Paul v. Davis

1976 United States Supreme Court case

Paul v. Davis

Supreme Court of the United States

Argued November 4, 1975
Decided March 23, 1976
Full case name| Paul, Chief of Police, Louisville, et al. v. Davis
Citations| 424 U.S. 693 (more)

96 S. Ct. 1155; 47 L. Ed. 2d 405; 1976 U.S. LEXIS 112; 1 I.E.R. Cas. (BNA) 1827

Case history
Prior| Davis v. Paul, 505 F.2d 1180 (6th Cir. 1974); cert. granted, 421 U.S. 909 (1975).
Subsequent| Rehearing denied, 425 U.S. 985 (1976); affirmed on remand, Davis v. Paul, 538 F.2d 328 (6th Cir. 1976).
Holding
Reputation alone is not a constitutionally protected interest.
Court membership

Chief Justice
Warren E. Burger
Associate Justices
William J. Brennan Jr. * Potter Stewart
Byron White * Thurgood Marshall
Harry Blackmun * Lewis F. Powell Jr.
William Rehnquist * John P. Stevens
Case opinions
Majority| Rehnquist, joined by Burger, Stewart, Blackmun, Powell
Dissent| Brennan, joined by Marshall, White (in part)
Stevens took no part in the consideration or decision of the case.
Laws applied
U.S. Const. amend. XIV; 42 U.S.C. § 1983

Paul v. Davis, 424 U.S. 693 (1976), is a United States Supreme Court case in which a sharply divided Court held that the plaintiff, whom the local police chief had named an "active shoplifter," suffered no deprivation of liberty resulting from injury to his reputation.[1] In the case, the court broke from precedents and restricted the definition of the constitutional right to privacy "to matters relating to 'marriage procreation, contraception, family relationships, and child rearing and education".

## Background

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The plaintiff, Edward C. Davis III, had been previously arrested on shoplifting charges. After the charges were dropped, Davis sued the chief of police of Louisville, Kentucky, for distributing "active shoplifter" posters to merchants throughout the city.

## Majority holding

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In a 5–3 decision in favor of the police chief, Paul, Justice Rehnquist wrote the opinion for the majority. The majority opinion held that petitioner's alleged defamation, a typical state court claim, was not actionable under the Due Process Clause[2] and 42 U.S.C. § 1983.[3] The procedural guarantees of the Due Process Clause could not be the source for a body of general federal court law. The Court also found that respondent's injury to reputation was not specially protected by § 1983 and the Due Process Clause. Damage to reputation, alone, apart from some more tangible interests, was not sufficient to invoke the protection of the Due Process Clause. Further, the police chief did not deprive respondent of any state-provided right, and respondent's case was not within the constitutional zone of privacy. The Court reversed the judgment.[4][1]

## Dissenting opinion

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Justice Brennan wrote the dissenting opinion which was joined by Justice Marshall and which Justice White concurred in part. Justice Brennan pointed out that the majority's opinion was inconsistent with the Court's prior case law and was unduly restrictive in its construction of the Bill of Rights.[1]

Justice Brennan pointed out that the majority misread the precedence in Adickes v. S. H. Kress & Co.[5] which they believed supported the idea that the existence of a state remedy (such as a cause of action for defamation) would be relevant to the determination whether there is a separate cause of action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 citing Monroe v. Pape[6] and McNeese v. Board of Educ.[7] which clarified that the federal remedy is supplementary to the state remedy and that the state remedy need not be first sought and refused before the federal one could be invoked.[7]

Justice Brennan further points out that the majority "by mere fiat and with no analysis, wholly excludes personal interest in reputation from the ambit of "life, liberty, or property" under the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments, thus rendering due process concerns never applicable to the official stigmatization, however arbitrary, of an individual" adding that "The logical and disturbing corollary of this holding is that no due process infirmities would inhere in a statute constituting a commission to conduct ex party trials of individuals, so long as the only official judgment pronounced was limited to the public condemnation and branding of a person as a Communist, a traitor, an "active murderer," a homosexual, or any other mark that "merely" carries social opprobrium" further pointing out that "The potential of [the majority's holding] is frightening for a free people." and that it finds no support in relevant constitutional jurisprudence.

The Court previously held in Meyer v. Nebraska that "Without doubt, [liberty] denotes not merely freedom from bodily restraint, but also the right of the individual . . . generally to enjoy those privileges long recognized . . . as essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by free men."[8]

In a concurring opinion in Rosenblatt v. Baer, Justice Stewart pointed out that the individual's right to the protection of his own good name...reflects no more than our basic concept of the essential dignity and worth of every human being—a concept at the root of any decent system of ordered liberty. The protection of private personality, like the protection of life itself, is left primarily to the individual States under the Ninth and Tenth Amendments. But this does not mean that the right is entitled to any less recognition by this Court as a basic of our constitutional system."[9]

Justice Brennan also points out that the majority essentially ignored the case of Jenkins v. McKeithen,[10] a case closely akin to the factual pattern of the current case which was also about an action brought under § 1983, and recognized that the public branding of an individual implicates interests cognizable as either "liberty" or "property" and held that such public condemnation cannot be accomplished without procedural safeguards designed to eliminate arbitrary or capricious executive action.

Justice Brennan went on to say

> I have always thought that one of this Court's most important roles is to provide a formidable bulwark against governmental violation of the constitutional safeguards securing in our free society the legitimate expectations of every person to innate human dignity and sense of worth. It is a regrettable abdication of that role and a saddening denigration of our majestic Bill of Rights when the Court tolerates arbitrary and capricious official conduct branding an individual as a criminal without compliance with constitutional procedures designed to ensure the fair and impartial ascertainment of criminal culpability.

## Notes

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1. ^ a b c Paul v. Davis, 424 U.S. 693 (1976).
2. ^ "Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment: Due Process Clause Law & Legal Definition". USLegal, Inc. Retrieved July 25, 2016. "nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law"
3. ^ "42 U.S. Code § 1983 - Civil action for deprivation of rights". Legal Information Institute: Cornell University Law School. Retrieved July 25, 2016. "Every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territory, subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress."
4. ^ "Paul v. Davis \- 424 U.S. 693 (1976)". Oyez: Chicago-Kent College of Law. Retrieved October 28, 2013.
5. ^ Adickes v. S. H. Kress & Co., 398 U.S. 144 (1970).
6. ^ Monroe v. Pape, 365 U.S. 167 (1961).
7. ^ a b McNeese v. Board of Educ., 365 U.S. 167 (1963).
8. ^ Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390 (1923).
9. ^ Rosenblatt v. Baer, 383 U.S. 75, 92 (1966). See also Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U.S. 323, 341 (1974).
10. ^ Jenkins v. McKeithen, 395 U.S. 411 (1969).

## External links

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* Text of Paul v. Davis, 424 U.S. 693 (1976) is available from: CourtListener Findlaw Google Scholar Justia Library of Congress Oyez (oral argument audio)

* v
* t
* e

United States Fourteenth Amendment case law

Citizenship Clause

* Slaughter-House Cases (1873)
* Minor v. Happersett (1875)
* Elk v. Wilkins (1884)
* United States v. Wong Kim Ark (1898)
* Mackenzie v. Hare (1915)
* Perez v. Brownell (1958)
* Afroyim v. Rusk (1967)
* Rogers v. Bellei (1971)
* Saenz v. Roe (1999)

Due Process Clause

| Economic substantive
due process|

* Mugler v. Kansas (1887)
* Allgeyer v. Louisiana (1897)
* Holden v. Hardy (1898)
* Lochner v. New York (1905)
* Muller v. Oregon (1908)
* Coppage v. Kansas (1915)
* Buchanan v. Warley (1917)
* Adams v. Tanner (1917)
* O'Gorman & Young, Inc. v. Hartford Fire Insurance Co. (1931)
* West Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish (1937)

|

Right to privacy|

* Meyer v. Nebraska (1923)
* Pierce v. Society of Sisters (1925)
* Griswold v. Connecticut (1965)
* Roe v. Wade (1973)
* Doe v. Bolton (1973)
* Bowers v. Hardwick (1986)
* Webster v. Reproductive Health Services (1989)
* Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992)
* Lawrence v. Texas (2003)
* Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt (2016)
* Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization (2022)

Abortion jurisprudence|

* United States v. Vuitch (1971)
* Roe v. Wade (1973)
* Doe v. Bolton (1973)
* Planned Parenthood of Central Missouri v. Danforth (1976)
* Bellotti v. Baird I (1976)
* Colautti v. Franklin (1979)
* Bellotti v. Baird II (1979)
* H. L. v. Matheson (1981)
* City of Akron v. Akron Center for Reproductive Health (1983)
* Thornburgh v. American College of Obstetricians & Gynecologists (1986)
* Webster v. Reproductive Health Services (1989)
* Hodgson v. Minnesota (1990)
* Ohio v. Akron Center for Reproductive Health (1990)
* Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992)
* Leavitt v. Jane L. (1996)
* Lambert v. Wicklund (1997)
* Mazurek v. Armstrong (1997)
* Stenberg v. Carhart (2000)
* Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood of Northern New England (2006)
* Gonzales v. Carhart (2007)
* Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt (2016)
* Azar v. Garza (2018)
* Box v. Planned Parenthood of Indiana and Kentucky, Inc. (2019)
* June Medical Services, LLC v. Russo (2020)
* Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization (2022)

Litigation under
R.S. § 1979 (42 U.S.C. 1983)|

* Monroe v. Pape (1961)
* McNeese v. Board of Education (1963)
* Pierson v. Ray (1967)
* Jenkins v. McKeithen (1969)
* Scheuer v. Rhodes (1974)
* Wood v. Strickland (1975)
* O'Connor v. Donaldson (1975)
* Paul v. Davis (1976)
* Imbler v. Pachtman (1976)
* Monell v. Department of Social Services of the City of New York (1978)
* Procunier v. Navarette (1978)
* Owen v. City of Independence (1980)
* Harlow v. Fitzgerald (1982)
* Felder v. Casey (1988)
* Will v. Michigan Department of State Police (1989)
* Gonzaga University v. Doe (2002)
* Inyo County v. Paiute-Shoshone Indians of the Bishop Community (2003)
* City of Rancho Palos Verdes v. Abrams (2005)
* Fitzgerald v. Barnstable School Committee (2009)
* Ashcroft v. Iqbal (2009)
* Los Angeles County v. Humphries (2010)
* Connick v. Thompson (2011)

Other|

* Jacobson v. Massachusetts (1905)
* Zucht v. King (1922)
* Buck v. Bell (1927)
* Powell v. Alabama (1932)
* Mullane v. Central Hanover Bank & Trust Co. (1950)
* NAACP v. Alabama (1958)
* Hoyt v. Florida (1961)
* Oyler v. Boles (1962)
* Loving v. Virginia (1967)
* Epperson v. Arkansas (1968)
* In re Winship (1971)
* Cleveland Board of Education v. LaFleur (1974)
* Arnett v. Kennedy (1974)
* Taylor v. Louisiana (1975)
* Goss v. Lopez (1975)
* Mathews v. Eldridge (1976)
* Moore v. City of East Cleveland (1977)
* Duren v. Missouri (1979)
* Parham v. J.R. (1979)
* Parratt v. Taylor (1981)
* Logan v. Zimmerman Brush Co. (1982)
* Kolender v. Lawson (1983)
* Hudson v. Palmer (1984)
* Cleveland Board of Education v. Loudermill (1985)
* Edwards v. Aguillard (1987)
* Turner v. Safley (1987)
* DeShaney v. Winnebago County (1989)
* Michael H. v. Gerald D. (1989)
* Cruzan v. Director, Missouri Department of Health (1990)
* Washington v. Glucksberg (1997)
* Troxel v. Granville (2000)
* Caperton v. A.T. Massey Coal Co. (2009)
* Obergefell v. Hodges (2015)
* Williams v. Pennsylvania (2016)

Equal Protection Clause

| Race|

* Pace v. Alabama (1883)
* Yick Wo v. Hopkins (1886)
* Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)
* Cumming v. Richmond County Board of Education (1899)
* Lum v. Rice (1927)
* Smith v. Texas (1940)
* Hirabayashi v. United States (1943)
* Korematsu v. United States (1944)
* Sipuel v. Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma (1948)
* Shelley v. Kraemer (1948)
* Perez v. Sharp (Cal. 1948)
* Sweatt v. Painter (1950)
* McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents (1950)
* Brown v. Board of Education (1954)
* Briggs v. Elliott
* Davis v. County School Board of Prince Edward County
* Gebhart v. Belton
* Lucy v. Adams (1955)
* Browder v. Gayle (M.D. Ala. 1956)
* Anderson v. Martin (1964)
* Griffin v. County School Board of Prince Edward County (1964)
* McLaughlin v. Florida (1964)
* Reitman v. Mulkey (1967)
* Loving v. Virginia (1967)
* Lee v. Washington (1968)
* Green v. County School Board of New Kent County (1968)
* Hunter v. Erickson (1969)
* Hadnott v. Amos (1969)
* United States v. Montgomery County Board of Education (1969)
* Alexander v. Holmes County Board of Education (1969)
* Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education (1971)
* McDaniel v. Barresi (1971)
* Palmer v. Thompson (1971)
* Coit v. Green (1971)
* Guey Heung Lee v. Johnson (1971)
* Jefferson v. Hackney (1972)
* Keyes v. School District No. 1, Denver (1973)
* Norwood v. Harrison (1973)
* Milliken v. Bradley (1974)
* Village of Arlington Heights v. Metropolitan Housing Development Corp. (1977)
* Dayton Bd. of Ed. v. Brinkman (1977)
* Regents of the University of California v. Bakke (1978)
* Washington v. Seattle School Dist. No. 1 (1982)
* Crawford v. Los Angeles Board of Education (1982)
* Palmore v. Sidoti (1984)
* Hunter v. Underwood (1985)
* Wygant v. Jackson Board of Education (1986)
* City of Richmond v. J.A. Croson Co. (1989)
* Board of Education of Oklahoma City v. Dowell (1991)
* Freeman v. Pitts (1992)
* United States v. Fordice (1992)
* Northeastern Fla. Chapter, Associated Gen. Contractors of America v. Jacksonville (1993)
* Missouri v. Jenkins (1995)
* Texas v. Lesage (1999)
* Gratz v. Bollinger (2003)
* Grutter v. Bollinger (2003)
* Johnson v. California (2005)
* Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1 (2007)
* Fisher v. University of Texas I (2013)
* Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action (2014)
* Fisher v. University of Texas II (2016)
* Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College (2023)

|

Sex|

* Breedlove v. Suttles (1937)
* Goesaert v. Cleary (1948)
* Reed v. Reed (1971)
* Moritz v. Commissioner (1972)
* Kahn v. Shevin (1974)
* Geduldig v. Aiello (1974)
* Stanton v. Stanton (1975)
* Edwards v. Healy (1975)
* Craig v. Boren (1976)
* Orr v. Orr (1979)
* Parham v. Hughes (1979)
* Caban v. Mohammed (1979)
* Personnel Administrator of Massachusetts v. Feeney (1979)
* Wengler v. Druggists Mut. Ins. Co. (1980)
* Kirchberg v. Feenstra (1981)
* Michael M. v. Superior Court of Sonoma County (1981)
* Mississippi University for Women v. Hogan (1982)
* Lehr v. Robertson (1983)
* J.E.B. v. Alabama ex rel. T.B. (1994)
* United States v. Virginia (1996)
* United States v. Skrmetti (2024)

Sexual orientation|

* Bowers v. Hardwick (1986)
* Romer v. Evans (1996)
* Obergefell v. Hodges (2015)

Alienage|

* Patsone v. Pennsylvania (1914)
* Truax v. Raich (1915)
* Heim v. McCall (1915)
* Crane v. New York (1915)
* Terrace v. Thompson (1923)
* Porterfield v. Webb (1923)
* Webb v. O'Brien (1923)
* Frick v. Webb (1923)
* Ohio ex rel. Clark v. Deckebach (1927)
* Takahashi v. Fish and Game Comm'n (1948)
* Hernandez v. Texas (1954)
* Graham v. Richardson (1971)
* Sugarman v. Dougall (1973)
* In re Griffiths (1973)
* Examining Board v. Flores de Otero (1976)
* Nyquist v. Mauclet (1977)
* Foley v. Connelie (1978)
* Ambach v. Norwick (1979)
* Cabell v. Chavez-Salido (1982)
* Plyler v. Doe (1982)
* Bernal v. Fainter (1984)

Residency|

* Shapiro v. Thompson (1969)
* Arlington County Board v. Richards (1977)
* Metropolitan Life Insurance Co. v. Ward (1985)

Other|

* United States v. Cruikshank (1876)
* Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Co. (1886)
* Quaker City Cab Co. v. Commonwealth (1928)
* Breedlove v. Suttles (1937)
* Skinner v. Oklahoma (1942)
* Oyama v. California (1948)
* Oyler v. Boles (1962)
* Harper v. Virginia State Board of Elections (1966)
* Rinaldi v. Yeager (1966)
* Levy v. Louisiana (1968)
* Williams v. Rhodes (1968)
* Oregon v. Mitchell (1970)
* Boddie v. Connecticut (1971)
* Eisenstadt v. Baird (1972)
* Lehnhausen v. Lake Shore Auto Parts Co. (1973)
* San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez (1973)
* Richardson v. Ramirez (1974)
* Village of Belle Terre v. Boraas (1974)
* Massachusetts Board of Retirement v. Murgia (1976)
* Trimble v. Gordon (1977)
* Zablocki v. Redhail (1978)
* New York City Transit Authority v. Beazer (1979)
* Mills v. Habluetzel (1982)
* City of Cleburne v. Cleburne Living Center, Inc. (1985)
* Clark v. Jeter (1988)
* Kadrmas v. Dickinson Public Schools (1988)
* Gregory v. Ashcroft (1991)
* Vacco v. Quill (1997)
* Bush v. Gore (2000)
* Armour v. Indianapolis (2012)

Enforcement Clause

* Civil Rights Cases (1883)
* Katzenbach v. Morgan (1966)
* Fitzpatrick v. Bitzer (1976)
* Dellmuth v. Muth (1989)
* City of Boerne v. Flores (1997)
* Florida Prepaid Postsecondary Education Expense Board v. College Savings Bank (1999)
* Kimel v. Florida Board of Regents (2000)
* United States v. Morrison (2000)
* Board of Trustees of the University of Alabama v. Garrett (2001)
* Nevada Department of Human Resources v. Hibbs (2003)
* Tennessee v. Lane (2004)
* United States v. Georgia (2006)
* Shelby County v. Holder (2013)

Other

* Gold Clause Cases (1935)
* Trump v. Anderson (2024)

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