *763his concern. I hope that damage has not already been done. If, however, damage has been done, and if, with the Court’s action today, these newspapers proceed to publish the critical documents and there results therefrom “the death of soldiers, thé destruction of alliances, the greatly increased difficulty of negotiation with our enemies, the inability of our diplomats to negotiate,” to which list I might add the factors of prolongation of the war and of further delay in the freeing of United States prisoners, then the Nation’s people will know where the responsibility for these sad consequences rests.

Mb. Chief Justice Burger

delivered the opinion of the Court.

The respondent State District Judge entered an order restraining the petitioners from publishing or broadcasting accounts of confessions or admissions made by the accused or facts “strongly implicative” of the accused in a widely reported murder of six persons. We granted cer-tiorari to decide whether the entry of such an order on the showing made before the state court violated the constitutional guarantee of freedom of the press.

*542I

On the evening of October 18, 1975, local police found the six members of the Henry Kellie family murdered in their home in Sutherland, Neb., a town of about 850 people. Police released the description of a suspect, Erwin Charles Simants, to the reporters who had hastened to the scene of the crime. Simants was arrested and arraigned in Lincoln County Court the following morning, ending a tense night for this small rural community.

The crime immediately attracted widespread news coverage, by local, regional, and national newspapers, radio and television stations. Three days after the crime, the County Attorney and Simants’ attorney joined in asking the County Court to enter a restrictive order relating to “matters that may or may not be publicly reported or disclosed to the public,” because of the “mass coverage by news media” and the “reasonable likelihood of prejudicial news which would make difficult, if not impossible, the impaneling of an impartial jury and tend to prevent a fair trial.” The County Court heard oral argument but took no evidence; no attorney for members of the press appeared at this stage. The County Court granted the prosecutor’s motion for a restrictive order and entered it the next day, October 22. The order prohibited everyone in attendance from “releasing] or authoriz [ing] the release for public dissemination in any form or manner whatsoever any testimony given or evidence adduced”; the order also required members of the press to observe the Nebraska Bar-Press Guidelines.1

*543Simants’ preliminary hearing was held the same day, open to the public but subject to the order. The County Court bound over the defendant for trial to the State District Court. The charges, as amended to reflect the autopsy findings, were that Simants had committed the murders in the course of a sexual assault.

Petitioners — several press and broadcast associations, publishers, and individual reporters — moved on October 23 for leave to intervene in the District Court, asking that the restrictive order imposed by the County Court be vacated. The District Court conducted a hearing, at which the County Judge testified and newspaper articles about the Simants case were admitted in evidence. The District Judge granted petitioners’ motion to intervene and, on October 27, entered his own restrictive order. The judge found “because of the nature of the crimes charged in the complaint that there is a clear and present danger that pre-trial publicity could impinge upon the defendant’s right to a fair trial.” The order applied only until the jury was impaneled, and specifically prohibited petitioners from reporting five subjects: (1) the existence or contents of a confession Simants had made to law enforcement officers, which had been introduced in open court at arraignment; (2) the fact or nature of statements Simants had made to other persons; (3) the contents of a note he had written the night of the crime; (4) certain aspects of the medical testimony at the preliminary hearing; and (5) the identity of the *544victims of the alleged sexual assault and the nature of the assault. It also prohibited reporting the exact nature of the restrictive order itself. Like the County Court’s order, this order incorporated the Nebraska Bar-Press Guidelines. Finally, the order set out a plan for attendance, seating, and courthouse traffic control during the trial.

Four days later, on October 31, petitioners asked the District Court to stay its order. At the same time, they applied to the Nebraska Supreme Court for a writ of mandamus, a stay, and an expedited appeal from the order. The State of Nebraska and the defendant Simants intervened in these actions. The Nebraska Supreme Court heard oral argument on November 25, and issued its per curiam opinion December 1. State v. Simants, 194 Neb. 783, 236 N. W. 2d 794 (1975).2

*545The Nebraska Supreme Court balanced the “heavy-presumption against . . . constitutional validity” that an order restraining publication bears, New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U. S. 713, 714 (1971), against the importance of the defendant’s right to trial by an impartial jury. Both society and the individual defendant, the court held, had a vital interest in assuring that Simants be tried by an impartial jury. Because of the publicity surrounding the crime, the court determined that this right was in jeopardy. The court noted that Nebraska statutes required the District Court to try Simants within six months of his arrest, and that a change of venue could move the trial only to adjoining counties, which had been subject to essentially the same publicity as Lincoln County. The Nebraska Supreme Court held that “[ujnless the absolutist position of the relators was constitutionally correct, it would appear that the District Court acted properly.” 194 Neb., at 797, 236 N. W. 2d, at 803.

The Nebraska Supreme Court rejected that “absolutist position,” but modified the District Court’s order to accommodate the defendant’s right to a fair trial and the petitioners’ interest in reporting pretrial events. The order as modified prohibited reporting of only three matters: (a) the existence and nature of any confessions or admissions made by the defendant to law enforcement officers, (b) any confessions or admissions made to any third parties, except members of the press, and (c) other facts “strongly implicative” of the accused. The Nebraska Supreme Court did not rely on the Nebraska Bar-Press Guidelines. See n. 1, supra. After construing Nebraska law to permit closure in certain circumstances, the court remanded the case to the District Judge for reconsideration of the issue whether pretrial hearings should be closed to the press and public.

*546We granted certiorari to address the important issues raised by the District Court order as modified by the Nebraska Supreme Court, but we denied the motion to expedite review or to stay entirely the order of the State District Court pending Simants’ trial. 423 U. S. 1027 (1975). We are informed by the parties that since we granted certiorari, Simants has been convicted of murder and sentenced to death. His appeal is pending in the Nebraska Supreme Court.

II

The order at issue in this case expired by its own terms when the jury was impaneled on January 7, 1976. There were no restraints on publication once the jury was selected, and there are now no restrictions on what may be spoken or written about the Simants case. Intervenor Simants argues that for this reason the case is moot.

Our jurisdiction under Art. Ill, § 2, of the Constitution extends only to actual cases and controversies. Indianapolis School Comm’rs v. Jacobs, 420 U. S. 128 (1975); Sosna v. Iowa, 419 U. S. 393, 397-403 (1975). The Court has recognized, however, that jurisdiction is not necessarily defeated simply because the order attacked has expired, if the underlying dispute between the parties is one “capable of repetition, yet evading review.” Southern Pacific Terminal Co. v. ICC, 219 U. S. 498, 515 (1911).

The controversy between the parties to this case is “capable of repetition” in two senses. First, if Simants’’ conviction is reversed by the Nebraska Supreme Court and a new trial ordered, the District Court may enter another restrictive order to prevent a resurgence of prejudicial publicity before Simants’ retrial. Second, the State of Nebraska is a party to this case; the Nebraska Supreme Court’s decision authorizes state prosecutors to *547seek restrictive orders in appropriate cases. The dispute between the State and the petitioners who cover events throughout the State is thus “capable of repetition.” Yet, if we decline to address the issues in this case on grounds of mootness, the dispute will evade review, or at least considered plenary review in this Court, since these orders are by nature short-lived. See, e. g., Weinstein v. Bradford, 423 U. S. 147 (1975); Sosna v. Iowa, supra; Roe v. Wade, 410 U. S. 113, 125 (1973); Moore v. Ogilvie, 394 U. S. 814, 816 (1969); Carroll v. Princess Anne, 393 U. S. 175, 178-179 (1968). We therefore conclude that this case is not moot, and proceed to the merits.

Ill

The problems presented by this case are almost as old as the Republic. Neither in the Constitution nor in contemporaneous writings do we find that the conflict between these two important rights was anticipated, yet it is inconceivable that the authors of the Constitution were unaware of the potential conflicts between the right to an unbiased jury and the guarantee of freedom of the press. The unusually able lawyers who helped write the Constitution and later drafted the Bill of Rights were familiar with the historic episode in which John Adams defended British soldiers charged with homicide for firing into a crowd of Boston demonstrators; they were intimately familiar with the clash of the adversary system and the part that passions of the populace sometimes play in influencing potential jurors. They did not address themselves directly to the situation presented by this case; their chief concern was the need for freedom of expression in the political arena and the dialogue in ideas. But they recognized that there were risks to private rights from an unfettered press. Jefferson, for ex*548ample, writing from Paris in 1786 concerning press attacks on John Jay, stated:

“In truth it is afflicting that a man who has past his life in serving the public . . . should yet be liable to have his peace of mind so much disturbed by any individual who shall think proper to arraign him in a newspaper. It is however an evil for which there is no remedy. Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost. ...” 9 Papers of Thomas Jefferson 239 (J. Boyd ed. 1954).

See also F. Mott, Jefferson and the Press 21, 38-46 (1943).

The trial of Aaron Burr in 1807 presented Mr. Chief Justice Marshall, presiding as a trial judge, with acute problems in selecting an unbiased jury. Few people in the area of Virginia from which jurors were drawn had not formed some opinions concerning Mr. Burr or the case, from newspaper accounts and heightened discussion both private and public. The Chief Justice conducted a searching voir dire of the two panels eventually called, and rendered a substantial opinion on the purposes of voir dire and the standards to be applied. See 1 Causes Celebres, Trial of Aaron Burr for Treason 404-427, 473-481 (1879); United States v. Burr, 25 F. Cas. 49 (No. 14,692g) (CC Va. 1807). Burr was acquitted, so there was no occasion for appellate review to examine the problem of prejudicial pretrial publicity. Mr. Chief Justice Marshall’s careful voir dire inquiry into the matter of possible bias makes clear that the problem is not a new one.

The speed of communication and the pervasiveness of the modern news media have exacerbated these problems, however, as numerous appeals demonstrate. The trial of Bruno Hauptmann in a small New Jersey community for *549the abduction and murder of the Charles Lindberghs’ infant child probably was the most widely covered trial up to that time, and the nature of the coverage produced widespread public reaction. Criticism was directed at the “carnival” atmosphere that pervaded the community and the courtroom itself. Responsible leaders of press and the legal profession — including other judges — pointed out that much of this sorry performance could have been controlled by a vigilant trial judge and by other public officers subject to the control of the court. See generally Hudon, Freedom of the Press Versus Fair Trial: The Remedy Lies With the Courts, 1 Val. U. L. Rev. 8, 12-14 (1966); Hallam, Some Object Lessons on Publicity in Criminal Trials, 24 Minn. L. Rev. 453 (1940); Lippmann, The Lindbergh Case in Its Relation to American Newspapers, in Problems of Journalism 15A-156 (1936).

The excesses of press and radio and lack of responsibility of those in authority in the Hauptmann case and others of that era led to efforts to develop voluntary guidelines for courts, lawyers, press, and broadcasters. See generally J. Lofton, Justice and the Press 117-130 (1966).3 The effort was renewed in 1965 when the American Bar Association embarked on a project to develop standards for all aspects of criminal justice, including guidelines to accommodate the right to a fair trial and the rights of a free press. See Powell, The Right to a *550Fair Trial, 51 A. B. A. J. 534 (1965). The resulting standards, approved by the Association in 1968, received support from most of the legal profession. American Bar Association Project on Standards for Criminal Justice, Fair Trial and Free Press (Approved Draft 1968). Other groups have undertaken similar studies. See Report of the Judicial Conference Committee on the Operation of the Jury System, “Free Press-Fair Trial” Issue, 45 F. R. D. 391 (1968); Special Committee on Radio, Television, and the Administration of Justice of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York, Freedom of the Press and Fair Trial (1967). In the wake of these efforts, the cooperation between bar associations and members of the press led to the adoption of voluntary guidelines like Nebraska’s. See n. 1, supra; American Bar Association Legal Advisory Committee on Fair Trial and Free Press, The Rights of Fair Trial and Free Press 1-6 (1969).

In practice, of course, even the most ideal guidelines are subjected to powerful strains when a case such as Simants’ arises, with reporters from many parts of the country on the scene. Reporters from distant places are unlikely to consider themselves bound by local standards. They report to editors outside the area covered by the guidelines, and their editors are likely to be guided only by their own standards. To contemplate how a state court can control acts of a newspaper or broadcaster outside its jurisdiction, even though the newspapers and broadcasts reach the very community from which jurors are to be selected, suggests something of the practical difficulties of managing such guidelines.

The problems presented in this case have a substantial history outside the reported decisions of courts, in the efforts of many responsible people to accommodate the competing interests. We cannot resolve all of them, for *551it is not the function of this Court to write a code. We look instead to this particular case and the legal context in which it arises.

IV

The Sixth Amendment in terms guarantees “trial, by an impartial jury . . .” in federal criminal prosecutions. Because “trial by jury in criminal cases is fundamental to the American scheme of justice,” the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment guarantees the same right in state criminal prosecutions. Duncan v. Louisiana, 391 U. S. 145, 149 (1968).

“In essence, the right to jury trial guarantees to the criminally accused a fair trial by a panel of impartial, 'indifferent’ jurors. ... 'A fair trial in a fair tribunal is a basic requirement of due process/ In re Murchison, 349 U. S. 133, 136. In the ultimate analysis, only the jury can strip a man of his liberty or his life. In the language of Lord Coke, a juror must be as 'indifferent as he stands unsworne/ Co. Litt. 155b. His verdict must be based upon the evidence developed at the trial.” Irvin v. Dowd, 366 U. S. 717, 722 (1961).

In the overwhelming majority of criminal trials, pretrial publicity presents few unmanageable threats to this important right. But when the case is a “sensational” one tensions develop between the right of the accused to trial by an impartial jury and the rights guaranteed others by the First Amendment. The relevant decisions of this Court, even if not dispositive, are instructive by way of background.

In Irvin v. Dowd, supra, for example, the defendant was convicted of murder following intensive and hostile news coverage. The trial judge had granted a defense motion for a change of venue, but only to an *552adjacent county, which had been exposed to essentially the same news coverage. At trial, 430 persons were called for jury service; 268 were excused because they had fixed opinions as to guilt. Eight of the 12 who served as jurors thought the defendant guilty, but said they could nevertheless render an impartial verdict. On review the Court vacated the conviction and death sentence and remanded to allow a new trial for, “[w]ith his life at stake, it is not requiring too much that petitioner be tried in an atmosphere undisturbed by so huge a wave of public passion . . . .” 366 U. S., at 728.

Similarly, in Rideau v. Louisiana, 373 U. S. 723 (1963), the Court reversed the conviction of a defendant whose staged, highly emotional confession had been filmed with the cooperation of local police and later broadcast on television for three days while he was awaiting trial, saying “[a]ny subsequent court proceedings in a community so pervasively exposed to such a spectacle could be but a hollow formality.” Id., at 726. And in Estes v. Texas, 381 U. S. 532 (1965), the Court held that the defendant had not been afforded due process where the volume of trial publicity, the judge’s failure to control the proceedings, and the telecast of a hearing and of the trial itself “inherently prevented a sober search for the truth.” Id., at 551. See also Marshall v. United States, 360 U. S. 310 (1959).

In Sheppard v. Maxwell, 384 U. S. 333 (1966), the Court focused sharply on the impact of pretrial publicity and a trial court’s duty to protect the defendant’s constitutional right to a fair trial. With only Mr. Justice Black dissenting, and he without opinion, the Court ordered a new trial for the petitioner, even though the first trial had occurred 12 years before. Beyond doubt the press had shown no responsible concern for the constitutional guarantee of a fair trial; the com*553munity from which the jury was drawn had been inundated by publicity hostile to the defendant. But the trial judge “did not fulfill his duty to protect [the defendant] from the inherently prejudicial publicity which saturated the community and to control disruptive influences in the courtroom.” Id., at 363. The Court noted that “unfair and prejudicial news comment on pending trials has become increasingly prevalent,” id., at 362, and issued a strong warning:

“Due process requires that the accused receive a trial by an impartial jury free from outside influences. Given the pervasiveness of modern communications and the difficulty of effacing prejudicial publicity from the minds of the jurors, the trial courts must take strong measures to ensure that the balance is never weighed against the accused. . . . Of course, there is nothing that proscribes the press from reporting events that transpire in the courtroom. But where there is a reasonable likelihood that prejudicial news prior to trial will prevent a fair trial, the judge should continue the case until the threat abates, or transfer it to another county not so permeated with publicity. In addition, sequestration of the jury was something the judge should have raised sua sponte with counsel. If publicity during the proceedings threatens the fairness of the trial, a new trial should be ordered. But we must remember that reversals are but palliatives; the cure lies in those remedial measures that will prevent the prejudice at its inception. The courts must take such steps by rule and regulation that will protect their processes from prejudicial outside interferences. Neither prosecutors, counsel for defense, the accused, witnesses, court staff nor enforcement officers coming under the jurisdiction of the *554court should he permitted to frustrate its function. Collaboration between counsel and the press as to information affecting the fairness of a criminal trial is not only subject to regulation, but is highly censurable arid worthy of disciplinary measures.” Id., at 362-363 (emphasis added).

Because the trial court had failed to use even minimal efforts to insulate the trial and the jurors from the “deluge of publicity,” id., at 357, the Court vacated the judgment of conviction and a new trial followed, in which the accused was acquitted.

Cases such as these are relatively rare, and we have held in other cases that trials have been fair in spite of widespread publicity. In Stroble v. California, 343 U. S. 181 (1952), for example, the Court affirmed a conviction and death sentence challenged on the ground that pretrial news accounts, including the prosecutor's release of the defendant’s recorded confession, were allegedly so inflammatory as to amount to a denial of due process. The Court disapproved of the prosecutor’s conduct, but noted that the publicity had receded some six weeks before trial, that the defendant had not moved for a change of venue, and that the confession had'been found voluntary and admitted in evidence at trial. The Court also noted the thorough examination of jurors on voir dire and the careful review of the facts by the state courts, and held that petitioner had failed to demonstrate a denial of due process. See also Murphy v. Florida, 421 U. S. 794 (1975); Beck v. Washington, 369 U. S. 541 (1962).

Taken together, these cases demonstrate that pretrial publicity — even pervasive, adverse publicity — does not inevitably lead to an unfair trial. The capacity of the jury eventually impaneled to decide the case fairly is influenced by the tone and extent of the publicity, *555which is in part, and often in large part, shaped by what attorneys, police, and other officials do to precipitate news coverage. The trial judge has a major responsibility. What the judge says about a case, in or out of the courtroom, is likely to appear in newspapers and broadcasts. More important, the measures a judge takes or fails to take to mitigate the effects of pretrial publicity — the measures described in Sheppard — may well determine whether the defendant receives a trial consistent with the requirements of due process. That this responsibility has not always been properly discharged is apparent from the decisions just reviewed.

The costs of failure to afford a fair trial are high. In the most extreme cases, like Sheppard and Estes, the risk of injustice was avoided when the convictions were reversed. But a reversal means that justice has been delayed for both the defendant and the State; in some cases, because of lapse of time retrial is impossible or further prosecution is gravely handicapped. Moreover, in borderline cases in which the conviction is not reversed, there is some possibility of an injustice unredressed. The “strong measures” outlined in Sheppard v. Maxwell are means by which a trial judge can try to avoid exacting these costs from society or from the accused.

The state trial judge in the case before us acted responsibly, out of a legitimate concern, in an effort topro-tect the defendant's right to a fair trial.4 What we must decide is not simply whether the Nebraska courts erred *556in seeing the possibility of real danger to the defendant’s rights, but whether in the circumstances of this case the means employed were foreclosed by another provision of the Constitution.

Y

The First Amendment provides that “Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom ... of the press,” and it is “no longer open to doubt that the liberty of the press, and of speech, is within the liberty safeguarded by the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment from invasion by state action.” Near v. Minnesota ex rel. Olson, 283 U. S. 697, 707 (1931). See also Grosjean v. American Press Co., 297 U. S. 233, 244 (1936). The Court has interpreted these guarantees to afford special protection against orders that prohibit the publication or broadcast of particular information or commentary — orders that impose a “previous” or “prior” restraint on speech. None of our decided cases on prior restraint involved restrictive orders entered to protect a defendant’s right to a fair and impartial jury, but the opinions on prior restraint have a common thread relevant to this case.

In Near v. Minnesota ex rel. Olson, supra, the Court held invalid a Minnesota statute providing for the abatement as a public nuisance of any “malicious, scandalous and defamatory newspaper, magazine or other periodical.” Near had published an occasional weekly newspaper described by the County Attorney’s complaint as “largely devoted to malicious, scandalous and defamatory articles” concerning political and other public figures. 283 U. S., at 703. Publication was enjoined pursuant to the statute. Excerpts from Near’s paper, set out in the dissenting opinion of Mr. Justice Butler, show beyond question that one of its principal characteristics was blatant anti-Semitism. See id., at 723, 724-727, n. 1.

*557Mr. Chief Justice Hughes, writing for the Court, noted that freedom of the press is not an absolute right, and the State may punish its abuses. He observed that the statute was “not aimed at the redress of individual or private wrongs.” Id., at 708, 709. He then focused on the statute:

“[T]he operation and effect of the statute in substance is that public authorities may bring the owner or publisher of a newspaper or periodical before a judge upon a charge of conducting a business of publishing scandalous and defamatory matter . . . and unless the owner or publisher is able ... to satisfy the judge that the [matter is] true and . .. published with good motives ... his newspaper or periodical is suppressed .... This is of the essence of censorship.” Id., at 713.

The Court relied on Patterson v. Colorado ex rel. Attorney General, 205 U. S. 454, 462 (1907): “[T]he main purpose of [the First Amendment] is ‘to prevent all such previous restraints upon publications as had been practiced by other governments.’ ” 5

The principles enunciated in Near were so universally accepted that the precise issue did not come before us again until Organization for a Better Austin v. Keefe, *558402 U. S. 415 (1971). There the state courts had enjoined the petitioners from picketing or passing out literature of any kind in a specified area. Noting the similarity to Near v. Minnesota, a unanimous Court held:

“Here, as in that case, the injunction operates, not to redress alleged private wrongs, but to suppress, on the basis of previous publications, distribution of literature 'of any kind’ in a city of 18,000.

“Any prior restraint on expression comes to this Court with a 'heavy presumption’ against its constitutional validity. Carroll v. Princess Anne, 393 U. S. 175, 181 (1968); Bantam Books, Inc. v. Sullivan, 372 U. S. 58, 70 (1963). Respondent thus carries a heavy burden of showing justification for the imposition of such a restraint. He has not met that burden. . . . Designating the conduct as an invasion of privacy, the apparent basis for the injunction here, is not sufficient to support an injunction against peaceful distribution of informational literature of the nature revealed by this record.” 402 U. S., at 418-420.

More recently in New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U. S. 713 (1971), the Government sought to enjoin the publication of excerpts from a massive, classified study of this Nation’s involvement in the Vietnam conflict, going back to the end of the Second World War. The dispositive opinion of the Court simply concluded that the Government had not met its heavy burden of showing justification for the prior restraint. Each of the six concurring Justices and the three dissenting Justices expressed his views separately, but “every member of the Court, tacitly or explicitly, accepted the Near and Keefe condemnation of prior restraint as presumptively unconstitutional.” Pittsburgh Press Co. v. Human Rel. *559Comm’n, 413 U. S. 376, 396 (1973) (Burger, C. J., dissenting). The Court’s conclusion in New York Times suggests that the burden on the Government is not reduced by the temporary nature of a restraint; in that case the Government asked for a temporary restraint solely to permit it to study and assess the impact on national security of the lengthy documents at issue.

The thread running through all these cases is that prior restraints on speech and publication are the most serious and the least tolerable infringement on First Amendment rights. A criminal penalty or a judgment in a defamation case is subject to the whole panoply of protections afforded by deferring the impact of the judgment until all avenues of appellate review have been exhausted. Only after judgment has become final, correct or otherwise, does the law’s sanction become fully operative.

A prior restraint, by contrast and by definition, has an immediate and irreversible sanction. If it can be said that a threat of criminal or civil sanctions after publication “chills” speech, prior restraint “freezes” it at least for the time.6

The damage can be particularly great when the prior restraint falls upon the communication of news and commentary on current events. Truthful reports of public judicial proceedings have been afforded special protection against subsequent punishment. See Cox Broadcasting Corp v. Cohn, 420 U. S. 469, 492-493(1975); see also, Craig v. Harney, 331 U. S. 367, 374 (1947). For the same reasons the protection against prior restraint should have particular force as applied to reporting of criminal proceedings, whether the crime in question is a single isolated act or a pattern of criminal conduct.

“A responsible press has always been regarded as *560the handmaiden of effective judicial administration, especially in the criminal field. Its function in this regard is documented by an impressive record of service over several centuries. The press does not simply publish information about trials but guards against the miscarriage of justice by subjecting the police, prosecutors, and judicial processes to extensive public scrutiny and criticism.” Sheppard v. Maxwell, 384 U. S., at 350.

The extraordinary protections afforded by the First Amendment carry with them something in the nature of a fiduciary duty to exercise the protected rights responsibly — a duty widely acknowledged but not always observed by editors and publishers. It is not asking too much to suggest that those who exercise First Amendment rights in newspapers or broadcasting enterprises direct some effort to protect the rights of an accused to a fair trial by unbiased jurors.

Of course, the order at issue — like the order requested in New York Times — does not prohibit but only postpones publication. Some news can be delayed and most commentary can even more readily be delayed without serious injury, and there often is a self-imposed delay when responsible editors call for verification of information. But such delays are normally slight and they are self-imposed. Delays imposed by governmental authority are a different matter.

“We have learned, and continue to learn, from what we view as the unhappy experiences of other nations where government has been allowed to meddle in the internal editorial affairs of newspapers. Regardless of how beneficent-sounding the purposes of controlling the press might be, we . . . remain intensely skeptical about those measures that would allow government to insinuate itself into the editorial *561rooms of this Nation’s press.” Miami Herald Publishing Co. v. Tornillo, 418 U. S. 241, 259 (1974) (White, J., concurring).

See also Columbia Broadcasting v. Democratic Comm., 412 U. S. 94 (1973). As a practical matter, moreover, the element of time is not unimportant if press coverage is to fulfill its traditional function of bringing news to the public promptly.

The authors of the Bill of Rights did not undertake to assign priorities as between First Amendment and Sixth Amendment rights, ranking one as superior to the other. In this ease, the petitioners would have us declare the right of an accused subordinate to their right to publish in all circumstances. But if the authors of these guarantees, fully aware of the potential conflicts between them, were unwilling or unable to resolve the issue by assigning to one priority over the other, it is not for us to rewrite the Constitution by undertaking what they declined to do. It is unnecessary, after nearly two centuries, to establish a priority applicable in all circumstances. Yet it is nonetheless clear that the barriers to prior restraint remain high unless we are to abandon what the Court has said for nearly a quarter of our national existence and implied throughout all of it. The history of even wartime suspension of categorical guarantees, such as habeas corpus or the right to trial by civilian courts, see Ex parte Milligan, 4 Wall. 2 (1867), cautions against suspending explicit guarantees.

The Nebraska courts in this case enjoined the publication of certain kinds of information about the Simants case. There are, as we suggested earlier, marked differences in setting and purpose between the order entered here and the orders in Near, Keefe, and New York Times, but as to the underlying issue — the right of the press to be free from prior restraints on publication — those *562cases form the backdrop against which we must decide this case.

VI

We turn now to the record in this case to determine whether, as Learned Hand put it, “the gravity of the 'evil/ discounted by its improbability, justifies such invasion of free speech as is necessary to avoid the danger.” United States v. Dennis, 183 F. 2d 201, 212 (CA2 1950), aff’d, 341 U. S. 494 (1951); see also L. Hand, The Bill of Rights 58-61 (1958). To do so, we must examine the evidence before the trial judge when the order was entered to determine (a) the nature and extent of pretrial news coverage; (b) whether other measures would be likely to mitigate the effects of unrestrained pretrial publicity; and (c) how effectively a restraining order would operate to prevent the threatened danger. The precise terms of the restraining order are also important. We must then consider whether the record supports the entry of a prior restraint on publication, one of the most extraordinary remedies known to our jurisprudence.

A

In assessing the probable extent of publicity, the trial judge had before him newspapers demonstrating that the crime had already drawn intensive news coverage, and the testimony of the County Judge, who had entered the initial restraining order based on the local and national attention the case had attracted. The District Judge was required to assess the probable publicity that would be given these shocking crimes prior to the time a jury was selected and sequestered. He then had to examine the probable nature of the publicity and determine how it would affect prospective jurors.

Our review of the pretrial record persuades us that the trial judge was justified in concluding that there would *563be intense and pervasive pretrial publicity concerning this case. He could also reasonably conclude, based on common human experience, that publicity might impair the defendant’s right to a fair trial. He did not purport to say more, for he found only “a clear and present danger that pre-trial publicity could impinge upon the defendant’s right to a fair trial.” (Emphasis added.) His conclusion as to the impact of such publicity on prospective jurors was of necessity speculative, dealing as he was with factors unknown and unknowable.

B

We find little in the record that goes to another aspect of our task, determining whether measures short of an order restraining all publication would have insured the defendant a fair trial. Although the entry of the order might be read as a judicial determination that other measures would not suffice, the trial court made no express findings to that effect; the Nebraska Supreme Court referred to the issue only by implication. See 194 Neb., at 797-798, 236 N. W. 2d, at 803.

Most of the alternatives to prior restraint of publication in these circumstances were discussed with obvious approval in Sheppard v. Maxwell, 384 U. S./at 357-362: (a) change of trial venue to a place less exposed to the intense publicity that seemed imminent in Lincoln County;7 (b) postponement of the trial to allow *564public attention to subside; (c) searching questioning of prospective jurors, as Mr. Chief Justice Marshall used in the Burr case, to screen out those with fixed opinions as to guilt or innocence; (d) the use of emphatic and clear instructions on the sworn duty of each juror to decide the issues only on evidence presented in open court. Sequestration of jurors is, of course, always available. Although that measure insulates jurors only after they are sworn, it also enhances the likelihood of dissipating the impact of pretrial publicity and emphasizes the elements of the jurors’ oaths.

This Court has outlined other measures short of prior restraints on publication tending to blunt the impact of pretrial publicity. See Sheppard v. Maxwell, supra, at 361-362. Professional studies have filled out these suggestions, recommending that trial courts in appropriate cases limit what the contending lawyers, the police, and witnesses may say to anyone. See American Bar Association Project on Standards for Criminal Justice, Fair Trial and Free Press 2-15 (App. Draft 1968) .8

*565We have noted earlier that pretrial publicity, even if pervasive and concentrated, cannot be regarded as leading automatically and in every kind of criminal case to an unfair trial. The decided cases “cannot be made to stand for the proposition that juror exposure to information about a state defendant's prior convictions or to news accounts of the crime with which he is charged alone presumptively deprives the defendant of due process." Murphy v. Florida, 421 U. S., at 799. Appellate evaluations as to the impact of publicity take into account what other measures were used to mitigate the adverse effects of publicity. The more difficult prospective or predictive assessment that a trial judge must make also calls for a judgment as to whether other precautionary steps will suffice.

We have therefore examined this record to determine the probable efficacy of the measures short of prior restraint on the press and speech. There is no finding that alternative measures would not have protected Simants' rights, and the Nebraska Supreme Court did no more than imply that such measures might not be adequate. Moreover, the record is lacking in evidence to support such a finding.

C

We must also assess the probable efficacy of prior restraint on publication as a workable method of protecting Simants’ right to a fair trial, and we cannot ignore the reality of the problems of managing and enforcing pretrial restraining orders. The territorial jurisdiction of the issuing court is limited by concepts of sovereignty, see, e. g., Hanson v. Denckla, 357 U. S. 235 (1958); Pennoyer v. Neff, 95 U. S. 714 (1878). The need for in *566personam jurisdiction also presents an obstacle to a restraining order that applies to publication at large as distinguished from restraining publication within a given jurisdiction.9 See generally American Bar Association, Legal Advisory Committee on Fair Trial and Free Press, Recommended Court Procedure to Accommodate Rights of Fair Trial and Free Press (Rev. Draft, Nov. 1975); Rendleman, Free Press-Fair Trial: Review of Silence Orders, 52 N. C. L. Rev. 127, 149-155 (1973).10

The Nebraska Supreme Court narrowed the scope of the restrictive order, and its opinion reflects awareness of the tensions between the need to protect the accused as fully as possible and the need to restrict publication as little as possible. The dilemma posed underscores how *567difficult it is for trial judges to predict what information will in fact undermine the impartiality of jurors, and the difficulty of drafting an order that will effectively keep prejudicial information from prospective jurors. When a restrictive order is sought, a court can anticipate only part of what will develop that may injure the accused. But information not so obviously prejudicial may emerge, and what may properly be published in these “gray zone” circumstances may not violate the restrictive order and yet be prejudicial.

Finally, we note that the events disclosed by the record took place in a community of 850 people. It is reasonable to assume that, without any news accounts being printed or broadcast, rumors would travel swiftly by word of mouth. One can only speculate on the accuracy of such reports, given the generative propensities of rumors; they could well be more damaging than reasonably accurate news accounts. But plainly a whole community cannot be restrained from discussing a subject intimately affecting life within it.

Given these practical problems, it is far from clear that prior restraint on publication would have protected Simants’ rights.

D

Finally, another feature of this case leads us to conclude that the restrictive order entered here is not supportable. At the outset the County Court entered a very broad restrictive order, the terms of which are not before us; it then held a preliminary hearing open to the public and the press. There was testimony concerning at least two incriminating statements made by Simants to private persons; the statement — evidently a confession — that he gave to law enforcement officials was also introduced. The State District Court’s later order was entered after this public hearing and, as modified by the *568Nebraska Supreme Court, enjoined reporting of (1) “[cjonfessions or admissions against interest made by the accused to law enforcement officials”; (2) “[cjon-fessions or admissions against interest, oral or written, if any, made by the accused to third parties, excepting any statements, if any, made by the accused to representatives of the news media”; and (3) all “[ojther information strongly implicative of the accused as the perpetrator of the slayings.” 194 Neb., at 801, 236 N. W. 2d, at 805.

To the extent that this order prohibited the reporting of evidence adduced at the open preliminary hearing, it plainly violated settled principles: “[Tjhere is nothing that proscribes the press from reporting events that transpire in the courtroom.” Sheppard v. Maxwell, 384 U. S., at 362-363. See also Cox Broadcasting Corp. v. Cohn, 420 U. S. 469 (1975); Craig v. Harney, 331 U. S. 367 (1947). The County Court could not know that closure of the preliminary hearing was an alternative open to it until the Nebraska Supreme Court so construed state law; but once a public hearing had been held, what transpired there could not be subject to prior restraint.

The third prohibition of the order was defective in another respect as well. As part of a final order, entered after plenary review, this prohibition regarding “implicative” information is too vague and too broad to survive the scrutiny we have given to restraints on First Amendment rights. See, e. g., Hynes v. Mayor of Oradell, 425 U. S. 610 (1976); Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1, 76-82 (1976); NAACP v. Button, 371 U. S. 415 (1963). The third phase of the order entered falls outside permissible limits.

E

The record demonstrates, as the Nebraska courts held, that there was indeed a risk that pretrial news accounts, *569true or false, would have some adverse impact on the attitudes of those who might be called as jurors. But on the record now before us it is not clear that further publicity, unchecked, would so distort the views of potential jurors that 12 could not be found who would, under proper instructions, fulfill their sworn duty to render a just verdict exclusively on the evidence presented in open court. We cannot say on this record that alternatives to a prior restraint on petitioners would not have sufficiently mitigated the adverse effects of pretrial publicity so as to make prior restraint unnecessary. Nor can we conclude that the restraining order actually entered would serve its intended purpose. Reasonable minds can have few doubts about the gravity of the evil pretrial publicity can work, but the probability that it would do so here was not demonstrated with the degree of certainty our cases on prior restraint require.

Of necessity our holding is confined to the record before us. But o.ur conclusion is not simply a result of assessing the adequacy of the showing made in this case; it results in part from the problems inherent in meeting the heavy burden of demonstrating, in advance of trial, that without prior restraint a fair trial will be denied. The practical problems of managing and enforcing restrictive orders will always be present. In this sense, the record now before us is illustrative rather than exceptional. It is significant that when this Court has reversed a state conviction because of prejudicial publicity, it has carefully noted that some course of action short of prior restraint would have made a critical difference. See Sheppard v. Maxwell, supra, at 363; Estes v. Texas, 381 U. S., at 550-551; Rideau v. Louisiana, 373 U. S., at 726; Irvin v. Dowd, 366 U. S., at 728. However difficult it may be, we need not rule out the possibility of showing the kind of threat to fair trial rights that would possess *570the requisite degree of certainty to justify restraint. This Court has frequently denied that First Amendment rights are absolute and has consistently rejected the proposition that a prior restraint can never be employed. See New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U. S. 713 (1971); Organization for a Better Austin v. Keefe, 402 U. S. 415 (1971); Near v. Minnesota ex rel. Olson, 283 U. S. 697 (1931).

Our analysis ends as it began, with a confrontation between prior restraint imposed to protect one vital constitutional guarantee and the explicit command of another that the freedom to speak and publish shall not be abridged. We reaffirm that the guarantees of freedom of expression are not an absolute prohibition under all circumstances, but the barriers to prior restraint remain high and the presumption against its use continues intact. We hold that, with respect to the order entered in this case prohibiting reporting or commentary on judicial proceedings held in public, the barriers have not been overcome; to the extent that this order restrained publication of such material, it is clearly invalid. To the extent that it prohibited publication based on information gained from other sources, we conclude that the heavy burden imposed as a condition to securing a prior restraint was not met and the judgment of the Nebraska Supreme Court is therefore

Reversed.

MR. Justice White,

concurring.

Technically there is no need to go farther than the Court does to dispose of this case, and I join the Court’s opinion. I should add, however, that for the reasons which the Court itself canvasses there is grave doubt in my mind whether orders with respect to the press such as were entered in this case would ever be justifi*571able. It may be the better part of discretion, however, not to announce such a rule in the first case in which the issue has been squarely presented here. Perhaps we should go no further than absolutely necessary until the federal courts, and ourselves, have been exposed to a broader spectrum of cases presenting similar issues. If the recurring result, however, in case after case is to be similar to our judgment today, we should at some point announce a more general rule and avoid the interminable litigation that our failure to do so would necessarily entail.

Mr. Justice Powell,

concurring.

Although I join the opinion of the Court, in view of the importance of the case I write to emphasize the unique burden that rests upon the party, whether it be the State or a defendant, who undertakes to show the necessity for prior restraint on pretrial publicity.*

In my judgment a prior restraint properly may issue only when it is shown to be necessary to prevent the dissemination of prejudicial publicity that otherwise poses a high likelihood of preventing, directly and irreparably, the impaneling of a jury meeting the Sixth Amendment requirement of impartiality. This requires a showing that (i) there is a clear threat to the fairness of trial, (ii) such a threat is posed by the actual publicity to be restrained, and (iii) no less restrictive alternatives are available. Notwithstanding such a showing, a restraint may not issue unless it also is shown that previous publicity or publicity from unrestrained sources will not render the restraint inefficacious. The threat to the fair*572ness of the trial is to be evaluated in the context of Sixth Amendment law on impartiality, and any restraint must comply with the standards of specificity always required in the First Amendment context.

I believe these factors are sufficiently addressed in the Court’s opinion to demonstrate beyond question that the prior restraint here was impermissible.

Mr. Justice Brennan-,

with whom Mr. Justice Stewart and Mr. Justice Marshall join, concurring in the judgment.

The question presented in this case is whether, consistently with the First Amendment, a court may enjoin the press, in advance of publication,1 from reporting or commenting on information acquired from public court proceedings, public court records, or other sources about pending judicial proceedings. The Nebraska Supreme Court upheld such a direct prior restraint on the press, issued by the judge presiding over a sensational state murder trial, on the ground that there existed a “clear and present danger that pretrial publicity could substantially impair the right of the defendant [in the murder trial] to a trial by an impartial jury unless restraints were imposed.” State v. Simants, 194 Neb. 783, 794, 236 N. W. 2d 794, 802 (1975). The right to a fair trial by a jury of one’s peers is unquestionably one of the most precious and sacred safeguards enshrined in the Bill of Rights. I would hold, however, that resort to prior restraints on the freedom of the press is a constitutionally impermissible method for enforcing that right; judges have at their disposal a broad spectrum of devices for ensuring that fundamental fairness is accorded the *573accused without necessitating so drastic an incursion on the equally fundamental and salutary constitutional mandate that discussion of public affairs in a free society cannot depend on the preliminary grace of judicial censors.

I

The history of the current litigation highlights many of the dangers inherent in allowing any prior restraint on press reporting and commentary concerning the operations of the criminal justice system.

This action arose out of events surrounding the prosecution of respondent-intervenor Simants for the premeditated mass murder of the six members of the Kellie family in Sutherland, Neb., on October 18,1975. Shortly after the crimes occurred, the community of 850 was alerted by a special announcement over the local television station. Residents were requested by the police to stay off the streets and exercise caution as to whom they admitted into their houses, and rumors quickly spread that a sniper was loose in Sutherland. When an investigation implicated Simants as a suspect, his name and description were provided to the press and then disseminated to the public.

Simants was apprehended on the morning of October 19, charged with six counts of premeditated murder, and arraigned before the County Court of Lincoln County, Neb. Because several journalists were in attendance and “proof concerning bail . . . would be prejudicial to the rights of the defendant to later obtain a fair trial," App. 7, a portion of the bail hearing was closed, over Simants’ objection, pursuant to the request of the Lincoln County Attorney. At the hearing, counsel was appointed for Simants, bail was denied, and October 22 was set as the date for a preliminary hearing to determine whether Simants should be bound over for trial in *574the District Court of Lincoln County, Neb. News of Simants' apprehension, which was broadcast over radio and television and reported in the press, relieved much of the tension that had built up during the night. During the period from October 19 until the first restrictive order was entered three days later, representatives of the press made accurate factual reports of the events that transpired, including reports of incriminating statements made by Simants to various relatives.

On the evening of October 21, the prosecution filed a motion that the County Court issue a restrictive order enjoining the press from reporting significant aspects of the case. The motion, filed without further evidentiary support, stated:

“The State of Nebraska hereby represents unto the Court that by reason of the nature of the above-captioned case, there has been, and no doubt there will continue to be, mass coverage by news media not only locally but nationally as well; that a preliminary hearing on the charges has been set to commence at 9:00 a. m. on October 22, 1975; and there is a reasonable likelihood of prejudicial news which would make difficult, if not impossible, the impaneling of an impartial jury and tend to prevent a fair trial should the defendant be bound over to trial in the District Court if testimony of witnesses at the preliminary hearing is reported to the public.

“Wherefore the State of Nebraska moves that the Court forthwith enter a Restrictive Order setting forth the matters that may or may not be publicly reported or disclosed to the public with reference to said case or with reference to the preliminary hearing thereon, and to whom said order shall apply.” App. 8. (Emphasis supplied.)

Half an hour later, the County Court Judge heard *575argument on the prosecution motion. Defense counsel joined in urging imposition of a restrictive order, and further moved that the preliminary hearing be closed to both the press and the public. No representatives of the media were notified of or called to testify at the hearing, and no evidence of any kind was introduced.

On October 22, when the autopsy results were completed, the County Attorney filed an amended complaint charging that the six premeditated murders had been committed by Simants in conjunction with the perpetration of or attempt to perpetrate a sexual assault. About the same time, at the commencement of the preliminary hearing, the County Court entered a restrictive order premised on its finding that there was “a reasonable likelihood of prejudicial news which would make difficult, if not impossible, the impaneling of an impartial jury in the event that the defendant is bound over to the District Court for trial . . . Amended Pet. for Cert. la. Accordingly, the County Court ordered that all parties to the case, attorneys, court personnel, public officials, law enforcement officials, witnesses, and “any other person present in Court” during the preliminary hearing, were not to “release or authorize the release for public dissemination in any form or manner whatsoever any testimony given or evidence adduced during the preliminary hearing.” Id., at 2a. The court further ordered that no law enforcement official, public officer, attorney, witness, or “news media” “disseminate any information concerning this matter apart from the preliminary hearing other than as set forth in the Nebraska Bar-Press Guidelines for Disclosure and Reporting of Information Relating to Imminent or Pending Criminal Litigation.” Ibid.2 The order was to *576remain in effect “until modified or rescinded by a higher court or until the defendant is ordered released from these charges.” Id., at 3a. The court also denied the defense request to close the preliminary hearing,3 and an open hearing was then held, at which time various witnesses testified, disclosing significant factual information concerning the events surrounding the alleged crimes. Upon completion of the hearing, the County Court bound the defendant over for trial in the District Court, since it found that the offenses charged in the indictment had been committed, and that there was probable cause to believe that Simants had committed them.

The next day, petitioners — Nebraska newspaper publishers, broadcasters, journalists, and media associations, *577and national newswire services that report from and to Nebraska — sought leave from the District Court to intervene in the criminal case and vacation of the County Court’s restrictive order as repugnant to the First and Sixth Amendments to the United States Constitution as well as relevant provisions of the Nebraska Constitution. Simants’ attorney moved that the order be continued and that future pretrial hearings in the case be closed. The District Court then held an evidentiary hearing, after which it denied the motion to close any hearings, granted petitioners’ motion to intervene, and adopted on an interim basis the County Court’s restrictive order. The only testimony adduced at the hearing with respect to the need for the restrictive order was that of the County Court Judge, who stated that he had premised his order on his awareness of media publicity, “ [c] onversation around the courthouse,” and “statements of counsel.” App. 64, 65. In addition, several newspaper clippings pertaining to the case were introduced as exhibits before the District Court.

Without any further hearings, the District Court on October 27 terminated the County Court’s order and substituted its own. The court found that “because of the nature of the crimes charged in the complaint . . . there is a clear and present danger that pre-trial publicity could impinge upon the defendant’s right to a fair trial and that an order setting forth the limitations of pre-trial publicity is appropriate . . . .” Amended Pet. for Cert. 9a (emphasis supplied). Respondent Stuart, the District Court Judge, then “adopted” as his order the Nebraska Bar-Press Guidelines as “clarified” by him in certain respects.4

*578On October 31, petitioners sought a stay of the order from the District Court and immediate relief from the Nebraska Supreme Court by way of mandamus, stay, or expedited appeal. When neither the District Court nor the Nebraska Supreme Court acted on these mo*579tions, petitioners on November 5 applied to Mr. Justice Blackmun, as Circuit Justice, for a stay of the District Court’s order. Five days later, the Nebraska Supreme Court issued a per curiam statement that to avoid being put in the position of “exercising parallel jurisdiction with the Supreme Court of the United States,” it would continue the matter until this Court “made known whether or not it will accept jurisdiction in the matter.” Id., at 19a-20a.

On November 13, Mr. Justice Blackmun filed an in-chambers opinion in which he declined to act on the stay “at least for the immediate present.” 423 U. S. 1319, 1326. He observed: “[I]f no action on the [petitioners’] application to the Supreme Court of Nebraska could be anticipated before December 1, [as was indicated by a communication from that court’s clerk before the court issued the per curiam statement,] ... a definitive decision by the State’s highest court on an issue of profound constitutional implications, demanding immediate resolution, would be delayed for a period so long that the very day-to-day duration of that delay would constitute and aggravate a deprival of such constitutional rights, if any, that the [petitioners] possess and may properly assert. Under those circumstances, I would not hesitate promptly to act.” Id., at 1324-1325. However, since the Nebraska Supreme Court had indicated in its per curiam statement that it was only declining to act because of uncertainty as to what this Court would do, and since it was deemed appropriate for the state court to pass initially on the validity of the restrictive order, Mr. Justice Blackmun, “without prejudice to the [petitioners] to reapply to me should prompt action not be forthcoming,” id., at 1326, denied the stay “[o]n the expectation . . . that the Supreme Court of Nebraska, forthwith and without delay will entertain the *580[petitioners’] application made to it, and will promptly decide it in the full consciousness that ‘time is of the essence.’ ” Id., at 1325.

When, on November 18, the Supreme Court of Nebraska set November 25 as the date to hear arguments on petitioners’ motions, petitioners reapplied to Mr. Justice Blackmun for relief. On November 20, Mr. Justice Blackmun, concluding that each passing day constituted an irreparable infringement on First Amendment values and that the state courts had delayed adjudication of petitioners’ claims beyond “tolerable limits,” 423 U. S. 1327, 1329, granted a partial stay of the District Court’s order. First, the “wholesale incorporation” of the Nebraska Bar-Press Guidelines was stayed on the ground that they “constitute a 'voluntary code’ which was not intended to be mandatory” and which was “sufficiently riddled with vague and indefinite admonitions — understandably so in view of the basic nature of ‘guidelines,’ ” that they did “not provide the substance of a permissible court order in the First Amendment area.” Id., at 1330, 1331. However, the state courts could “reimpose particular provisions included in the Guidelines so long as they are deemed pertinent to the facts of this particular case and so long as they are adequately specific and in keeping with the remainder of this order.” Id., at 1331. Second, the portion of the District Court order prohibiting reporting of the details of the crimes, the identities of the victims, and the pathologist’s testimony at the preliminary hearing was stayed because there was “[n]o persuasive justification” for the restraint; such “facts in themselves do not implicate a particular putative defendant,” ibid., and “until the bare facts concerning the crimes are related to a particular accused, . . . their being reported in the media [does not appear to] irreparably infringe the accused’s right *581to a fair trial of the issue as to whether he was the one who committed the crimes.” Id., at 1332. Third, believing that prior restraints of this kind “are not necessarily and in all cases invalid,” Mr. Justice Black-mtjn concluded that “certain facts that strongly implicate an accused may be restrained from publication by the media prior to his trial. A confession or statement against interest is the paradigm,” id., at 1332-1333, and other such facts would include “those associated with the circumstances of his arrest,” those “that are not necessarily implicative, but that are highly prejudicial, as, for example, facts associated with the accused's criminal record, if he has one,” and “statements as to the accused's guilt by those associated with the prosecution.” Id., at 1333.5 Finally, the restrictive order’s limitation on disclosure of the nature of the limitations themselves was stayed “to the same extent” as the limitations. Ibid.6

The following day petitioners filed a motion that the Court vacate Mr. Justice Blackmun’s order to the extent it permitted the imposition of any prior restraint on publication. Meanwhile, on November 25, the Supreme Court of Nebraska heard oral argument as sched*582uled, and on December 1 filed a per curiam opinion.7 Initially, the court held that it was improper for petitioners or any other third party to intervene in a criminal case, and that the appeal from that case must therefore be denied. However, the court concluded that it had judisdiction over petitioners’ mandamus action against respondent Stuart, and that respondents Simants and State of Nebraska had properly intervened in that action.8 Addressing the merits of the prior restraint issued by the District Court, the Nebraska Supreme Court acknowledged that this Court “has not yet had occasion to speak definitively where a clash between these two preferred rights [the First Amendment freedom of speech and of the press and the Sixth Amendment right to trial by an impartial jury] was sought to be accommodated by a prior restraint on freedom of the press.” 194 Neb., at 791, 236 N. W. 2d, at 800. However, relying on dictum in Branzburg v. Hayes, 408 U. S. 665 (1972),9 and our statement in New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U. S. 713 (1971), that a prior restraint on the *583media bears “ ‘a heavy presumption against its constitutional validity/ ” id., at 714, the court discerned an “implication” “that if there is only a presumption of unconstitutionality then there must be some circumstances under which prior restraints may be constitutional for otherwise there is no need for a mere presumption.” 194 Neb., at 793, 236 N. W. 2d, at 801. The court then concluded that there was evidence “to overcome the heavy presumption” in that the State’s obligation to accord Simants an impartial jury trial “may be impaired” by pretrial publicity and that pretrial publicity “might make it difficult or impossible” to accord Simants a fair trial. Id., at 794, 797, 236 N. W. 2d, at 802, 803.10 Accordingly, the court held, id., at 801, 236 N. W. 2d, at 805:

“[T]he order of the District Court of October 27, 1975, is void insofar as it incorporates the voluntary guidelines and in certain other respects in that it impinges too greatly upon freedom of the press. The guidelines were not intended to be contractual and cannot be enforced as if they were.

“The order of the District Court of October 27, 1975, is vacated and is modified and reinstated in the *584following respects: It shall be effective only as to events which have occurred prior to the filing of this opinion, and only as it applies to the relators herein, and only insofar as it restricts publication of the existence or content of the following, if any such there be: (1) Confessions or admissions against interest made by the accused to law enforcement officials. (2) Confessions or admissions against interest, oral or written, if any, made by the accused to third parties, excepting any statements, if any, made by the accused to representatives of the news media. (3) Other information strongly implicative of the accused as the perpetrator of the slayings.”11

On December 4 petitioners applied to this Court for a stay of that order and moved that their previously filed papers be treated as a petition for a writ of certiorari. On December 8, we granted the latter motion and deferred consideration of the petition for a writ and application for a stay pending responses from respondents on the close of business the following day. 423 U. S. 1011.12 On December 12, we granted the petition for a writ of certiorari, denied the motion to expedite, and denied the application for a stay. 423 U. S. 1027.13

*585II

A

The Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution guarantees that “[i]n all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed . . . The right to a jury trial, applicable to the States through the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, see, e. g., Duncan v. Louisiana, 391 U. S. 145 (1968), is essentially *586the right to a “fair trial by a panel of impartial, ‘indifferent’ jurors,” Irvin v. Dowd, 366 U. S. 717, 722 (1961), jurors who are “ ‘indifferent as [they] stand unsworn.’ ” Reynolds v. United States, 98 U. S. 145, 154 (1879), quoting E. Coke, A Commentary upon Littleton 1556 (19th ed. 1832). See also, e. g., Ristaino v. Ross, 424 U. S. 589, 597 n. 9 (1976); Rideau v. Louisiana, 373 U. S. 723 (1963); Irvin v. Dowd, supra, at 722; In re Murchison, 349 U. S. 133, 136 (1955); In re Oliver, 333 U. S. 257 (1948). So basic to our jurisprudence is the right to a fair trial that it has been called “the most fundamental of all freedoms.” Estes v. Texas, 381 U. S. 532, 540 (1965). It is a right essential to the preservation and enjoyment of all other rights, providing a necessary means of safeguarding personal liberties against government oppression. See, e. g., Rideau v. Louisiana, supra, at 726-727. See generally Duncan v. Louisiana, supra, at 149-158.

The First Amendment to the United States Constitution, however, secures rights equally fundamental in our jurisprudence, and its ringing proclamation that “Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press . . .” has been both applied through the Fourteenth Amendment to invalidate restraints on freedom of the press imposed by the States, see, e. g., Miami Herald Publishing Co. v. Tornillo, 418 U. S. 241 (1974); New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254 (1964); Near v. Minnesota ex rel. Olson, 283 U. S. 697 (1931), and interpreted to interdict such restraints imposed by the courts, see, e. g., New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U. S. 713 (1971); Craig v. Harney, 331 U. S. 367 (1947); Bridges v. California, 314 U. S. 252 (1941). Indeed, it has been correctly perceived that a “responsible press has always been regarded as the handmaiden of effective judicial administration, especially in the criminal field. . . . The *587press does not simply publish information about trials but guards against the miscarriage of justice by subjecting the police, prosecutors, and judicial processes to extensive public scrutiny and criticism.” Sheppard v. Maxwell, 384 U. S. 333, 350 (1966). See also, e. g., Cox Broadcasting Corp. v. Cohn, 420 U. S. 469, 491-496 (1975). Commentary and reporting on the criminal justice system is at the core of First Amendment values, for the operation and integrity of that system is of crucial import to citizens concerned with the administration of government. Secrecy of judicial action can only breed ignorance and distrust of courts and suspicion concerning the competence and impartiality of judges; free and robust reporting, criticism, and debate can contribute to public understanding of the rule of law and to comprehension of the functioning of the entire criminal justice system, as well as improve the quality of that system by subjecting it to the cleansing effects of exposure and public accountability. See, e. g., In re Oliver, supra, at 270-271; L. Brandeis, Other People’s Money 62 (1933) (“Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants; electric light the most efficient policeman”).

No one can seriously doubt, however, that uninhibited prejudicial pretrial publicity may destroy the fairness of a criminal trial, see, e. g., Sheppard v. Maxwell, supra, and the past decade has witnessed substantial debate, colloquially known as the Free Press/Fair Trial controversy, concerning this interface of First and Sixth Amendment rights. In effect, we are now told by respondents that the two rights can no longer coexist when the press possesses and seeks to publish “confessions or admissions against interest” and other information “strongly implicative”14 of a criminal defendant as the *588perpetrator of a crime, and that one or the other right must therefore be subordinated. I disagree. Settled case law concerning the impropriety and constitutional invalidity of prior restraints on the press compels the conclusion that there can be no prohibition on the publication by the press of any information pertaining to pending judicial proceedings or the operation of the criminal justice system, no matter how shabby the means by which the information is obtained.15 This does not imply, however, any subordination of Sixth Amendment rights, for an accused’s right to a fair trial may be adequately assured through methods that do not infringe First Amendment values.

B

“[I]t has been generally, if not universally, considered that it is the chief purpose of the [First Amendment’s] guaranty to prevent previous restraints upon publica*589tion.” Near v. Minnesota ex rel. Olson, 283 U. S., at 713. See also, e. g., id., at 716-717; Patterson v. Colorado ex rel. Attorney General, 205 U. S. 454, 462 (1907) ; Grosjean v. American Press Co., 297 U. S. 233, 249 (1936).16 Prior restraints are “the essence of censorship,” Near v. Minnesota ex rel. Olson, supra, at 713, and “[o]nr distaste for censorship — reflecting the natural distaste of a free people — is deep-written in our law.” Southeastern Promotions, Ltd. v. Conrad, 420 U. S. 546, 553 (1975). The First Amendment thus accords greater protection against prior restraints than it does against subsequent punishment for a particular speech, see, e. g., Carroll v. Princess Anne, 393 U. S. 175, 180-181 (1968) ; Near v. Minnesota ex rel. Olson, supra; “a free society prefers to punish the few who abuse rights of speech after they break the law than to throttle them and all others beforehand. It is always difficult to know in advance what an individual will say, and the line between legitimate and illegitimate speech is often so finely drawn that the risks of free-wheeling censorship are formidable.” Southeastern Promotions, Ltd. v. Conrad, supra, at 559. A commentator has cogently summarized many of the reasons for this deep-seated American hostility to prior restraints:

“A system of prior restraint is in many ways more inhibiting than a system of subsequent punishment: It is likely to bring under government scrutiny a far wider range of expression; it shuts off communication before it takes place; suppression by a stroke of the pen is more likely to be applied than suppression through a criminal process; the procedures *590do not require attention to the safeguards of the criminal process; the system allows less opportunity for public appraisal and criticism; the dynamics of the system drive toward excesses, as the history of all censorship shows.” T. Emerson, The System of Freedom of Expression 506 (1970).17

Respondents correctly contend that “the [First Amendment] protection even as to previous restraint is not absolutely unlimited.” Near v. Minnesota ex rel. Olson, supra, at 716. However, the exceptions to the rule have been confined to “exceptional cases.” Ibid. The Court in Near, the first case in which we were faced with a prior restraint against the press, delimited three such possible exceptional circumstances. The first two exceptions were that “the primary requirements of decency may be enforced against obscene publications,” and that “[t]he security of the community life may be protected against incitements to acts of violence and the overthrow by force of orderly government [for] [t]he constitutional guaranty of free speech does not 'protect a man from an injunction against uttering words that may have all the effect of force. . . .’ ” Ibid. These exceptions have since come to be interpreted as situations in which the “speech” involved is not encompassed within the meaning of the First Amendment. See, e. g., Roth v. United States, 354 U. S. 476, 481 (1957); Miller v. California, 413 U. S. 15 (1973); Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, 315 U. S. 568 (1942). See also New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U. S., at 726 n. (Brennan, J., concurring); id., at 731 n. 1 (White, J., concurring). *591And even in these situations, adequate and timely procedures are mandated to protect against any restraint of speech that does come within the ambit of the First Amendment. See, e. g., Southeastern Promotions, Ltd. v. Conrad, supra; United States v. Thirty-seven Photographs, 402 U. S. 363 (1971); Freedman v. Maryland, 380 U. S. 51 (1965); Bantam Books, Inc. v. Sullivan, 372 U. S. 58 (1963); Speiser v. Randall, 357 U. S. 513 (1958); Kingsley Books, Inc. v. Brown, 354 U. S. 436 (1957). Thus, only the third category in Near contemplated the possibility that speech meriting and entitled to constitutional protection might nevertheless be suppressed before publication in the interest of some overriding countervailing interest:

“ ‘When a nation is at war many things that might be said in time of peace are such a hindrance to its effort that their utterance will not be endured so long as men fight and that no Court could regard them as protected by any constitutional right.’ Schenck v. United States, 249 U. S. 47, 52. No one would question but that a government might prevent actual obstruction to its recruiting service or the publication of the sailing dates of transports or the number and location of troops.” 283 U. S., at 716.

Even this third category, however, has only been adverted to in dictum and has never served as the basis for actually upholding a prior restraint against the publication of constitutionally protected materials. In New York Times Co. v. United States, supra, we specifically addressed the scope of the “military security” exception alluded to in Near and held that there could be no prior restraint on publication of the “Pentagon Papers” despite the fact that a majority of the Court believed that release of the documents, which were *592classified “Top Secret-Sensitive” and which were obtained surreptitiously, would be harmful to the Nation and might even be prosecuted after publication as a violation of various espionage statutes. To be sure, our brief per curiam declared that “‘[a]ny system of prior restraints of expression comes to this Court bearing a heavy presumption against its constitutional validity/ ” id., at 714, quoting Bantam Books, Inc. v. Sullivan, supra, at 70, and that the “Government 'thus carries a heavy burden of showing justification for the imposition of such a restraint.’ ” 403 U. S., at 714, quoting Organization for a Better Austin v. Keefe, 402 U. S. 415, 419 (1971). This does not mean, as the Nebraska Supreme Court assumed,18 that prior restraints can be justified on an ad hoc balancing approach that concludes that the “presumption” must be overcome in light of some perceived “justification.” Rather, this language refers to the fact that, as a matter of procedural safeguards and burden of proof, prior restraints even within a recognized exception to the rule against prior restraints will be extremely difficult to justify; but as an initial matter, the purpose for which a prior restraint is sought to be imposed “must fit within one of the narrowly defined exceptions to the prohibition against prior restraints.” Southeastern Promotions, Ltd. v. Conrad, 420 U. S., at 559; see also, e. g., id., at 555; Pittsburgh Press Co. v. Human Rel. Comm’n, 413 U. S. 376, 382 (1973); Organization for a Better Austin v. Keefe, supra, at 419-420; cf., e. g., Healy v. James, 408 U. S. 169 (1972) ; Freedman v. Maryland, 380 U. S., at 58-59. Indeed, two Justices in New York Times apparently controverted the existence of even a limited “military security” exception to the rule against prior restraints on the publication of otherwise protected material, see 403 U. S., *593at 714 (Black, J., concurring); id., at 720 (Douglas, J., concurring). And a majority of the other Justices who expressed their views on the merits made it clear that they would take cognizance only of a “single, extremely narrow class of cases in which the First Amendment’s ban on prior judicial restraint may be overridden.” Id., at 726 (Brennan, J., concurring). Although variously expressed, it was evident that even the exception was to be construed very, very narrowly: when disclosure “will surely result in direct, immediate, and irreparable damage to our Nation or its people,” id., at 730 (Stewart, J., joined by White, J., concurring) (emphasis supplied) or when there is “governmental allegation and proof that publication must inevitably, directly, and immediately cause the occurrence of an event kindred to imperiling the safety of a transport already at sea .... [But] [i]n no event may mere conclusions be sufficient.” Id., at 726-727 (Brennan, J., concurring) (emphasis supplied). See also id., at 730-731 (White, J., joined by Stewart, J., concurring) (“concededly extraordinary protection against prior restraints enjoyed by the press under our constitutional system” is not overcome even by a showing that “revelation of these documents will do substantial damage to public interests”).19 It is thus clear that even within the sole possible exception to the prohibition against prior restraints on publication of constitutionally protected materials, *594the obstacles to issuance of such an injunction are formidable. What respondents urge upon us, however, is the creation of a new, potentially pervasive exception to this settled rule of virtually blanket prohibition of prior restraints.20

I would decline this invitation. In addition to the almost insuperable presumption against the constitutionality of prior restraints even under a recognized exception, and however laudable the State's motivation for imposing restraints in this case,21 there are compelling *595reasons for not carving out a new exception to the rule against prior censorship' of publication.

1

Much of the information that the Nebraska courts *596enjoined petitioners from publishing was already in the public domain, having been revealed in open court proceedings or through public documents. Our prior cases have foreclosed any serious contention that further disclosure of such information can be suppressed before publication or even punished after publication. “A trial is a public event. What transpires in the court room is public property. . . . Those who see and hear what transpired can report it with impunity. There is no special perquisite of the judiciary which enables it, as distinguished from other institutions of democratic government, to suppress, edit, or censor events which transpire in proceedings before it.” Craig v. Harney, 331 U. S., at 374. Similarly, Estes v. Texas, 381 U. S., at 541-542, a case involving the Sixth Amendment right to a fair trial, observed: “[R]eporters of all media . . . are plainly free to report whatever occurs in open court through their respective media. This was settled in Bridges v. California, 314 U. S. 252 (1941), and Pennekamp v. Florida, 328 U. S. 331 (1946), which we reaffirm.” See also id., at 583-585 (Warren, C. J., concurring). And Sheppard v. Maxwell, 384 U. S., at 362-363, a case that detailed numerous devices that could be employed for ensuring fair trials, explicitly reiterated that “[o]f course, there is nothing that proscribes the press from reporting events that transpire in the courtroom.” See also id., at 350; Stroble v. California, 343 U. S. 181, 193 (1952). The continuing vitality of these statements was reaffirmed only last Term in Cox Broadcasting Corp. v. Cohn, a case involving a suit for damages brought after publication under state law recognizing the privacy interest of its citizens. In holding that *597a “State may [not] impose sanctions on the accurate publication of the name of a rape victim obtained from public records,” 420 U. S., at 491, we observed:

“[I]n a society in which each individual has but limited time and resources with which to observe at first hand the operations of his government, he relies necessarily upon the press to bring to him in convenient form the facts of those operations. Great responsibility is accordingly placed upon the news media to report fully and accurately the proceedings of government, and official records and documents open to the public are the basic data of governmental operations. Without the information provided by the press most of us and many of our representatives would be unable to vote intelligently or to register opinions on the administration of government generally. With respect to judicial proceedings in particular, the function of the press serves to guarantee the fairness of trials and to bring to bear the beneficial effects of public scrutiny upon the administration of justice. See Sheppard v. Maxwell, 384 U. S. 333, 350 (1966).

“Appellee has claimed in this litigation that the efforts of the press have infringed his right to privacy by broadcasting to the world the fact that his daughter was a rape victim. The commission of crime, prosecutions resulting from it, and judicial proceedings arising from the prosecutions, however, are without question events of legitimate ■ concern to the public and consequently fall within the responsibility of the press to report the operations of government.

“The special protected nature of accurate reports of judicial proceedings has repeatedly been recog-nizedId., at 491-492 (emphasis supplied).

*598“By placing the information in the public domain on official court records, the State must be presumed to have concluded that the public interest was thereby being served. Public records by their very nature are of interest to those concerned with the administration of government, and a public benefit is performed by the reporting of the true contents of the records by the media. The freedom of the press' to publish that information appears to us to be of critical importance to our type of government in which the citizenry is the final judge of the proper conduct of public business. In preserving that form of government the First and Fourteenth Amendments command nothing less than that the States may not impose sanctions on the publication of truthful information contained in official court records open to public inspection.” Id., at 495 (emphasis supplied).

See also id., at 496. Prior restraints are particularly anathematic to the First Amendment, and any immunity from punishment subsequent to publication of given material applies a fortiori to immunity from suppression of that material before publication. Thus,- in light of Craig, which involved a contempt citation for a threat to the administration of justice, and Cox Broadcasting, which similarly involved an attempt to establish civil liability after publication, it should be clear that no injunction against the reporting of such information can be permissible.

2

The order of the Nebraska Supreme Court also applied, of course,, to “confessions” and other information “strongly implicative” of the accused which were obtained from sources other than official records or open *599court proceedings. But for the reasons that follow — reasons equally applicable to information obtained by the press from official records or public court proceedings — I believe that the same rule against prior restraints governs any information pertaining to the criminal justice system, even if derived from nonpublic sources and regardless of the means employed by the press in its acquisition.

The only exception that has thus far been recognized even in dictum to the blanket prohibition against prior restraints against publication of material which would otherwise be constitutionally shielded was the “military security” situation addressed in New York Times Co. v. United States. But unlike the virtually certain, direct, and immediate harm required for such a restraint under Near and New York Times, the harm to a fair trial that might otherwise eventuate from publications which are suppressed pursuant to orders such as that under review must inherently remain speculative.

A judge importuned to issue a prior restraint in the pretrial context will be unable to predict the manner in which the potentially prejudicial information would be published, the frequency with which it would be repeated or the emphasis it would be given, the context in which or purpose for which it would be reported, the scope of the audience that would be exposed to the information,22 *600or the impact, evaluated in terms of current standards for assessing juror impartiality,23 the information would have on that audience. These considerations would render speculative the prospective impact on a fair trial of reporting even an alleged confession or other information “strongly implicative” of the accused. Moreover, we can take judicial notice of the fact that given the prevalence of plea bargaining, few criminal cases proceed to trial, and the judge would thus have to predict what the likelihood was that a jury would even have to be impaneled.24 Indeed, even in cases that do proceed to trial, the material sought to be suppressed before trial will often be admissible and may be admitted in any event.25 *601And, more basically, there are adequate devices for screening from jury duty those individuals who have in fact been exposed to prejudicial pretrial publicity.

Initially, it is important to note that once the jury is impaneled, the techniques of sequestration of jurors and control over the courtroom and conduct of trial should prevent prejudicial publicity from infecting the fairness of judicial proceedings.26 Similarly, judges may stem much of the flow of prejudicial publicity at its source, before it is obtained by representatives of the press.27 But even if the press nevertheless obtains potentially prejudicial information and decides to publish that infor*602mation, the Sixth Amendment rights of the accused may still be adequately protected. In particular, the trial judge should employ the voir dire to probe fully into the effect of publicity. The judge should broadly explore such matters as the extent to which prospective jurors had read particular news accounts or whether they had heard about incriminating data such as an alleged confession or statements by purportedly reliable sources concerning the defendant’s guilt. See, e. g., Ham v. South Carolina, 409 U. S. 524, 531-534 (1973) (opinion of Marshall, J.); Swain v. Alabama, 380 U. S. 202, 209-222 (1965). Particularly in cases of extensive publicity, defense counsel should be accorded more latitude in personally asking or tendering searching questions that might root out indications of bias, both to facilitate intelligent exercise of peremptory challenges and to help uncover factors that would dictate disqualification for cause. Indeed, it may sometimes be necessary to question on voir dire prospective jurors individually or in small groups, both to maximize the likelihood that members of the venire will respond honestly to questions concerning bias, and to avoid contaminating unbiased members of the venire when other members disclose prior knowledge of prejudicial information. Moreover, voir dire may indicate the need to grant a brief continuance 28 or to grant a change of venue,29 techniques that can ef*603fectively mitigate any publicity at a particular time or in a particular locale. Finally, if the trial court fails or refuses to utilize these devices effectively, there are the “palliatives” of reversals on appeal and directions for a new trial. Sheppard v. Maxwell, 384 U. S., at 363.30 We have indicated that even in a case involving outrageous publicity and a “carnival atmosphere” in the courtroom, “these procedures would have been sufficient to guarantee [the defendant] a fair trial . . . .” Id., at 358. See generally id., at 358-363; cf. Times-Picayune Pub. Corp. v. Schulingkamp, 419 U. S. 1301, 1308, and n. 3 (1974) (Powell, J., in chambers). For this reason, the one thing Sheppard did not approve was “any direct limitations on the freedom traditionally exercised by the news media.” 384 U. S., at 350.31 Indeed, the *604traditional techniques approved in Sheppard for ensuring fair trials would have been adequate in every case in which we have found that a new trial was required due to lack of fundamental fairness to the accused.

For these reasons alone I would reject the contention that speculative deprivation of an accused’s Sixth Amendment right to an impartial jury is comparable to the damage to the Nation or its people that Near and New York Times would have found sufficient to justify a prior restraint on reporting. Damage to that Sixth Amendment right could never be considered so direct, immediate and irreparable, and based on such proof rather than speculation, that prior restraints on the press could be justified on this basis.

C

There are additional, practical reasons for not starting down the path urged by respondents.32 The exception *605to the prohibition of prior restraints adumbrated in Near and New York Times involves no judicial weighing of the countervailing public interest in receiving the suppressed information; the direct, immediate, and irreparable harm that would result from disclosure is simply deemed to outweigh the public’s interest in knowing, for example, the specific details of troop movements during wartime. As the Supreme Court of Nebraska itself admitted,33 however, any attempt to impose a prior restraint on the reporting of information concerning the operation of the criminal justice system will inevitably involve the courts in an ad hoc evaluation of the need for the public to receive particular information that might nevertheless implicate the accused as the perpetrator of a crime. For example, disclosure of the *606circumstances surrounding the obtaining of an involuntary confession or the conduct of an illegal search resulting in incriminating fruits may be the necessary predicate for a movement to reform police methods, pass regulatory statutes, or remove judges who do not adequately oversee law enforcement activity; publication of facts surrounding particular plea-bargaining proceedings or the practice of plea bargaining generally may provoke substantial public concern as to the operations of the judiciary or the fairness of prosecutorial decisions; reporting the details of the confession of one accused may reveal that it may implicate others as well, and the public may rightly demand to know what actions are being taken by law enforcement personnel to bring those other individuals to justice; commentary on the fact that there is strong evidence implicating a government official in criminal activity goes to the very core of matters of public concern, and even a brief delay in reporting that information shortly before an election may have a decisive impact on the outcome of the democratic process, see Carroll v. Princess Anne, 393 U. S., at 182; dissemination of the fact that indicted individuals who had been accused of similar misdeeds in the past had not been prosecuted or had received only mild sentences may generate crucial debate on the functioning of the criminal justice system; revelation of the fact that despite apparently overwhelming evidence of guilt, prosecutions were dropped or never commenced against large campaign contributors or members of special interest groups may indicate possible corruption among government officials; and disclosure of the fact that a suspect has been apprehended as the perpetrator of a heinous crime may be necessary to calm community fears that the actual perpetrator is still at large. Cf. Times-Picayune Pub. Corp. v. Schulingkamp, 419 U. S., at 1302 *607(Powell, J., in chambers).34 In all of these situations, judges would be forced to evaluate whether the public interest in receiving the information outweighed the speculative impact on Sixth Amendment rights.

These are obviously only some examples of the problems that plainly would recur, not in the almost theoretical situation of suppressing disclosure of the location of troops during wartime, but on a regular basis throughout the courts of the land. Recognition of any judicial authority to impose prior restraints on the basis of harm to the Sixth Amendment rights of particular defendants, especially since that harm must remain speculative, will thus inevitably interject judges at all levels into censorship roles that are simply inappropriate and impermissible under the First Amendment. Indeed, the potential for arbitrary and excessive judicial utilization of any such power would be exacerbated by the fact that judges and committing magistrates might in some cases be determining the propriety of publishing information that reflects on their competence, integrity, or general performance on the bench.

There would be, in addition, almost intractable procedural difficulties associated with any attempt to impose prior restraints on publication of information relating to pending criminal proceedings, and the ramifications of these procedural difficulties would accentuate the burden on First Amendment rights. The incentives and dynamics of the system of prior restraints would inevitably lead to overemployment of the technique. In order to minimize pretrial publicity against *608his clients and pre-empt ineffective-assistance-of-counsel claims, counsel for defendants might routinely seek such restrictive orders. Prosecutors would often acquiesce in such motions to avoid jeopardizing a conviction on appeal. And although judges could readily reject many such claims as frivolous, there would be a significant danger that judges would nevertheless be predisposed to grant the motions, both to ease their task of ensuring fair proceedings and to insulate their conduct in the criminal proceeding from reversal. We need not raise any specter of floodgates of litigation or drain on judicial resources to note that the litigation with respect to these motions will substantially burden the media. For to bind the media, they would have to be notified and accorded an opportunity to be heard. See, e. g., Carroll v. Princess Anne, supra; McKinney v. Alabama, 424 U. S. 669 (1976). This would at least entail the possibility of restraint proceedings collateral to every criminal case before the courts, and there would be a significant financial drain on the media involuntarily made parties to these proceedings. Indeed, small news organs on the margin of economic viability might choose not to contest even blatantly unconstitutional restraints or to avoid all crime coverage, with concomitant harm to the public’s right to be informed of such proceedings.35 Such acquiescence might also mean that significant erroneous precedents will remain unchallenged, to be relied on for even broader restraints in the future. Moreover, these collateral restraint proceedings would be unlikely to result in equal treatment of all *609organs of the media36 and, even if all the press could be brought into the proceeding, would often be ineffective, since disclosure of incriminating material may transpire before an effective restraint could be imposed.37

To be sure, because the decision to impose such restraints even on the disclosure of supposedly narrow categories of information would depend on the facts of each case, and because precious First Amendment rights are at stake, those who could afford the substantial costs would seek appellate review. But that review is often inadequate, since delay inherent in judicial proceedings could itself destroy the contemporary news value of the information the press seeks to disseminate.38 As one commentator has observed:

“Prior restraints fall on speech with a brutality and a finality all their own. Even if they are ultimately lifted they cause irremediable loss — a loss in the immediacy, the impact, of speech. . . . Indeed it is the hypothesis of the First Amendment that injury is inflicted on our society when we stifle the immediacy of speech.” A. Bickel, The Morality of Consent 61 (1975).39

*610And, as noted, given the significant financial disincentives, particularly on the smaller organs of the media,40 to challenge any restrictive orders once they are imposed *611by trial judges, there is the distinct possibility that many erroneous impositions would remain uncorrected.41

Ill

I unreservedly agree with Mr. Justice Black that “free speech and fair trials are two of the most cherished policies of our civilization, and it would be a trying task to choose between them.” Bridges v. California, 314 U. S., at 260. But I would reject the notion that a *612choice is necessary, that there is an inherent conflict that cannot be resolved without essentially abrogating one right or the other. To hold that courts cannot impose any prior restraints on the reporting of or commentary upon information revealed in open court proceedings, disclosed in public documents, or divulged by other sources with respect to the criminal justice system is not, I must emphasize, to countenance the sacrifice of precious Sixth Amendment rights on the altar of the First Amendment. For although there may in some instances be tension between uninhibited and robust reporting by the press and fair trials for criminal defendants, judges possess adequate tools short of injunctions against reporting for relieving that tension. To be sure, these alternatives may require greater sensitivity and effort on the part of judges conducting criminal trials than would the stifling of publicity through the simple expedient of issuing a restrictive order on the press; but that sensitivity and effort is required in order to ensure the full enjoyment and proper accommodation of both First and Sixth Amendment rights.

There is, beyond peradventure, a clear and substantial damage to freedom of the press whenever even a temporary restraint is imposed on reporting of material concerning the operations of the criminal justice system, an institution of such pervasive influence in our constitutional scheme. And the necessary impact of reporting even confessions can never be so direct, immediate, and irreparable that I would give credence to any notion that prior restraints may be imposed on that rationale. It may be that such incriminating material would be of such slight news value or so inflammatory in particular cases that responsible organs of the media, in an exercise of self-restraint, would choose not to publicize that material, and not make the judicial task of safeguarding *613precious rights of criminal defendants more difficult. Voluntary codes such as the Nebraska Bar-Press Guidelines are a commendable acknowledgment by the media that constitutional prerogatives bring enormous responsibilities, and I would encourage continuation of such voluntary cooperative efforts between the bar and the media. However, the press may be arrogant, tyrannical, abusive, and sensationalist, just as it may be incisive, probing, and informative. But at least in the context of prior restraints on publication, the decision of what, when, and how to publish is for editors, not judges. See, e. g., Near v. Minnesota ex rel. Olson, 283 U. S., at 720; Cox Broadcasting Corp. v. Cohn, 420 U. S., at 496; Miami Herald Publishing Co. v. Tornillo, 418 U. S., at 258; id., at 259 (White, J., concurring); cf. New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S., at 269-283. Every restrictive order imposed on the press in this case was accordingly an unconstitutional prior restraint on the freedom of the press, and I would therefore reverse the judgment of the Nebraska Supreme Court and remand for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.

APPENDIX TO OPINION OF BRENNAN, J., CONCURRING IN JUDGMENT

NEBRASKA BAR-PRESS GUIDELINES FOR DISCLOSURE AND REPORTING OF INFORMATION RELATING TO IMMINENT OR PENDING CRIMINAL LITIGATION

These voluntary guidelines reflect standards which bar and news media representatives believe are a reasonable means of accommodating, on a voluntary basis, the correlative constitutional rights of free speech and free press with the right of an accused to a fair trial. They *614are not intended to prevent the news media from inquiring into and reporting on the integrity, fairness, efficiency and effectiveness of law enforcement, the administration of justice, or political or governmental questions whenever involved in the judicial process.

As a voluntary code, these guidelines do not necessarily reflect in all respects what the members of the bar or the news media believe would be permitted or required by law.

Information Generally Appropriate for Disclosure, Reporting

Generally, it is appropriate to disclose and report the following information:

1. The arrested person’s name, age, residence, employment, marital status and similar biographical information.

2. The charge, its text, any amendments thereto, and, if applicable, the identity of the complainant.

3. The amount or conditions of bail.

4. The identity of and biographical information concerning the complaining party and victim, and, if a death is involved, the apparent cause of death unless it appears that the cause of death may be a contested issue.

5. The identity of the investigating and arresting agencies and the length of the investigation.

6. The circumstances of arrest, including time, place, resistance, pursuit, possession of and all weapons used, and a description of the items seized at the time of arrest. It is appropriate to disclose and report at the time of seizure the description of physical evidence subsequently seized other than a confession, admission or statement. It is appropriate to disclose and report the subsequent finding of weapons, bodies, contraband, stolen property and similar physical items if, in view *615of the time and other circumstances, such disclosure and reporting are not likely to interfere with a fair trial.

7. Information disclosed by the public records, including all testimony and other evidence adduced at the trial.

Information Generally Not Appropriate for Disclosure, Reporting

Generally, it is not appropriate to disclose or report the following information because of the risk of prejudice to the right of an accused to a fair trial:

1. The existence or contents of any confession, admission or statement given by the accused, except it may be stated that the accused denies the charges made against him. This paragraph is not intended to apply to statements made by the accused to representatives of the news media or to the public.

2. Opinions concerning the guilt, the innocence or the character of the accused.

3. Statements predicting or influencing the outcome of the trial.

4. Results of any examination or tests or the accused;s refusal or failure to submit to an examination or test.

5. Statements or opinions concerning the credibility or anticipated testimony of prospective witnesses.

6. Statements made in the judicial proceedings outside the presence of the jury relating to confessions or other matters which, if reported, would likely interfere with a fair trial.

Prior Criminal Records

Lawyers and law enforcement personnel should not volunteer the prior criminal records of an accused except to aid in his apprehension or to warn the public of any dangers he presents. The news media can obtain prior criminal records from the public records of the courts, *616police agencies and other governmental agencies and from their own files. The news media acknowledge, however, that publication or broadcast of an individual’s criminal record can be prejudicial, and its publication or broadcast should be considered very carefully, particularly after the filing of formal charges and as the time of the trial approaches, and such publication or broadcast should generally be avoided because readers, viewers and listeners are potential jurors and an accused is presumed innocent until proven guilty.

Photographs

1. Generally, it is not appropriate for law enforcement personnel to deliberately pose a person in custody for photographing or televising by representatives of the news media.

2. Unposed photographing and televising of an accused outside the courtroom is generally appropriate, and law enforcement personnel should not interfere with such photographing or televising except in compliance with an order of the court or unless such photographing or televising would interfere with their official duties.

3. It is appropriate for law enforcement personnel to release to representatives of the news media photographs of a suspect or an accused. Before publication of any such photographs, the news media should eliminate any portions of the photographs that would indicate a prior criminal offense or police record.

Continuing Committee for Cooperation

The members of the bar and the news media recognize the desirability of continued joint efforts in attempting to resolve any areas of differences that may arise in their mutual objective of assuring to all Americans both the correlative constitutional rights to free*617dom of speech and press and to a fair trial. The bar and the news media, through their respective associations, have determined to establish a permanent committee to revise these guidelines whenever this appears necessary or appropriate, to issue opinions as to their application to specific situations, to receive, evaluate and make recommendations with respect to complaints and to seek to effect through educational and other voluntary means a proper accommodation of the constitutional correlative rights of free speech, free press and fair trial.

June, 1970

Mr. Justice Stevens,

concurring in the judgment.

For the reasons eloquently stated by Mr. Justice Brennan, I agree that the judiciary is capable of protecting the defendant's right to a fair trial without enjoining the press from publishing information in the public domain, and that it may not do so. Whether the same absolute protection would apply no matter how shabby or illegal the means by which the information is obtained, no matter how serious an intrusion on privacy might be involved, no matter how demonstrably false the information might be, no matter how prejudicial it might be to the interests of innocent persons, and no matter how perverse the motivation for publishing it, is a question I would not answer without further argument. See Ashwander v. TV A, 297 U. S. 288, 346-347 (Brandeis, J., concurring). I do, however, subscribe to most of what Mr. Justice Brennan says and, if ever required to face the issue squarely, may well accept his ultimate conclusion.

Opinion of the Court by

Mr. Justice White,

announced by The Chief Justice.

The issue in these cases is whether requiring newsmen to appear and testify before state or federal grand juries abridges the freedom of speech and press guaranteed by the First Amendment. We hold that it does not.

I

The writ of certiorari in No. 70-85, Branzburg v. Hayes and Meigs, brings before us two judgments of the Kentucky Court of Appeals, both involving petitioner Branzburg, a staff reporter for the Courier-Journal, a daily newspaper published in Louisville, Kentucky.

On November 15, 1969, the Courier-Journal carried a story under petitioner’s by-line describing in detail his observations of two young residents of Jefferson County synthesizing hashish from marihuana, an activity which, they asserted, earned them about $5,000 in three weeks. The article included a photograph of a pair of hands working above a laboratory table on which was a substance identified by the caption as hashish. The article stated that petitioner had promised not to *668reveal the identity of the two hashish makers.1 Petitioner was shortly subpoenaed by the Jefferson County grand jury; he appeared, but refused to identify the individuals he had seen possessing marihuana or the persons he had seen making hashish from marihuana.2 A state trial court judge3 ordered petitioner to answer these questions and rejected his contention that the Kentucky reporters’ privilege statute, Ky. Rev. Stat. §421.100 (1962),4 the First Amendment of the United States Constitution, or §§ 1, 2, and 8 of the Kentucky Constitution authorized his refusal to answer. Petitioner then sought prohibition and mandamus in the Kentucky Court of Appeals on the same grounds, but the Court of Appeals denied the petition. Branzburg v. *669Pound, 461 S. W. 2d 345 (1970), as modified on denial of rehearing, Jan. 22, 1971. It held that petitioner had abandoned his First Amendment argument in a supplemental memorandum he had filed and tacitly rejected his argument based on the Kentucky Constitution. It also construed Ky. Rev. Stat. § 421.100 as affording a newsman the privilege of refusing to divulge the identity of an informant who supplied him with information, but held that the statute did not permit a reporter to refuse to testify about events he had observed personally, including the identities of those persons he had observed.

The second case involving petitioner Branzburg arose out of his later story published on January 10, 1971, which described in detail the use of drugs in Frankfort, Kentucky. The article reported that in order to provide a comprehensive survey of the “drug scene” in Frankfort, petitioner had “spent two weeks interviewing several dozen drug users in the capital city” and had seen some of them smoking marihuana. A number of conversations with and observations of several unnamed drug users were recounted. Subpoenaed to appear before a Franklin County grand jury “to testify in the matter of violation of statutes concerning use and sale of drugs,” petitioner Branzburg moved to quash the summons;5 the motion was denied, al*670though an order was issued protecting Branzburg from revealing “confidential associations, sources or information” but requiring that he “answer any questions which concern or pertain to any criminal act, the commission of which was actually observed by [him].” Prior to the time he was slated to appear before the grand jury, petitioner sought mandamus and prohibition from the Kentucky Court of Appeals, arguing that if he were forced to go before the grand jury or to answer questions regarding the identity of informants or disclose information given to him in confidence, his effectiveness as a reporter would be greatly damaged. The Court of Appeals once again denied the requested writs, reaffirming its construction of Ky. Rev. Stat. § 421.100, and rejecting petitioner’s claim of a First Amendment privilege. It distinguished Caldwell v. United States, 434 F. 2d 1081 (CA9 1970), and it also announced its “misgivings” about that decision, asserting that it represented “a drastic departure from the generally recognized rule that the sources of information of a newspaper reporter are not privileged under the First Amendment.” It characterized petitioner’s fear that his ability to obtain *671news would be destroyed as “so tenuous that it does not, in the opinion of this court, present an issue of abridgement of the freedom of the press within the meaning of that term as used in the Constitution of the United States.”

Petitioner sought a writ of certiorari to review both judgments of the Kentucky Court of Appeals, and we granted the writ.6 402 U. S. 942 (1971).

*672In re Pappas, No. 70-94, originated when petitioner Pappas, a television newsman-photographer working out of the Providence, Rhode Island, office of a New Bedford, Massachusetts, television station, was called to New Bedford on July 30, 1970, to report on civil disorders there which involved fires and other turmoil. He intended to cover a Black Panther news conference at that group’s headquarters in a boarded-up store. Petitioner found the streets around the store barricaded, but he ultimately gained entrance to the area and recorded and photographed a prepared statement read by one of the Black Panther leaders at about 3 p. m.7 He then asked for and received permission to reenter the area. Returning at about 9 o’ clock, he was allowed to enter and remain inside Panther headquarters. As a condition of entry, Pappas agreed not to disclose anything he saw or heard inside the store except an anticipated police raid, which Pappas, “on his own,” was free to photograph and report as he wished. Pappas stayed inside the headquarters for about three hours, but there was no police raid, and petitioner wrote no story and did not otherwise reveal what had occurred in the store while he was there. Two months later, petitioner was summoned before the Bristol *673County Grand Jury and appeared, answered questions as to his name, address, employment, and what he had seen and heard outside Panther headquarters, but refused to answer any questions about what had taken place inside headquarters while he was there, claiming that the First Amendment afforded him a privilege to protect confidential informants and their information. A second summons was then served upon him, again directing him to appear before the grand jury and “to give such evidence as he knows relating to any matters which may be inquired of on behalf of the Commonwealth before . . . the Grand Jury.” His motion to quash on First Amendment and other grounds was denied by the trial judge who, noting the absence of a statutory newsman’s privilege in Massachusetts, ruled that petitioner had no constitutional privilege to refuse to divulge to the grand jury what he had seen and heard, including the identity of persons he had observed. The case was reported for decision to the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts.8 The record there did not include a transcript of the hearing on the motion to quash, nor did it reveal the specific questions petitioner had refused to answer, the expected nature of his testimony, the nature of the grand jury investigation, or the likelihood of the grand jury’s securing the information it sought from petitioner by other means.9 The *674Supreme Judicial Court, however, took “judicial notice that in July, 1970, there were serious civil disorders in New Bedford, which involved street barricades, exclusion of the public from certain streets, fires, and similar turmoil. We were told at the arguments that there was gunfire in certain streets. We assume that the grand jury investigation was an appropriate effort to discover and indict those responsible for criminal acts.” 358 Mass. 604, 607, 266 N. E. 2d 297, 299 (1971). The court then reaffirmed prior Massachusetts holdings that testimonial privileges were “exceptional” and “limited,” stating that “[t]he principle that the public ‘has a right to every man’s evidence’ ” had usually been preferred, in the Commonwealth, to countervailing interests. Ibid. The court rejected the holding of the Ninth Circuit in Caldwell v. United States, supra, and “adhere [d] to the view that there exists no constitutional newsman’s privilege, either qualified or absolute, to refuse to appear and testify before a court or grand jury.” 10 358 Mass., at 612, 266 N. E. 2d, at 302-303. Any adverse effect upon the free dissemination of news by virtue of petitioner’s being called to testify was deemed to be only “indirect, theoretical, and uncertain.” Id., at 612, 266 N. E. 2d, at 302. The court concluded that “[t]he obligation of newsmen ... is that of every citizen ... to appear when summoned, with relevant written or other material when required, and to answer relevant and reasonable inquiries.” Id., at 612, 266 N. E. 2d, at 303. The court nevertheless noted that grand juries were subject to supervision by the presid*675ing judge, who had the duty “to prevent oppressive, unnecessary, irrelevant, and other improper inquiry and investigation,” ibid., to insure that a witness’ Fifth Amendment rights were not infringed, and to assess the propriety, necessity, and pertinence of the probable testimony to the investigation in progress.11 The burden was deemed to be on the witness to establish the impropriety of the summons or the questions asked. The denial of the motion to quash was affirmed and we granted a writ of certiorari to petitioner Pappas. 402 U. S. 942 (1971).

United States v. Caldwell, No. 70-57, arose from subpoenas issued by a federal grand jury in the Northern District of California to respondent Earl Caldwell, a reporter for the New York Times assigned to cover the Black Panther Party and other black militant groups. A subpoena duces tecum was served on respondent on February 2, 1970, ordering him to appear before the grand jury to testify and to bring with him notes and tape recordings of interviews given him for publication by officers and spokesmen of the Black Panther Party concerning the aims, purposes, and activities of that organization.12 Respondent objected to the scope *676of this subpoena, and an agreement between his counsel and the Government attorneys resulted in a continuance. A second subpoena, served on March 16, omitted the documentary requirement and simply ordered Caldwell “to appear ... to testify before the Grand Jury.” Respondent and his employer, the New York Times,13 moved to quash on the ground that the unlimited breadth of the subpoenas and the fact that Caldwell would have to appear in secret before the grand jury would destroy his working relationship with the Black Panther Party and “suppress vital First Amendment freedoms ... by driving a wedge of distrust and silence between the news media and the militants.” App. 7. Respondent argued that “so drastic an incursion upon First Amendment freedoms” should not be permitted “in the absence of a compelling governmental interest — not shown here — in requiring Mr. Caldwell's appearance before the grand jury.” Ibid. The motion was supported by amicus curiae memoranda from other publishing concerns and by affidavits from newsmen asserting the unfavorable impact on news sources of requiring reporters to appear before grand juries. The Government filed three memoranda in opposition to the motion to quash, each supported by affidavits. These documents stated that the grand jury was investigating, among other things, possible violations of a number of criminal statutes, including 18 U. S. C. § 871 (threats against the President), 18 U. S. C. *677§ 1751 (assassination, attempts to assassinate, conspiracy to assassinate the President), 18 U. S. C. § 231 (civil disorders), 18 U. S. C. § 2101 (interstate travel to incite a riot), and 18 U. S. C. § 1341 (mail frauds and swindles). It was recited that on November 15, 1969, an officer of the Black Panther Party made a publicly televised speech in which he had declared that “[w]e will kill Richard Nixon” and that this threat had been repeated in three subsequent issues of the Party newspaper. App. 66, 77. Also referred to were various writings by Caldwell about the Black Panther Party, including an article published in the New York Times on December 14, 1969, stating that “[i]n their role as the vanguard in a revolutionary struggle the Panthers have picked up guns,” and quoting the Chief of Staff of the Party as declaring: “We advocate the very direct overthrow of the Government by way of force and violence. By picking up guns and moving against it because we recognize it as being oppressive and in recognizing that we know that the only solution to it is armed struggle [sic].” App. 62. The Government also stated that the Chief of Staff of the Party had been indicted by the grand jury on December 3, 1969, for uttering threats against the life of the President in violation of 18 U. S. C. § 871 and that various efforts had been made to secure evidence of crimes under investigation through the immunization of persons allegedly associated with the Black Panther Party.

On April 6, the District Court denied the motion to quash, Application of Caldwell, 311 F. Supp. 358 (ND Cal. 1970), on the ground that “every person within the jurisdiction of the government” is bound to testify upon being properly summoned. Id., at 360 (emphasis in original) . Nevertheless, the court accepted respondent’s First Amendment arguments to the extent of issuing a protective order, providing that although respondent had to di*678vulge whatever information had been given to him for publication, he “shall not be required to reveal confidential associations, sources or information received, developed or maintained by him as a professional journalist in the course of his efforts to gather news for dissemination to the public through the press or other news media.” The court held that the First Amendment afforded respondent a privilege to refuse disclosure of such confidential information until there had been “a showing by the Government of a compelling and overriding national interest in requiring Mr. Caldwell’s testimony which cannot be served by any alternative means.” Id., at 362.

Subsequently,14 the term of the grand jury expired, a new grand jury was convened, and a new subpoena ad testificandum was issued and served on May 22, 1970. A new motion to quash by respondent and memorandum in opposition by the Government were filed, and, by stipulation of the parties, the motion was submitted on the prior record. The court denied the motion to quash, repeating the protective provisions in its prior order but this time directing Caldwell to appear before the grand jury pursuant to the May 22 subpoena. Respondent refused to appear before the grand jury, and the court issued an order to show cause why he should not be held in contempt. Upon his further refusal to go before the grand jury, respondent was ordered committed for contempt until such time as he complied with the court’s order or until the expiration of the term of the grand jury.

*679Respondent Caldwell appealed the contempt order,15 and the Court of Appeals reversed. Caldwell v. United States, 434 F. 2d 1081 (CA9 1970). Viewing the issue before it as whether Caldwell was required to appear before the grand jury at all, rather than the scope of permissible interrogation, the court first determined that the First Amendment provided a qualified testimonial privilege to newsmen; in its view, requiring a reporter like Caldwell to testify would deter his informants from communicating with him in the future and would cause him to censor his writings in an effort to avoid being subpoenaed. Absent compelling reasons for requiring his testimony, he was held privileged to withhold it. The court also held, for similar First Amendment reasons, that, absent some special showing of necessity by the Government, attendance by Caldwell at a secret meeting of the grand jury was something he was privileged to refuse because of the potential impact of such an appearance on the flow of news to the public. We granted the United States’ petition for certiorari.16 402 U. S. 942 (1971).

II

Petitioners Branzburg and Pappas and respondent Caldwell press First Amendment claims that may be simply put: that to gather news it is often necessary to agree either not to identify the source of information published or to publish only part of the facts revealed, or both; that if the reporter is nevertheless *680forced to reveal these confidences to a grand jury, the source so identified and other confidential sources of other reporters will be measurably deterred from furnishing publishable information, all to the detriment of the free flow of information protected by the First Amendment. Although the newsmen in these cases do not claim an absolute privilege against official interrogation in all circumstances, they assert that the reporter should not be forced either to appear or to testify before a grand jury or at trial until and unless sufficient grounds are shown for believing that the reporter possesses information relevant to a crime the grand jury is investigating, that the information the reporter has is unavailable from other sources, and that the need for the information is sufficiently compelling to override the claimed invasion of First Amendment interests occasioned by the disclosure. Principally relied upon are prior cases emphasizing the importance of the First Amendment guarantees to individual development and to our system of representative government,17 decisions requiring that official action with adverse impact on First Amendment rights be justified by a public interest that is “compelling” or “paramount,” 18 and those precedents establishing the principle that justifiable governmental goals may not be achieved by unduly broad means having an unnecessary impact *681on protected rights of speech, press, or association.19 The heart of the claim is that the burden on news gathering resulting from compelling reporters to disclose confidential information outweighs any public interest in obtaining the information.20

We do not question the significance of free speech, press, or assembly to the country’s welfare. Nor is it suggested that news gathering does not qualify for First Amendment protection; without some protection for seeking out the news, freedom of the press could be eviscerated. But these cases involve no intrusions upon speech or assembly, no prior restraint or restriction on what the press may publish, and no express or implied command that the press publish what it prefers to withhold. No exaction or tax for the privilege of publishing, and no penalty, civil or criminal, related to the content of published material is at issue here. The use of confidential sources by the press is not forbidden or restricted; reporters remain free to seek news from *682any source by means within the law. No attempt is made to require the press to publish its sources of information or indiscriminately to disclose them on request.

The sole issue before us is the obligation of reporters to respond to grand jury subpoenas as other citizens do and to answer questions relevant to an investigation into the commission of crime. Citizens generally are not constitutionally immune from grand jury subpoenas; and neither the First Amendment nor any other constitutional provision protects the average citizen from disclosing to a grand jury information that he has received in confidence.21 The claim is, however, that reporters are exempt from these obligations because if forced to respond to subpoenas and identify their sources or disclose other confidences, their informants will refuse or be reluctant to furnish newsworthy information in the future. This asserted burden on news gathering is said to make compelled testimony from newsmen constitutionally suspect and to require a privileged position for them.

It is clear that the First Amendment does not invalidate every incidental burdening of the press that may result from the enforcement of civil or criminal statutes of general applicability. Under prior cases, otherwise valid laws serving substantial public interests may be enforced against the press as against others, despite *683the possible burden that may be imposed. The Court has emphasized that “[t]he publisher of a newspaper has no special immunity from the application of general laws. He has no special privilege to invade the rights and liberties of others.” Associated Press v. NLRB, 301 U. S. 103, 132-133 (1937). It was there held that the Associated Press, a news-gathering and disseminating organization, was not exempt from the requirements of the National Labor Relations Act. The holding was reaffirmed in Oklahoma Press Publishing Co. v. Walling, 327 U. S. 186, 192-193 (1946), where the Court rejected the claim that applying the Fair Labor Standards Act to a newspaper publishing business would abridge the freedom of press guaranteed by the First Amendment. See also Mabee v. White Plains Publishing Co., 327 U. S. 178 (1946). Associated Press v. United States, 326 U. S. 1 (1945), similarly overruled assertions that the First Amendment precluded application of the Sherman Act to a news-gathering and disseminating organization. Cf. Indiana Farmer’s Guide Publishing Co. v. Prairie Farmer Publishing Co., 293 U. S. 268, 276 (1934); Citizen Publishing Co. v. United States, 394 U. S. 131, 139 (1969); Lorain Journal Co. v. United States, 342 U. S. 143, 155-156 (1951). Likewise, a newspaper may be subjected to nondiscriminatory forms of general taxation. Grosjean v. American Press Co., 297 U. S. 233, 250 (1936); Murdock v. Pennsylvania, 319 U. S. 105, 112 (1943).

The prevailing view is that the press is not free to publish with impunity everything and anything it desires to publish. Although it may deter or regulate what is said or published, the press may not circulate knowing or reckless falsehoods damaging to private reputation without subjecting itself to liability for damages, including punitive damages, or even criminal prosecution. See New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254, *684279-280 (1964); Garrison v. Louisiana, 379 U. S. 64, 74 (1964); Curtis Publishing Co. v. Butts, 388 U. S. 130, 147 (1967) (opinion of Harlan, J.,); Monitor Patriot Co. v. Roy, 401 U. S. 265, 277 (1971). A newspaper or a journalist may also be punished for contempt of court, in appropriate circumstances. Craig v. Harney, 331 U. S. 367, 377-378 (1947).

It has generally been held that the First Amendment does not guarantee the press a constitutional right of special access to information not available to the public generally. Zemel v. Rusk, 381 U. S. 1, 16-17 (1965); New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U. S. 713, 728-730 (1971), (Stewart, J., concurring); Tribune Review Publishing Co. v. Thomas, 254 F. 2d 883, 885 (CA3 1958) ; In the Matter of United Press Assns. v. Valente, 308 N. Y. 71, 77, 123 N. E. 2d 777, 778 (1954). In Zemel v. Rusk, supra, for example, the Court sustained the Government’s refusal to validate passports to Cuba even though that restriction “render[ed] less than wholly free the flow of information concerning that country.” Id., at 16. The ban on travel was held constitutional, for “[t]he right to speak and publish does not carry with it the unrestrained right to gather information.” Id., at 17.22

Despite the fact that news gathering may be hampered, the press is regularly excluded from grand jury proceedings, our own conferences, the meetings of other official bodies gathered in executive session, and the meetings of private organizations. Newsmen have no constitutional right of access to the scenes of crime or *685disaster when the general public is excluded, and they may be prohibited from attending or publishing information about trials if such restrictions are necessary to assure a defendant a fair trial before an impartial tribunal. In Sheppard v. Maxwell, 384 U. S. 333 (1966), for example, the Court reversed a state court conviction where the trial court failed to adopt “stricter rules governing the use of the courtroom by newsmen, as Sheppard’s counsel requested,” neglected to insulate witnesses from the press, and made no “effort to control the release of leads, information, and gossip to the press by police officers, witnesses, and the counsel for both sides.” Id., at 358, 359. “[T]he trial court might well have proscribed extrajudicial statements by any lawyer, party, witness, or court official which divulged prejudicial matters.” Id., at 361. See also Estes v. Texas, 381 U. S. 532, 539-540 (1965); Rideau v. Louisiana, 373 U. S. 723, 726 (1963).

It is thus not surprising that the great weight of authority is that newsmen are not exempt from the normal duty of appearing before a grand jury and answering questions relevant to a criminal investigation. At common law, courts consistently refused to recognize the existence of any privilege authorizing a newsman to refuse to reveal confidential information to a grand jury. See, e. g., Ex parte Lawrence, 116 Cal. 298, 48 P. 124 (1897); Plunkett v. Hamilton, 136 Ga. 72, 70 S. E. 781 (1911); Clein v. State, 52 So. 2d 117 (Fla. 1950); In re Grunow, 84 N. J. L. 235, 85 A. 1011 (1913); People ex rel. Mooney v. Sheriff, 269 N. Y. 291, 199 N. E. 415 (1936); Joslyn v. People, 67 Colo. 297, 184 P. 375 (1919); Adams v. Associated Press, 46 F. R. D. 439 (SD Tex. 1969); Brewster v. Boston Herald-Traveler Corp., 20 F. R. D. 416 (Mass. 1957). See generally Annot., 7 A. L. R. 3d 591 (1966). In 1958, a news gatherer asserted for the first time that the First Amend*686ment exempted confidential information from public disclosure pursuant to a subpoena issued in a civil suit, Garland v. Torre, 259 F. 2d 545 (CA2), cert. denied, 358 U. S. 910 (1958), but the claim was denied, and this argument has been almost uniformly rejected since then, although there are occasional dicta that, in circumstances not presented here, a newsman might be excused. In re Goodfader, 45 Haw. 317, 367 P. 2d 472 (1961); In re Taylor, 412 Pa. 32, 193 A. 2d 181 (1963); State v. Buchanan, 250 Ore. 244, 436 P. 2d 729, cert. denied, 392 U. S. 905 (1968); Murphy v. Colorado (No. 19604, Sup. Ct. Colo.), cert. denied, 365 U. S. 843 (1961) (unreported, discussed in In re Goodfader, supra, at 366, 367 P. 2d, at 498 (Mizuha, J., dissenting)). These courts have applied the presumption against the existence of an asserted testimonial privilege, United States v. Bryan, 339 U. S. 323, 331 (1950), and have concluded that the First Amendment interest asserted by the newsman was outweighed by the general obligation of a citizen to appear before a grand jury or at trial, pursuant to a subpoena, and give what information he possesses. The opinions of the state courts in Branzburg and Pappas are typical of the prevailing view, although a few recent cases, such as Caldwell, have recognized and given effect to some form of constitutional newsman’s privilege. See State v. Knops, 49 Wis. 2d 647, 183 N. W. 2d 93 (1971) (dictum); Alioto v. Cowles Communications, Inc., C. A. No. 52150 (ND Cal. 1969); In re Grand Jury Witnesses, 322 F. Supp. 573 (ND Cal. 1970); People v. Dohrn, Crim. No. 69-3808 (Cook County, Ill., Cir. Ct. 1970).

The prevailing constitutional view of the newsman’s privilege is very much rooted in the ancient role of the grand jury that has the dual function of determining if there is probable cause to believe that a crime has been committed and of protecting citizens against un*687founded criminal prosecutions.23 Grand jury proceedings are constitutionally mandated for the institution of federal criminal prosecutions for capital or other serious crimes, and “its constitutional prerogatives are rooted in long centuries of Anglo-American history.” Hannah v. Larche, 363 U. S. 420, 489-490 (1960) (Frankfurter, J., concurring in result). The Fifth Amendment provides that “[n]o person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury.” 24 The adoption of the grand jury “in our Constitution as the sole method for preferring charges in serious criminal cases shows the high place it held as an instrument of justice.” Costello v. United States, 350 U. S. 359, 362 (1956). Although state systems of criminal procedure differ greatly among themselves, the grand jury is similarly guaranteed by many state constitutions and plays an important role in fair and effective law enforcement in the overwhelm*688ing majority of the States.25 Because its task is to inquire into the existence of possible criminal conduct and to return only well-founded indictments, its investigative powers are necessarily broad. “It is a grand inquest, a body with powers of investigation and inquisition, the scope of whose inquiries is not to be limited narrowly by questions of propriety or forecasts of the probable result of the investigation, or by doubts whether any particular individual will be found properly subject to an accusation of crime.” Blair v. United States, 250 U. S. 273, 282 (1919). Hence, the grand jury’s authority to subpoena witnesses is not only historic, id., at 279-281, but essential to its task. Although the powers of the grand jury are not unlimited and are subject to the supervision of a judge, the longstanding principle that “the public . . . has a right to every man’s evidence,” except for those persons protected by a constitutional, common-law, or statutory privilege, United States v. Bryan, 339 U. S., at 331; Blackmer v. United States, 284 U. S. 421, 438 (1932) ; 8 J. Wigmore, Evidence §2192 (McNaughton rev. 1961), is particularly applicable to grand jury proceedings.26

*689A number of States have provided newsmen a statutory privilege of varying breadth,27 but the majority have not done so, and none has been provided by federal statute.28 Until now the only testimonial privilege for unofficial witnesses that is rooted in the Federal Con*690stitution is the Fifth Amendment privilege against compelled self-incrimination. We are asked to create another by interpreting the First Amendment to grant newsmen a testimonial privilege that other citizens do not enjoy. This we decline to do.29 Fair and effective law enforcement aimed at providing security for the person and property of the individual is a fundamental function of government, and the grand jury plays an important, constitutionally mandated role in this process. On the records now before us, we perceive no basis for holding that the public interest in law enforcement and in ensuring effective grand jury proceedings is insufficient to override the consequential, but uncertain, burden on news gathering that is said to result from insisting that reporters, like other citizens, respond to relevant *691questions put to them in the course of a valid grand jury-investigation or criminal trial.

This conclusion itself involves no restraint on what newspapers may publish or on the type or quality of information reporters may seek to acquire, nor does it threaten the vast bulk of confidential relationships between reporters and their sources. Grand juries address themselves to the issues of whether crimes have been committed and who committed them. Only where news sources themselves are implicated) in crime or possess information relevant to the grand jury’s task need they or the reporter be concerned about grand jury subpoenas. Nothing before us indicates that a large number or percentage of all confidential news sources falls into either category and would in any way be deterred by our holding that the Constitution does not, as it never has, exempt the newsman from performing the citizen’s normal duty of appearing and furnishing information relevant to the grand jury’s task.

The preference for anonymity of those confidential informants involved in actual criminal conduct is presumably a product of their desire to escape criminal prosecution, and this preference, while understandable, is hardly deserving of constitutional protection. It would be frivolous to assert — and no one does in these cases — that the First Amendment, in the interest of securing news or otherwise, confers a license on either the reporter or his news sources to violate valid criminal laws. Although stealing documents or private wiretapping could provide newsworthy information, neither reporter nor source is immune from conviction for such conduct, whatever the impact on the flow of news. Neither is immune, on First Amendment grounds, from testifying against the other, before the grand jury or at a criminal trial. The Amendment does not reach so far as to override the interest of the public in en*692suring that neither reporter nor source is invading the rights of other citizens through reprehensible conduct forbidden to all other persons. To assert the contrary-proposition

“is to answer it, since it involves in its very statement the contention that the freedom of the press is the freedom to do wrong with impunity and implies the right to frustrate and defeat the discharge of those governmental duties upon the performance of which the freedom of all, including that of the press, depends. ... It suffices to say that, however complete is the right of the press to state public things and discuss them, that right, as every other right enjoyed in human society, is subject to the restraints which separate right from wrong-doing.” Toledo Newspaper Co. v. United States, 247 U. S. 402, 419-420 (1918).30

Thus, we cannot seriously entertain the notion that the First Amendment protects a newsman’s agreement to conceal the criminal conduct of his source, or evidence thereof, on the theory that it is better to write about crime than to do something about it. Insofar as any reporter in these cases undertook not to reveal or testify about the crime he witnessed, his claim of privilege under the First Amendment presents no substantial question. The crimes of news sources are no less reprehensible and threatening to the public interest when witnessed by a reporter than when they are not.

*693There remain those situations where a source is not engaged in criminal conduct but has information suggesting illegal conduct by others. Newsmen frequently receive information from such sources pursuant to a tacit or express agreement to withhold the source’s name and suppress any information that the source wishes not published. Such informants presumably desire anonymity in order to avoid being entangled as a witness in a criminal trial or grand jury investigation. They may fear that disclosure will threaten their job security or personal safety or that it will simply result in dishonor or embarrassment.

The argument that the flow of news will be diminished by compelling reporters to aid the grand jury in a criminal investigation is not irrational, nor are the records before us silent on the matter. But we remain unclear how often and to what extent informers are actually deterred from furnishing information when newsmen are forced to testify before a grand jury. The available data indicate that some newsmen rely a great deal on confidential sources and that some informants are particularly sensitive to the threat of exposure and may be silenced if it is held by this Court that, ordinarily, newsmen must testify pursuant to subpoenas,31 but the evidence fails to demonstrate that there would be a significant constriction of the flow of news to the public if this Court reaffirms the prior common-law and constitutional rule regarding the testimonial obligations of newsmen. Estimates of the inhibiting effect of such subpoenas on the willingness of informants to make disclosures to newsmen are widely divergent and *694to a great extent speculative.32 It would be difficult to canvass the views of the informants themselves; surveys of reporters on this topic are chiefly opinions of predicted informant behavior and must be viewed in the light of the professional self-interest of the interviewees.33 Reliance by the press on confidential informants does not mean that all such sources will in fact dry up because of the later possible appearance of the newsman before a grand jury. The reporter may never be called and if he objects to testifying, the prosecution may not insist. Also, the relationship of many informants to the press is a symbiotic one which is unlikely to be greatly inhibited by the threat of subpoena: quite often, such informants are members of a minority political or cultural group that *695relies heavily on the media to propagate its views, publicize its aims, and magnify its exposure to the public. Moreover, grand juries characteristically conduct secret proceedings, and law enforcement officers are themselves experienced in dealing with informers, and have their own methods for protecting them without interference with the effective administration of justice. There is little before us indicating that informants whose interest in avoiding exposure is that it may threaten job security, personal safety, or peace of mind, would in fact be in a worse position, or would think they would be, if they risked placing their trust in public officials as well as reporters. We doubt if the informer who prefers anonymity but is sincerely interested in furnishing evidence of crime will always or very often be deterred by the prospect of dealing with those public authorities characteristically charged with the duty to protect the public interest as well as his.

Accepting the fact, however, that an undetermined number of informants not themselves implicated in crime will nevertheless, for whatever reason, refuse to talk to newsmen if they fear identification by a reporter in an official investigation, we cannot accept the argument that the public interest in possible future news about crime from undisclosed, unverified sources must take precedence over the public interest in pursuing and prosecuting those crimes reported to the press by informants and in thus deterring the commission of such crimes in the future.

We note first that the privilege claimed is that of the reporter, not the informant, and that if the authorities independently identify the informant, neither his own reluctance to testify nor the objection of the newsman would shield him from grand jury inquiry, whatever the impact on the flow of news or on his future usefulness as a secret source of information. More impor*696tant, it is obvious that agreements to conceal information relevant to commission of crime have very little to recommend them from the standpoint of public policy. Historically, the common law recognized a duty to raise the “hue and cry” and report felonies to the authorities.34 Misprision of a felony — that is, the concealment of a felony “which a man knows, but never assented to . . . [so as to become] either principal or accessory,” 4 W. Blackstone, Commentaries *121, was often said to be a common-law crime.35 The first Congress passed a statute, 1 Stat. 113, § 6, as amended, 35 Stat. 1114, § 146, 62 Stat. 684, which is still in effect, defining a federal crime of misprision:

“Whoever, having knowledge of the actual commission of a felony cognizable by a court of the United States, conceals and does not as soon as possible make known the same to some judge or other person in civil or military authority under the United States, shall be [guilty of misprision].” 18 U. S. C. § 4.36

*697It is apparent from this statute, as well as from our history and that of England, that concealment of crime and agreements to do so are not looked upon with favor. Such conduct deserves no encomium, and we decline now to afford it First Amendment protection by denigrating the duty of a citizen, whether reporter or informer, to respond to grand jury subpoena and answer relevant questions put to him.

Of course, the press has the right to abide by its agreement not to publish all the information it has, but the right to withhold news is not equivalent to a First Amendment exemption from the ordinary duty of all other citizens to furnish relevant information to a grand jury performing an important public function. Private restraints on the flow of information are not so favored by the First Amendment that they override all other public interests. As Mr. Justice Black declared in another context, “[fjreedom of the press from governmental interference under the First Amendment does not sanction repression of that freedom by private interests.” Associated Press v. United States, 326 U. S., at 20.

Neither are we now convinced that a virtually impenetrable constitutional shield, beyond legislative or judicial control, should be forged to protect a private system of informers operated by the press to report on criminal conduct, a system that would be unaccountable to the public, would pose a threat to the citizen’s justifiable expectations of privacy, and would equally protect well-intentioned informants and those who for pay or otherwise betray their trust to their employer or associates. The public through its elected and appointed *698law enforcement officers regularly utilizes informers, and in proper circumstances may assert a privilege against disclosing the identity of these informers. But

“[t]he purpose of the privilege is the furtherance and protection of the public interest in effective law enforcement. The privilege recognizes the obligation of citizens to communicate their knowledge of the commission of crimes to law-enforcement officials and, by preserving their anonymity, encourages them to perform that obligation.” Roviaro v. United States, 353 U. S. 53, 59 (1957).

Such informers enjoy no constitutional protection. Their testimony is available to the public when desired by grand juries or at criminal trials; their identity cannot be concealed from the defendant when it is critical to his case. Id., at 60-61, 62; McCray v. Illinois, 386 U. S. 300, 310 (1967); Smith v. Illinois, 390 U. S. 129, 131 (1968); Alford v. United States, 282 U. S. 687, 693 (1931). Clearly, this system is not impervious to control by the judiciary and the decision whether to unmask an informer or to continue to profit by his anonymity is in public, not private, hands. We think that it should remain there and that public authorities should retain the options of either insisting on the informer’s testimony relevant to the prosecution of crime or of seeking the benefit of further information that his exposure might prevent.

We are admonished that refusal to provide a First Amendment reporter’s privilege will undermine the freedom of the press to collect and disseminate news. But this is not the lesson history teaches us. As noted previously, the common law recognized no such privilege, and the constitutional argument was not even asserted until 1958. From the beginning of our country the press has operated without constitutional pro*699tection for press informants, and the press has flourished. The existing constitutional rules have not been a serious obstacle to either the development or retention of confidential news sources by the press.37

It is said that currently press subpoenas have multiplied,38 that mutual distrust and tension between press and officialdom have increased, that reporting styles have changed, and that there is now more need for confidential sources, particularly where the press seeks news about minority cultural and political groups or dissident organizations suspicious of the law and public officials. These developments, even if true, are treacherous grounds for a far-reaching interpretation of the First Amendment fastening a nationwide rule on courts, grand juries, and prosecuting officials everywhere. The obligation to testify in response to grand jury subpoenas will not threaten these sources not involved with criminal conduct and without information relevant to grand jury investigations, and we cannot hold that the Constitution places the sources in these two categories either above the law or beyond its reach.

The argument for such a constitutional privilege rests heavily on those cases holding that the infringement of protected First Amendment rights must be no broader than necessary to achieve a permissible governmental purpose, see cases cited at n. 19, supra. We do not deal, however, with a governmental institution that has abused *700its proper function, as a legislative committee does when it “expose [s] for the sake of exposure.” Watkins v. United States, 354 U. S. 178, 200 (1957). Nothing in the record indicates that these grand juries were “prob[ing] at will and without relation to existing need.” DeGregory v. Attorney General of New Hampshire, 383 U. S. 825, 829 (1966). Nor did the grand juries attempt to invade protected First Amendment rights by forcing wholesale disclosure of names and organizational affiliations for a purpose that was not germane to the determination of whether crime has been committed, cf. NAACP v. Alabama, 357 U. S. 449 (1958); NAACP v. Button, 371 U. S. 415 (1963); Bates v. Little Rock, 361 U. S. 516 (1960), and the characteristic secrecy of grand jury proceedings is a further protection against the undue invasion of such rights. See Fed. Rule Crim. Proc. 6 (e). The investigative power of the grand jury is necessarily broad if its public responsibility is to be adequately discharged. Costello v. United States, 350 U. S., at 364.

The requirements of those cases, see n. 18, supra, which hold that a State’s interest must be “compelling” or “paramount” to justify even an indirect burden on First Amendment rights, are also met here. As we have indicated, the investigation of crime by the grand jury implements a fundamental governmental role of securing the safety of the person and property of the citizen, and it appears to us that calling reporters to give testimony in the manner and for the reasons that other citizens are called “bears a reasonable relationship to the achievement of the governmental purpose asserted as its justification.” Bates v. Little Rock, supra, at 525. If the test is. that the government “convincingly show a substantial relation between the information sought and a subject of overriding and compelling state interest,” Gibson v. Florida Legislative Investigation Committee, *701372 U. S. 539, 546 (1963), it is quite apparent (1) that the State has the necessary interest in extirpating the traffic in illegal drugs, in forestalling assassination attempts on the President, and in preventing the community from being disrupted by violent disorders endangering both persons and property; and (2) that, based on the stories Branzburg and Caldwell wrote and Pappas’ admitted conduct, the grand jury called these reporters as they would others — because it was likely that they could supply information to help the government determine whether illegal conduct had occurred and, if it had, whether there was sufficient evidence to return an indictment.

Similar considerations dispose of the reporters’ claims that preliminary to requiring their grand jury appearance, the State must show that a crime has been committed and that they possess relevant information not available from other sources, for only the grand jury itself can make this determination. The role of the grand jury as an important instrument of effective law enforcement necessarily includes an investigatory function with respect to determining whether a crime has been committed and who committed it. To this end it must call witnesses, in the manner best suited to perform its task. “When the grand jury is performing its investigatory function into a general problem area . . . society’s interest is best served by a thorough and extensive investigation.” Wood v. Georgia, 370 U. S. 375, 392 (1962). A grand jury investigation “is not fully carried out until every available clue has been run down and all witnesses examined in every proper way to find if a crime has been committed.” United States v. Stone, 429 F. 2d 138, 140 (CA2 1970). Such an investigation may be triggered by tips, rumors, evidence proffered by the prosecutor, or the personal knowledge of the grand jurors. Costello v. United States, 350 U. S., at 362. It is *702only after the grand jury has examined the evidence that a determination of whether the proceeding will result in an indictment can be made.

“It is impossible to conceive that in such cases the examination of witnesses must be stopped until a basis is laid by an indictment formally preferred, when the very object of the examination is to ascertain who shall be indicted.” Hale v. Henkel, 201 U. S. 43, 65 (1906).

See also Hendricks v. United States, 223 U. S. 178 (1912) ; Blair v. United States, 250 U. S., at 282-283. We see no reason to hold that these reporters, any more than other citizens, should be excused from furnishing information that may help the grand jury in arriving at its initial determinations.

The privilege claimed here is conditional, not absolute; given the suggested preliminary showings and compelling need, the reporter would be required to testify. Presumably, such a rule would reduce the instances in which reporters could be required to appear, but predicting in advance when and in what circumstances they could be compelled to do so would be difficult. Such a rule would also have implications for the issuance of compulsory process to reporters at civil and criminal trials and at legislative hearings. If newsmen’s confidential sources are as sensitive as they are claimed to be, the prospect of being unmasked whenever a judge determines the situation justifies it is hardly a satisfactory solution to the problem.39 For them, it would appear that only an absolute privilege would suffice.

*703We are unwilling to embark the judiciary on a long and difficult journey to such an uncertain destination. The administration of a constitutional newsman’s priv*704ilege would present practical and conceptual difficulties of a high order. Sooner or later, it would be necessary to define those categories of newsmen who qualified for the privilege, a questionable procedure in light of the traditional doctrine that liberty of the press is the right of the lonely pamphleteer who uses carbon paper or a mimeograph just as much as of the large metropolitan publisher who utilizes the latest photocomposition methods. Cf. In re Grand Jury Witnesses, 322 F. Supp. 573, 574 (ND Cal. 1970). Freedom of the press is a “fundamental personal right” which “is not confined to newspapers and periodicals. It necessarily embraces pamphlets and leaflets. . . . The press in its historic connotation comprehends every sort of publication which affords a vehicle of information and opinion.” Lovell v. Griffin, 303 U. S. 444, 450, 452 (1938). See also Mills *705v. Alabama, 384 U. S. 214, 219 (1966); Murdock v. Pennsylvania, 319 U. S. 105, 111 (1943). The informative function asserted by representatives of the organized press in the present cases is also performed by lecturers, political pollsters, novelists, academic researchers, and dramatists. Almost any author may quite accurately assert that he is contributing to the flow of information to the public, that he relies on confidential sources of information, and that these sources will be silenced if he is forced to make disclosures before a grand jury.40

In each instance where a reporter is subpoenaed to testify, the courts would also be embroiled in preliminary factual and legal determinations with respect to whether the proper predicate had been laid for the reporter’s appearance: Is there probable cause to believe a crime has been committed? Is it likely that the reporter has useful information gained in confidence? Could the grand jury obtain the information elsewhere? Is the official interest sufficient to outweigh the claimed privilege?

Thus, in the end, by considering whether enforcement of a particular law served a “compelling” governmental interest, the courts would be inextricably involved in *706distinguishing between the value of enforcing different criminal laws. By requiring testimony from a reporter in investigations involving some crimes but not in others, they would be making a value judgment that a legislature had declined to make, since in each case the criminal law involved would represent a considered legislative judgment, not constitutionally suspect, of what conduct is liable to criminal prosecution. The task of judges, like other officials outside the legislative branch, is not to make the law but to uphold it in accordance with their oaths.

At the federal level, Congress has freedom to determine whether a statutory newsman’s privilege is necessary and desirable and to fashion standards and rules as narrow or broad as deemed necessary to deal with the evil discerned and, equally important, to refashion those rules as experience from time to time may dictate. There is also merit in leaving state legislatures free, within First Amendment limits, to fashion their own standards in light of the conditions and problems with respect to the relations between law enforcement officials and press in their own areas. It goes without saying, of course, that we are powerless to bar state courts from responding in their own way and construing their own constitutions so as to recognize a newsman’s privilege, either qualified or absolute.

In addition, there is much force in the pragmatic view that the press has at its disposal powerful mechanisms of communication and is far from helpless to protect itself from harassment or substantial harm. Furthermore, if what the newsmen urged in these cases is true — that law enforcement cannot hope to gain and may suffer from subpoenaing newsmen before grand juries— prosecutors will be loath to risk so much for so little. Thus, at the federal level the Attorney General has already fashioned a set of rules for federal officials in con*707nection with subpoenaing members of the press to testify before grand juries or at criminal trials.41 These rules are a major step in the direction the reporters herein desire to move. They may prove wholly sufficient to resolve the bulk of disagreements and controversies between press and federal officials.

Finally, as we have earlier indicated, news gathering is not without its First Amendment protections, and grand jury investigations if instituted or conducted other than in good faith, would pose wholly different issues for resolution under the First Amendment.42 Official harassment of the press undertaken not for purposes of law enforcement but to disrupt a reporter’s relation*708ship with his news sources would have no justification. Grand juries are subject to judicial control and subpoenas to motions to quash. We do not expect courts will forget that grand juries must operate within the limits of the First Amendment as well as the Fifth.

Ill

We turn, therefore, to the disposition of the cases before us. From what we have said, it necessarily follows that the decision in United States v. Caldwell, No. 70-57, must be reversed. If there is no First Amendment privilege to refuse to answer the relevant and material questions asked during a good-faith grand jury investigation, then it is a fortiori true that there is no privilege to refuse to appear before such a grand jury until the Government demonstrates some “compelling need” for a newsman’s testimony. Other issues were urged upon us, but since they were not passed upon by the Court of Appeals, we decline to address them in the first instance.

The decisions in No. 70-85, Branzburg v. Hayes and Branzburg v. Meigs, must be affirmed. Here, petitioner refused to answer questions that directly related to criminal conduct that he had observed and written about. The Kentucky Court of Appeals noted that marihuana is defined as a narcotic drug by statute, Ky. Rev. Stat. § 218.010 (14) (1962), and that unlicensed possession or compounding of it is a felony punishable by both fine and imprisonment. Ky. Rev. Stat. §218.210 (1962). It held that petitioner “saw the commission of the statutory felonies of unlawful possession of marijuana and the unlawful conversion of it into hashish,” in Branzburg v. Pound, 461 S. W. 2d, at 346. Petitioner may be presumed to have observed similar violations of the state narcotics laws during the research he did for the story that forms the basis of the subpoena in Branzburg v. Meigs. In both cases, if what petitioner wrote was true, *709he had direct information to provide the grand jury-concerning the commission of serious crimes.

The only question presented at the present time in In re Pappas, No. 70-94, is whether petitioner Pappas must appear before the grand jury to testify pursuant to subpoena. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court characterized the record in this case as “meager,” and it is not clear what petitioner will be asked by the grand jury. It is not even clear that he will be asked to divulge information received in confidence. We affirm the decision of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court and hold that petitioner must appear before the grand jury to answer the questions put to him, subject, of course, to the supervision of the presiding judge as to “the propriety, purposes, and scope of the grand jury inquiry and the pertinence of the probable testimony.” 358 Mass., at 614, 266 N. E. 2d, at 303-304.

So ordered.

Mr. Justice Powell,

concurring.

I add this brief statement to emphasize what seems to me to be the limited nature of the Court's holding. The Court does not hold that newsmen, subpoenaed to testify before a grand jury, are without constitutional rights with respect to the gathering of news or in safeguarding their sources. Certainly, we do not hold, as suggested in Mr. Justice Stewart's dissenting opinion, that state and federal authorities are free to “annex” the news media as “an investigative arm of government.” The solicitude repeatedly shown by this Court for First Amendment freedoms should be sufficient assurance against any such effort, even if one seriously believed that the media — properly free and untrammeled in the fullest sense of these terms — were not able to protect themselves.

As indicated in the concluding portion of the opinion, the Court states that no harassment of newsmen will *710be tolerated. If a newsman believes that the grand jury-investigation is not being conducted in good faith he is not without remedy. Indeed, if the newsman is called upon to give information bearing only a remote and tenuous relationship to the subject of the investigation, or if he has some other reason to believe that his testimony implicates confidential source relationships without a legitimate need of law enforcement, he will have access to the court on a motion to quash and an appropriate protective order may be entered. The asserted claim to privilege should be judged on its facts by the striking of a proper balance between freedom of the press and the obligation of all citizens to give relevant testimony with respect to criminal conduct. The balance of these vital constitutional and societal interests on a case-by-case basis accords with the tried and traditional way of adjudicating such questions.*

In short, the courts will be available to newsmen under circumstances where legitimate First Amendment interests require protection.

*711Mr. Justice Douglas,

dissenting in No. 70-57, United States v. Caldwell.

Caldwell, a black, is a reporter for the New York Times and was assigned to San Francisco with the hope that he could report on the activities and attitudes of the Black Panther Party. Caldwell in time gained the complete confidence of its members and wrote in-depth articles about them.

He was subpoenaed to appear and testify before a federal grand jury and to bring with him notes and tapes covering interviews with its members. A hearing on a motion to quash was held. The District Court ruled that while Caldwell had to appear before the grand jury, he did not have to reveal confidential communications unless the court was satisfied that there was a “compelling and overriding national interest.” See 311 F. Supp. 358, 362. Caldwell filed a notice of appeal and the Court of Appeals dismissed the appeal without opinion.

Shortly thereafter a new grand jury was impaneled and it issued a new subpoena for Caldwell to testify. On a motion to quash, the District Court issued an order substantially identical to its earlier one.

Caldwell refused to appear and was held in contempt. On appeal, the Court of Appeals vacated the judgment of contempt. It said that the revealing of confidential sources of information jeopardized a First Amendment freedom and that Caldwell did not have to appear before the grand jury absent a showing that there was a “compelling and overriding national interest” in pursuing such an interrogation.

The District Court had found that Caldwell’s knowledge of the activities of the Black Panthers “derived in substantial part” from information obtained “within the scope of a relationship of trust and confidence.” Id., at 361. It also found that confidential relationships of this sort are commonly developed and maintained by *712professional journalists, and are indispensable to their work of gathering, analyzing, and publishing the news.

The District Court further had found that compelled disclosure of information received by a journalist within the scope of such confidential relationships jeopardized those relationships and thereby impaired the journalist’s ability to gather, analyze, and publish the news.

The District Court, finally, had found that, without a protective order delimiting the scope of interrogation of Earl Caldwell by the grand jury, his appearance and examination before the jury would severely impair and damage his confidential relationships with members of the Black Panther Party and other militants, and thereby severely impair and damage his ability to gather, analyze, and publish news concerning them; and that it would also damage and impair the abilities of all reporters to gather, analyze, and publish news concerning them.

The Court of Appeals agreed with the findings of the District Court but held that Caldwell did not have to appear at all before the grand jury absent a “compelling need” shown by the Government. 434 P. 2d 1081.

It is my view that there is no “compelling need” that can be shown which qualifies the reporter’s immunity from appearing or testifying before a grand jury, unless the reporter himself is implicated in a crime. His immunity in my view is therefore quite complete, for, absent his involvement in a crime, the First Amendment protects him against an appearance before a grand jury and if he is involved in a crime, the Fifth Amendment stands as a barrier. Since in my view there is no area of inquiry not protected by a privilege, the reporter need not appear for the futile purpose of invoking one to each question. And, since in my view a newsman has an absolute right not to appear before a grand jury, it follows for me that a journalist who voluntarily appears before that body may invoke his First Amendment privilege to specific ques*713tions. The basic issue is the extent to which the First Amendment (which is applicable to investigating committees, Watkins v. United States, 354 U. S. 178; NAACP v. Alabama, 357 U. S. 449, 463; Gibson v. Florida Legislative Investigation Committee, 372 U. S. 539; Baird v. State Bar of Arizona, 401 U. S. 1, 6-7; In re Stolar, 401 U. S. 23) must yield to the Government’s asserted need to know a reporter’s unprinted information.

The starting point for decision pretty well marks the range within which the end result lies. The New York Times, whose reporting functions are at issue here, takes the amazing position that First Amendment rights are to be balanced against other needs or conveniences of government.1 My belief is that all of the “balancing” was done by those who wrote the Bill of Rights. By casting the First Amendment in absolute terms, they repudiated the timid, watered-down, emasculated versions of the First Amendment which both the Government and the New York Times advance in the case.

My view is close to that of the late Alexander Meiklejohn: 2

“For the understanding of these principles it is essential to keep clear the crucial difference between ‘the rights’ of the governed and ‘the powers’ of the governors. And at this point, the title ‘Bill of Rights’ is lamentably inaccurate as a designation *714of the first ten amendments. They are not a ‘Bill of Rights’ but a ‘Bill of Powers and Rights.’ The Second through the Ninth Amendments limit the powers of the subordinate agencies in order that due regard shall be paid to the private ‘rights of the governed.’ The First and Tenth Amendments protect the governing ‘powers’ of the people from abridgment by the agencies which are established as their servants. In the field of our ‘rights,’ each one of us can claim ‘due process of law.’ In the field of our governing ‘powers,’ the notion of ‘due process’ is irrelevant.”

He also believed that “[s] elf-government can exist only insofar as the voters acquire the intelligence, integrity, sensitivity, and generous devotion to the general welfare that, in theory, casting a ballot is assumed to express,” 3 and that “[p]ublic discussions of public issues, together with the spreading of information and opinion bearing on those issues, must have a freedom unabridged by our agents. Though they govern us, we, in a deeper sense, govern them. Over our governing, they have no power. Over their governing we have sovereign power.” 4

Two principles which follow from this understanding of the First Amendment are at stake here. One is that the people, the ultimate governors, must have absolute freedom of, and therefore privacy of, their individual opinions and beliefs regardless of how suspect or strange they may appear to others. Ancillary to that principle is the conclusion that an individual must also have absolute privacy over whatever information he may generate in the course of testing his opinions and beliefs. In this regard, Caldwell’s status as a reporter is less relevant than is his status as a student who affirmatively pursued empirical research to enlarge his own intellectual view*715point. The second principle is that effective self-government cannot succeed unless the people are immersed in a steady, robust, unimpeded, and uncensored flow of opinion and reporting which are continuously subjected to critique, rebuttal, and re-examination. In this respect, Caldwell’s status as a news gatherer and an integral part of that process becomes critical.

I

Government has many interests that compete with the First Amendment. Congressional investigations determine how existing laws actually operate or whether new laws are needed. While congressional committees have broad powers, they are subject to the restraints of the First Amendment. As we said in Watkins v. United States, 354 U. S., at 197: “Clearly, an investigation is subject to the command that the Congress shall make no law abridging freedom of speech or press or assembly. While it is true that there is no statute to be reviewed, and that an investigation is not a law, nevertheless an investigation is part of lawmaking. It is justified solely as an adjunct to the legislative process. The First Amendment may be invoked against infringement of the protected freedoms by law or by lawmaking.”

Hence, matters of belief, ideology, religious practices, social philosophy, and the like are beyond the pale and of no rightful concern of government, unless the belief or the speech, or other expression has been translated into action. West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U. S. 624, 642; Baird v. State Bar of Arizona, 401 U. S., at 6-7; In re Stolar, 401 U. S. 23.

Also at stake here is Caldwell’s privacy of association. We have held that “[ijnviolability of privacy in group association may in many circumstances be indispensable to preservation of freedom of association, particularly where a group espouses dissident beliefs.” NAACP v. *716Alabama, 357 U. S., at 462; NAACP v. Button, 371 U. S. 415.

As I said in Gibson v. Florida Legislative Investigation Committee, 372 U. S., at 565: “the associational rights protected by the First Amendment . . . cover the entire spectrum in political ideology as well as in art, in journalism, in teaching, and in religion. . . . [Government is . . . precluded from probing the intimacies of spiritual and intellectual relationships in the myriad of such societies and groups that exist in this country, regardless of the legislative purpose sought to be served. ... If that is not true, I see no barrier to investigation of newspapers, churches, political parties, clubs, societies, unions, and any other association for their political, economic, social, philosophical, or religious views.” (Concurring opinion.) (Emphasis added.)

The Court has not always been consistent in its protection of these First Amendment rights and has sometimes allowed a government interest to override the absolutes of the First Amendment. For example, under the banner of the “clear and present danger” test,5 and later under the influence of the “balancing” formula,6 the *717Court has permitted men to be penalized not for any harmful conduct but solely for holding unpopular beliefs.

In recent years we have said over and over again that where First Amendment rights are concerned any regulation “narrowly drawn,”7 must be “compelling” and not *718merely “rational” as is the case where other activities are concerned.8 But the “compelling” interest in regulation neither includes paring down or diluting the right, nor *719embraces penalizing one solely for his intellectual view- • point; it concerns the State’s interest, for example, in regulating the time and place or perhaps manner of exercising First Amendment rights. Thus, one has an undoubted right to read and proclaim the First Amendment in the classroom or in a park. But he would not have the right to blare it forth from a sound truck rolling through the village or city at 2 a. m. The distinction drawn in Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U. S. 296, 303-304, should still stand: “[T]he Amendment embraces two concepts, — freedom to believe and freedom to act. The first is absolute but, in the nature of things, the second cannot be.” 9

Under these precedents there is no doubt that Caldwell could not be brought before the grand jury for the sole purpose of exposing his political beliefs. Yet today the Court effectively permits that result under the guise of allowing an attempt to elicit from him “factual information.” To be sure, the inquiry will be couched only in terms of extracting Caldwell’s recollection of what was said to him during the interviews, but the fact remains that his questions to the Panthers and therefore the respective answers were guided by Caldwell’s own preconceptions and views about the Black Panthers. His *720entire experience was shaped by his intellectual viewpoint. Unlike the random bystander, those who affirmatively set out to test a hypothesis, as here, have no tidy means of segregating subjective opinion from objective facts.

Sooner or later, any test which provides less than blanket protection to beliefs and associations will be twisted and relaxed so as to provide virtually no protection at all. As Justice Holmes noted in Abrams v. United States, 250 U. S. 616, 624, such was the fate of the “clear and present danger” test which he had coined in Schenck v. United States, 249 U. S. 47. Eventually, that formula was so watered down that the danger had to be neither clear nor present but merely “not improbable.” Dennis v. United States, 341 U. S. 494, 510. See my concurring opinion in Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U. S. 444, 450. A compelling-interest test may prove as pliable as did the clear-and-present-danger test. Perceptions of the worth of state objectives will change with the composition of the Court and with the intensity of the politics of the times. For example, in Uphaus v. Wyman, 360 U. S. 72, sustaining an attempt to compel a witness to divulge the names of participants in a summer political camp, Justice Brennan dissented on the ground that “it is patent that there is really no subordinating interest . .. . demonstrated on the part of the State.” Id., at 106. The majority, however, found that “the governmental interest in self-preservation is sufficiently compelling to subordinate the interest in associational privacy . . . .” Id., at 81. That is to enter the world of “make believe,” for New Hampshire, the State involved in Uphaus, was never in fear of being overthrown.

II

Today’s decision will impede the wide-open and robust dissemination of ideas and counterthought which *721a free press both fosters and protects and which is essential to the success of intelligent self-government. Forcing a reporter before a grand jury will have two retarding effects upon the ear and the pen of the press. Fear of exposure will cause dissidents to communicate less openly to trusted reporters. And, fear of accountability will cause editors and critics to write with more restrained pens.

I see no way of making mandatory the disclosure of a reporter’s confidential source of the information on which he bases his news story.

The press has a preferred position in our constitutional scheme, not to enable it to make money, not to set newsmen apart as a favored class, but to bring fulfillment to the public’s right to know. The right to know is crucial to the governing powers of the people, to paraphrase Alexander Meiklejohn. Knowledge is essential to informed decisions.

As Mr. Justice Black said in New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U. S. 713, 717 (concurring opinion), “The press was to serve the governed, not the governors. . . . The press was protected so that it could bare the secrets of government and inform the people.”

Government has an interest in law and order; and history shows that the trend of rulers — the bureaucracy and the police — is to suppress the radical and his ideas and to arrest him rather than the hostile audience. See Feiner v. New York, 340 U. S. 315. Yet, as held in Terminiello v. Chicago, 337 U. S. 1, 4, one “function of free speech under our system of government is to invite dispute.” We went on to say, “It may indeed best serve its high purpose when it induces a condition of unrest, creates dissatisfaction with conditions as they are, or even stirs people to anger. Speech is often provocative and challenging. It may strike at prejudices arid pre*722conceptions and have profound unsettling effects as it presses for acceptance of an idea.”

The people who govern are often far removed from the cabals that threaten the regime; the people are often remote from the sources of truth even though they live in the city where the forces that would undermine society operate. The function of the press is to explore and investigate events, inform the people what is going on, and to expose the harmful as well as the good influences at work. There is no higher function performed under our constitutional regime. Its performance means that the press is often engaged in projects that bring anxiety or even fear to the bureaucracies, departments, or officials of government. The whole weight of government is therefore often brought to bear against a paper or a reporter.

A reporter is no better than his source of information. Unless he has a privilege to withhold the identity of his source, he will be the victim of governmental intrigue or aggression. If he can be summoned to testify in secret before a grand jury, his sources will dry up and the attempted exposure, the effort to enlighten the public, will be ended. If what the Court sanctions today becomes settled law, then the reporter’s main function in American society will be to pass on to the public the press releases which the various departments of government issue.

It is no answer to reply that the risk that a newsman will divulge one’s secrets to the grand jury is no greater than the threat that he will in any event inform to the police. Even the most trustworthy reporter may not be able to withstand relentless badgering before a grand jury.10

*723The record in this case is replete with weighty affidavits from responsible newsmen, telling how important is the sanctity of their sources of information.11 When we deny newsmen that protection, we deprive the people of the information needed to run the affairs of the Nation in an intelligent way.

Madison said:

“A popular Government, without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a Prologue to a Farce or a Tragedy; or, perhaps both. Knowledge will forever govern ignorance: And a people who mean to be their own Governors, must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.” (To W. T. Barry, Aug. 4, 1822.) 9 Writings of James Madison 103 (G. Hunt ed. 1910).

*724Today’s decision is more than a clog upon news, gathering. It is a signal to publishers and editors that they should exercise caution in how they use whatever information they can obtain. Without immunity they may be summoned to account for their criticism. Entrenched officers have been quick to crash their powers down upon unfriendly commentators.12 E. g., New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254; Garrison v. Louisiana, 379 U. S. 64; Pickering v. Board of Education, 391 U. S. 563; Gravel v. United States, ante, p. 606.

The intrusion of government into this domain is symptomatic of the disease of this society. As the years pass the power of government becomes more and more pervasive. It is a power to suffocate both people and causes. Those in power, whatever their politics, want only to per*725petuate it. Now that the fences of the law and the tradition that has protected the press are broken down, the people are the victims. The First Amendment, as I read it, was designed precisely to prevent that tragedy.

I would also reverse the judgments in No. 70-85, Branzburg v. Hayes, and No. 70-94, In re Pappas, for the reasons stated in the above dissent in No. 70-57, United States v. Caldwell.

Mr. Justice Stewart,

with whom Mr. Justice Brennan and Mr. Justice Marshall join, dissenting.

The Court’s crabbed view of the First Amendment reflects a disturbing insensitivity to the critical role of an independent press in our society. The question whether a reporter has a constitutional right to a confidential relationship with his source is of first impression here, but the principles that should guide our decision are as basic as any to be found in the Constitution. While Mr. Justice Powell’s enigmatic concurring opinion gives some hope of a mpre flexible view in the future, the Court in these cases holds that a newsman has no First Amendment right to protect his sources when called before a grand jury. The Court thus invites state and federal authorities to undermine the historic independence of the press by attempting to annex the journalistic profession as an investigative arm of government. Not only will this decision impair performance of the press’ constitutionally protected functions, but it will, I am convinced, in the long run harm rather than help the administration of justice.

I respectfully dissent.

I

The reporter’s constitutional right to a confidential relationship with his source stems from the broad societal interest in a full and free flow of information to the public. It is this basic concern that underlies the Con*726stitution’s protection of a free press, Grosjean v. American Press Co., 297 U. S. 233, 250; New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254, 269,1 because the guarantee is “not for the benefit of the press so much as for the benefit of all of us.” Time, Inc. v. Hill, 385 U. S. 374, 389.2

Enlightened choice by an informed citizenry is the basic ideal upon which an open society is premised,3 and a free press' is thus indispensable to a free society. Not only does the press enhance personal self-fulfillment *727by providing the people with the widest possible range of fact and opinion, but it also is an incontestable precondition of self-government. The press “has been a mighty catalyst in awakening public interest in governmental affairs, exposing corruption among public officers and employees and generally informing the citizenry of public events and occurrences . . . Estes v. Texas, 381 U. S. 532, 539; Mills v. Alabama, 384 U. S. 214, 219; Grosjean, supra, at 250. As private and public aggregations of power burgeon in size and the pressures for conformity necessarily mount, there is obviously a continuing need for an independent press to disseminate a robust variety of information and opinion through reportage, investigation, and criticism, if we are to preserve our constitutional tradition of maximizing freedom of choice by encouraging diversity of expression.

A

In keeping with this tradition, we have held that the right to publish is central to the First Amendment and basic to the existence of constitutional democracy. Grosjean, supra, at 250; New York Times, supra, at 270.

A corollary of the right to publish must be the right to gather news. The full flow of information to the public protected by the free-press guarantee would be severely curtailed if no protection whatever were afforded to the process by which news is assembled and disseminated. We have, therefore, recognized that there is a right to publish without prior governmental approval, Near v. Minnesota, 283 U. S. 697; New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U. S. 713, a right to distribute information, see, e. g., Lovell v. Griffin, 303 U. S. 444, 452; Marsh v. Alabama, 326 U. S. 501; Martin v. City of Struthers, 319 U. S. 141; Grosjean, supra, and a right to receive printed matter, Lamont v. Postmaster General, 381 U. S. 301.

*728No less important to the news dissemination process is the gathering of information. News must not be unnecessarily cut off at its source, for without freedom to acquire information the right to publish would be im-permissibly compromised. Accordingly, a right to gather news, of some dimensions, must exist. Zemel v. Rusk, 381 U. S. 1.4 Note, The Right of the Press to Gather Information, 71 Col. L. Rev. 838 (1971). As Madison wrote: “A popular Government, without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a Prologue to a Farce or a Tragedy; or, perhaps both.” 9 Writings of James Madison 103 (G. Hunt ed. 1910).

B

The right to gather news implies, in turn, a right to a confidential relationship between a reporter and his source. This proposition follows as a matter of simple logic once three factual predicates are recognized: (1) newsmen require informants to gather news; (2) confidentiality — the promise or understanding that names or certain aspects of communications will be kept off the record — is essential to the creation and maintenance of a news-gathering relationship with informants; and (3) an unbridled subpoena power — the absence of a constitutional right protecting, in any way, a confidential relationship from compulsory process — will either deter sources from divulging information or deter reporters from gathering and publishing information.

*729It is obvious that informants are necessary to the news-gathering process as we know it today. If it is to perform its constitutional mission, the press must do far more than merely print public statements or publish prepared handouts. Familiarity with the people and circumstances involved in the myriad background activities that result in the final product called "news” is vital to complete and responsible journalism, unless the press is to be a captive mouthpiece of "newsmakers.” 5

It is equally obvious that the promise of confidentiality may be a necessary prerequisite to a productive relationship between a newsman and his informants. An officeholder may fear his superior; a member of the bureaucracy, his associates; a dissident, the scorn of majority opinion. All may have information valuable to the public discourse, yet each may be willing to relate that information only in confidence to a reporter whom he trusts, either because of excessive caution or because of a reasonable fear of reprisals or censure for unorthodox *730views. The First Amendment concern must not be with the motives of any particular news source, but rather with the conditions in which informants of all shades of the spectrum may make information available through the press to the public. Cf. Talley v. California, 362 U. S. 60, 65; Bates v. Little Rock, 361 U. S. 516; NAACP v. Alabama, 357 U. S. 449.6

In Caldwell, the District Court found that “confidential relationships . . . are commonly developed, and maintained by professional journalists, and are indispensable to their work of gathering, analyzing and publishing the news.” 7 Commentators and individual reporters have repeatedly noted the importance of confidentiality.8 *731And surveys among reporters and editors indicate that the promise of nondisclosure is necessary for many types of news gathering.9

Finally, and most important, when governmental officials possess an unchecked power to compel newsmen to disclose information received in confidence, sources will clearly be deterred from giving information, and reporters will clearly be deterred from publishing it, because uncertainty about exercise of the power will lead to “self-censorship.” Smith v. California, 361 U. S. 147, 149-154; New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S., at 279. The uncertainty arises, of course, because the judiciary has traditionally imposed virtually no limitations on the grand jury’s broad investigatory powers. See Antell, The Modern Grand Jury: Benighted Super-government, 51 A. B. A. J. 153 (1965). See also Part II, infra.

After today's decision, the potential informant can never be sure that his identity or off-the-record communications will not subsequently be revealed through the compelled testimony of a newsman. A public-spirited person inside government, who is not implicated in any crime, will now be fearful of revealing corruption or other governmental wrongdoing, because he will now know he can subsequently be identified by use of compulsory process. The potential source must, therefore, choose between risking exposure by giving information or avoiding the risk by remaining silent.

The reporter must speculate about whether contact with a controversial source or publication of controversial material will lead to a subpoena. In the event of a *732subpoena, under today’s decision, the newsman will know that he must choose between being punished for contempt if he refuses to testify, or violating his profession’s ethics10 and impairing his resourcefulness as a reporter if he discloses confidential information.11

Again, the commonsense understanding that such deterrence will occur is buttressed by concrete evidence. The existence of deterrent effects through fear and self-censorship was impressively developed in the District Court in Caldwell12 Individual reporters13 and commentators14 have noted such effects. Surveys have verified that an unbridled subpoena power will substan*733tially impair the flow of news to the public, especially in sensitive areas involving governmental officials, financial affairs, political figures, dissidents, or minority groups that require in-depth, investigative reporting.15 And the Justice Department has recognized that “compulsory process in some circumstances may have a limiting effect on the exercise of First Amendment rights.” 16 No evidence contradicting the existence of such deterrent effects was offered at the trials or in the briefs here by the petitioner in Caldwell or by the respondents in Branz-burg and Pappas.

The impairment of the flow of news cannot, of course, be proved with scientific precision, as the Court seems to demand. Obviously, not every news-gathering relationship requires confidentiality. And it is difficult to pinpoint precisely how many relationships do require a promise or understanding of nondisclosure. But we have never before demanded that First Amendment rights rest on elaborate empirical studies demonstrating beyond any conceivable doubt that deterrent effects exist; we have never before required proof of the exact number of people potentially affected by governmental action, who would actually be dissuaded from engaging in First Amendment activity.

Rather, on the basis of common sense and available information, we have asked, often implicitly, (1) whether there was a rational connection between the cause (the governmental action) and the effect (the deterrence or *734impairment of First Amendment activity), and (2) whether the effect would occur with some regularity, i. e., would not be de minimis. See, e. g., Grosjean v. American Press Co., 297 U. S., at 244-245 ; Burstyn, Inc. v. Wilson, 343 U. S. 495, 503; Sweezy v. New Hampshire, 354 U. S. 234, 248 (plurality opinion); NAACP v. Alabama, 357 U. S., at 461-466; Smith v. California, 361 U. S., at 150-154; Bates v. Little Rock, 361 U. S., at 523-524; Talley v. California, 362 U. S., at 64-65; Shelton v. Tucker, 364 U. S. 479, 485-486; Cramp v. Board of Public Instruction, 368 U. S. 278, 286; NAACP v. Button, 371 U. S. 415, 431-438; Gibson v. Florida Legislative Investigation Committee, 372 U. S. 539, 555-557; New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S., at 277-278; Freedman v. Maryland, 380 U. S. 51, 59; DeGregory v. New Hampshire Attorney General, 383 U. S. 825; Elfbrandt v. Russell, 384 U. S. 11, 16-19. And, in making this determination, we have shown a special solicitude towards the “indispensable liberties” protected by the First Amendment, NAACP v. Alabama, supra, at 461; Bantam Books, Inc. v. Sullivan, 372 U. S. 58, 66, for “[f]reedoms such as these are protected not only against heavy-handed frontal attack, but also from being stifled by more subtle governmental interference.” Bates, supra, at 523.17 Once this threshold inquiry has been satisfied, we have then examined the competing interests in determining whether *735there is an unconstitutional infringement of First Amendment freedoms.

For example, in NAACP v. Alabama, supra, we found that compelled disclosure of the names of those in Alabama who belonged to the NAACP “is likely to affect adversely the ability [of the NAACP] and its members to pursue their . . . beliefs which they admittedly have the right to advocate, in that it may induce members to withdraw from the Association and dissuade others from joining it because of fear of exposure of their beliefs shown through their associations and of the consequences of this exposure.” Id., at 462-463. In Talley, supra, we held invalid a city ordinance that forbade circulation of any handbill that did not have the distributor's name on it, for there was “no doubt that such an identification requirement would tend to restrict freedom to distribute information and thereby freedom of expression.” Id., at 64. And in Burstyn, Inc., supra, we found deterrence of First Amendment activity inherent in a censor’s power to exercise unbridled discretion under an overbroad statute. Id., at 503.

Surely the analogous claim of deterrence here is as securely grounded in evidence and common sense as the claims in the cases cited above, although the Court calls the claim “speculative.” See ante, at 694. The deterrence may not occur in every confidential relationship between a reporter and his source.18 But it will cer*736tainly occur in certain types of relationships involving sensitive and controversial matters. And such relationships are vital to the free flow of information.

To require any greater burden of proof is to shirk our duty to protect values securely embedded in the Constitution. We cannot await an unequivocal — and therefore unattainable — imprimatur from empirical studies.19 We can and must accept the evidence developed in the record, and elsewhere, that overwhelmingly supports the premise that deterrence will occur with regularity in important types of news-gathering relationships.20

Thus, we cannot escape the conclusion that when neither the reporter nor his source can rely on the shield of confidentiality against unrestrained use of the grand jury’s subpoena power, valuable information will not be published and the public dialogue will inevitably be impoverished.

II

Posed against the First Amendment’s protection of the newsman’s confidential relationships in these cases is society’s interest in the use of the grand jury to ad*737minister justice fairly and effectively. The grand jury serves two important functions: “to examine into the commission of crimes” and “to stand between the prosecutor and the accused, and to determine whether the charge was founded upon credible testimony or was dictated by malice or personal ill will.” Hale v. Henkel, 201 U. S. 43, 59. And to perform these functions the grand jury must have available to it every man’s relevant evidence. See Blair v. United States, 250 U. S. 273, 281; Blackmer v. United States, 284 U. S. 421, 438.

Yet the longstanding rule making every person’s evidence available to the grand jury is not absolute. The rule has been limited by the Fifth Amendment,21 the Fourth Amendment,22 and the evidentiary privileges of the common law.23 So it was that in Blair, supra, after recognizing that the right against compulsory self-incrimination prohibited certain inquiries, the Court noted that “some confidential matters are shielded from considerations of policy, and perhaps in other cases for special reasons a witness may be excused from telling all that he knows.” Id., at 281 (emphasis supplied). And in United States v. Bryan, 339 U. S. 323, the Court observed that any exemption from the duty to testify before the grand jury “presupposes a very real interest to be protected.” Id., at 332.

Such an interest must surely be the First Amendment protection of a confidential relationship that I have discussed above in Part I. As noted there, this protection does not exist for the purely private interests of the *738newsman or his informant, nor even, at bottom, for the First Amendment interests of either partner in the news-gathering relationship.24 Rather, it functions to insure nothing less than democratic decisionmaking through the free flow of information to the public, and it serves, thereby, to honor the “profound national commitment to the principle that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open.” New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S., at 270.

In striking the proper balance between the public interest in the efficient administration of justice and the First Amendment guarantee of the fullest flow of information, we must begin with the basic proposition that because of their “delicate and vulnerable” nature, NAACP v. Button, 371 U. S., at 433, and their transcendent importance for the just functioning of our society, First Amendment rights require special safeguards.

A

This Court has erected such safeguards when government, by legislative investigation or other investigative means, has attempted to pierce the shield of privacy inherent in freedom of association.25 In no previous case have we considered the extent to which the First Amendment limits the grand jury subpoena power. But the *739Court has said that “[t]he Bill of Rights is applicable to investigations as to all forms of governmental action. Witnesses cannot be compelled to give evidence against themselves. They cannot be subjected to unreasonable search and seizure. Nor can the First Amendment freedoms of speech, press ... or political belief and association be abridged.” Watkins v. United States, 354 U. S. 178, 188. And in Sweezy v. New Hampshire it was stated: “It is particularly important that the exercise of the power of compulsory process be carefully circumscribed when the investigative process tends to impinge upon such highly sensitive areas as freedom of speech or press, freedom of political association, and freedom of communication of ideas.” 354 U. S., at 245 (plurality opinion).

The established method of “carefully” circumscribing-investigative powers is to place a heavy burden of justification on government officials when First Amendment rights are impaired. The decisions of this Court have “consistently held that only a compelling state interest in the regulation of a subject within the State’s constitutional power to regulate can justify limiting First Amendment freedoms.” NAACP v. Button, 371 U. S., at 438. And “it is an essential prerequisite to the validity of an investigation which intrudes into the area of constitutionally protected rights of speech, press, association and petition that the State convincingly show a substantial relation between the information sought and a subject of overriding and compelling state interest.” Gibson v. Florida Legislative Investigation Committee, 372 U. S., at 546 (emphasis supplied). See also DeGregory v. Attorney General of New Hampshire, 383 U. S. 825; NAACP v. Alabama, 357 U. S. 449; Sweezy, supra; Watkins, supra.

Thus, when an investigation impinges on First Amendment rights, the government must not only show that *740the inquiry is of “compelling and overriding importance” but it must also “convincingly” demonstrate that the investigation is “substantially related” to the information sought.

Governmental officials must, therefore, demonstrate that the information sought is clearly relevant to a precisely defined subject of governmental inquiry. Watkins, supra; Sweezy, supra.26 They must demonstrate that it is reasonable to think the witness in question has that information. Sweezy, supra; Gibson, supra,27 And they must show that there is not any means of obtaining the information less destructive of First Amendment liberties. Shelton v. Tucker, 364 U. S., at 488; Louisiana ex rel. Gremillion v. NAACP, 366 U. S. 293, 296-297.28

These requirements, which we have recognized in decisions involving legislative and executive investigations, serve established policies reflected in numerous First *741Amendment decisions arising in other contexts. The requirements militate against vague investigations that, like vague laws, create uncertainty and needlessly discourage First Amendment activity.29 They also insure that a legitimate governmental purpose will not be pursued by means that “broadly stifle fundamental personal liberties when the end can be more narrowly achieved.” Shelton, supra, at 488.30 As we said in Gibson, supra, “Of course, a legislative investigation — as any investigation — must proceed ‘step by step,’ . . . but step by step or in totality, an adequate foundation for inquiry must be laid before proceeding in such a manner as will substantially intrude upon and severely curtail or inhibit constitutionally protected activities or seriously interfere with similarly protected associational rights.” 372 U. S., at 557.

I believe the safeguards developed in our decisions involving governmental investigations must apply to the grand jury inquiries in these cases. Surely the function of the grand jury to aid in the enforcement of the law is no more important than the function of the legislature, and its committees, to make the law. We have long recognized the value of the role played by legislative investigations, see, e. g., United States v. Rumely, *742345 U. S. 41, 43; Barenblatt v. United States, 360 U. S. 109, 111-112, for the “power of the Congress to conduct investigations is inherent . . . [encompassing] surveys of defects in our social, economic or political system for the purpose of enabling the Congress to remedy them.” Watkins, supra, at 187. Similarly, the associational rights of private individuals, which have been the prime focus of our First Amendment decisions in the investigative sphere, are hardly more important than the First Amendment rights of mass circulation newspapers and electronic media to disseminate ideas and information, and of the general public to receive them. Moreover, the vices of vagueness and overbreadth that legislative investigations may manifest are also exhibited by grand jury inquiries, since grand jury investigations are not limited in scope to specific criminal acts, see, e. g., Wilson v. United States, 221 U. S. 361, Hendricks v. United States, 223 U. S. 178, 184, United States v. Johnson, 319 U. S. 503, and since standards of materiality and relevance are greatly relaxed. Holt v. United States, 218 U. S. 245; Costello v. United States, 350 U. S. 359. See generally Note, The Grand Jury as an Investigatory Body, 74 Harv. L. Rev. 590, 591-592 (1961).31 For, as the United States notes in its brief in Caldwell, the *743grand jury “need establish no factual basis for commencing an investigation, and can pursue rumors which further investigation may prove groundless.”

Accordingly, when a reporter is asked to appear before a grand jury and reveal confidences, I would hold that the government must (1) show that there is probable cause to believe that the newsman has information that is clearly relevant to a specific probable violation of law;32 (2) demonstrate that the information sought cannot be obtained by alternative means less destructive of First Amendment rights; and (3) demonstrate a compelling and overriding interest in the information.33

This is not to say that a grand jury could not issue a subpoena until such a showing were made, and it is not to say that a newsman would be in any way privileged to ignore any subpoena that was issued. Obviously, before the government’s burden to make such a showing were triggered, the reporter would have to move to quash the subpoena, asserting the basis on which he considered the particular relationship a confidential one.

*744B

The crux of the Court’s rejection of any newsman’s privilege is its observation that only “where news sources themselves are implicated in crime or possess information relevant to the grand jury’s task need they or the reporter be concerned about grand jury subpoenas.” See ante, at 691 (emphasis supplied). But this is a most misleading construct. For it is obviously not true that the only persons about whom reporters will be forced to testify will be those “confidential informants involved in actual criminal conduct” and those having “information suggesting illegal conduct by others.” See ante, at 691, 693. As noted above, given the grand jury’s extraordinarily broad investigative powers and the weak standards of relevance and materiality that apply during such inquiries, reporters, if they have no testimonial privilege, will be called to give information about informants who have neither committed crimes nor have information about crime. It is to avoid deterrence of such sources and thus to prevent needless injury to First Amendment values that I think the government must be required to show probable cause that the newsman has information that is clearly relevant to a specific probable violation of criminal law.34

*745Similarly, a reporter may have information from a confidential source that is “related” to the commission of crime, but the government may be able to obtain an indictment or otherwise achieve its purposes by subpoenaing persons other than the reporter. It is an obvious but important truism that when government aims have been fully served, there can be no legitimate reason to disrupt a confidential relationship between a reporter and his source. To do so would not aid the administration of justice and would only impair the flow of information to the public. Thus, it is to avoid deterrence of such sources that I think the government must show that there are no alternative means for the grand jury to obtain the information sought.

Both the “probable cause” and “alternative means” requirements would thus serve the vital function of mediating between the public interest in the administration of justice and the constitutional protection of the full flow of information. These requirements would avoid a direct conflict between these competing concerns, and they would generally provide adequate protection for newsmen. See Part III, m/m.35 No doubt the courts would be required to make some delicate judgments in working out this accommodation. But that, after all, *746is the function of courts of law. Better such judgments, however difficult, than the simplistic and stultifying absolutism adopted by the Court in denying any force to the First Amendment in these cases.36

The error in the Court’s absolute rejection of First Amendment interests in these cases seems to me to be most profound. For in the name of advancing the administration of justice, the Court’s decision, I think, will only impair the achievement of that goal. People entrusted with law enforcement responsibility, no less than private citizens, need general information relating to controversial social problems. Obviously, press reports have great value to government, even when the newsman cannot be compelled to testify before a grand jury. The sad paradox of the Court’s position is that when a grand jury may exercise an unbridled subpoena power, and sources involved in sensitive matters become fearful of disclosing information, the newsman will not only cease to be a useful grand jury witness; he will cease to investigate and publish information about issues of public import. I cannot subscribe to such an anomalous result, for, in my view, the interests protected by the First Amendment are not antagonistic to the administration of justice. Rather, they can, in the long run, only be complementary, and for that reason must be given great “breathing space.” NAACP v. Button, 371 U. S., at 433.

Ill

In deciding what protection should be given to information a reporter receives in confidence from a news source, the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed the holding of the District Court that the grand *747jury power of testimonial compulsion must not be exercised in a manner likely to impair First Amendment interests “until there has been a clear showing of a compelling and overriding national interest that cannot be served by any alternative means.” Caldwell v. United States, 434 F. 2d 1081, 1086. It approved the request of respondent Caldwell for specification by the government of the “subject, direction or scope of the Grand Jury inquiry.” Id., at 1085. And it held that in the circumstances of this case Caldwell need not divulge confidential information.

I think this decision was correct. On the record before us the United States has not met the burden that I think the appropriate newsman’s privilege should require.

In affidavits before the District Court, the United States said it was investigating possible violations of 18 U. S. C. § 871 (threats against the President), 18 U. S. C. § 1751 (assassination, attempts to assassinate, conspiracy to assassinate the President), 18 U. S. C. § 231 (civil disorders), 18 U. S. C. § 2101 (interstate travel to incite a riot), 18 U. S. C. § 1341 (mail fraud and swindles) and other crimes that were not specified. But, with one exception, there has been no factual showing in this case of the probable commission of, or of attempts to commit, any crimes.37 The single exception relates to the allegation that a Black Panther Party leader, David Hilliard, violated 18 U. S. C. § 871 during the course of a speech in November 1969. But Caldwell was subpoenaed two months after an indictment was returned against Hil-liard, and that charge could not, subsequent to the indictment, be investigated by a grand jury. See In re National Window Glass Workers, 287 F. 219; United *748States v. Dardi, 330 F. 2d 316, 336.38 Furthermore, the record before us does not show that Caldwell probably had any information about the violation of any other federal criminal laws,39 or that alternative *749means of obtaining the desired information were pursued.40

In the Caldwell case, the Court of Appeals further found that Caldwell’s confidential relationship with the leaders of the Black Panther Party would be impaired if he appeared before the grand jury at all to answer questions, even though not privileged. Caldwell v. United States, 434 F. 2d, at 1088. On the particular facts before it,41 the court concluded that the very *750appearance by Caldwell before the grand jury would jeopardize his relationship with his sources, leading to a severance of the news-gathering relationship and impairment of the flow of news to the public:42

“Appellant asserted in affidavit that there is nothing to which he could testify (beyond that which he has already made public and for which, therefore, his appearance is unnecessary) that is not protected by the District Court’s order. If this is true — and the Government apparently has not believed it necessary to dispute it — appellant’s response to the subpoena would be a barren perform-*751anee — one of no benefit to the Grand Jury. To destroy appellant’s capacity as news gatherer for such a return hardly makes sense. Since the cost to the public of excusing his attendance is so slight, it may be said that there is here no public interest of real substance in competition with the First Amendment freedoms that are jeopardized.

“If any competing public interest is ever to arise in a case such as this (where First Amendment liberties are threatened by mere appearance at a Grand Jury investigation) it will be on an occasion in which the witness, armed with his privilege, can still serve a useful purpose before the Grand Jury. Considering the scope of the privilege embodied in the protective order, these occasions would seem to be unusual. It is not asking too much of the Government to show that such an occasion is presented here.” Id., at 1089.

I think this ruling was also correct in fight of the particularized circumstances of the Caldwell case. Obviously, only in very rare circumstances would a confidential relationship between a reporter and his source be so sensitive that mere appearance before the grand jury by the newsman would substantially irhpair his news-gathering function. But in this case, the reporter made out a prima facie case that the flow of news to the public would be curtailed. And he stated, without contradiction, that the only nonconfidential material about which he could testify was already printed in his newspaper articles.43 Since the United States has not attempted to *752refute this assertion, the appearance of Caldwell would, on these facts, indeed be a “barren performance.” But this aspect of the Caldwell judgment I would confine to its own facts. As the Court of Appeals appropriately observed: “[T]he rule of this case is a narrow one. . . .” Caldwell, supra, at 1090.

Accordingly, I would affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals in No. 70-57, United States v. Caldwell.44 In the other two cases before us, No. 70-85, Branzburg v. Hayes and Meigs, and No. 70-94, In re Pappas, I would vacate the judgments and remand the cases for further proceedings not inconsistent with the views I have expressed in this opinion.