Edwin Walker - Associated Press V. Walker

Associated Press V. Walker

Angered by negative publicity he was receiving for his conservative political views, Walker began to file libel lawsuits against various media outlets. One of these suits was in response to coverage of his participation in the University of Mississippi riot, specifically that he had "led a charge of students against federal marshals" and that he had "assumed command of the crowd." Several newspapers were named in the lawsuit, and Walker and his lawyers stood to win up to $30 million dollars if they won every suit.

A Texas trial court in 1964 found the statements false and defamatory. At this point Walker and his lawyers had won over $3 million in law suits.

The Associated Press appealed the decision, as Associated Press v. Walker, all the way to the United States Supreme Court, and in 1967 the Supreme Court ruled against Walker and found that although the statements may have been false, the Associated Press was not guilty of reckless disregard in their reporting about Walker. The Court, which had previously said that public officials could not recover damages unless they could prove actual malice, extended this to public figures as well.

It may be noteworthy that as a member of the John Birch Society, Edwin Walker, from 1962 through 1967, displayed a full-size billboard on his front lawn with the standard John Birch Society slogan, Impeach Earl Warren. The reason for this slogan was the fact that Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren was a key figure in the decision of Brown v. Board of Education which mandated the racial integration of all U.S. Public Schools. It is ironic that the Supreme Court judge who heard Walker's case against the Associated Press was none other than Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren. Walker and his lawyers walked away with nothing.