Wolston v. Reader's Digest Assn., Inc

In Wolston v. Reader's Digest Assn., Inc. (1979) 443 U.S. 157, plaintiff, the nephew of convicted spies Myra and Jack Soble, had been the subject of "a major investigation into the activities of Soviet intelligence agents in the United States," (443 U.S. at p. 161) and had failed to respond to a grand jury subpoena resulting in an order to show cause why he should not be punished for contempt. In his libel action arising out of the Reader's Digest article about him, the court held that he was not a public figure. The court recognized that he had received extensive publicity at the time of the 1958 contempt citation, yet despite that publicity and the obvious importance of the issue of Soviet espionage the United States Supreme Court said that he was not a public figure either at the time of the publicity, or at the time of the publication, because he did not voluntarily "engage the attention of the public in an attempt to influence the resolution of the issues involved." The language of the court defines the further limitations thus: "A private individual is not automatically transformed into a public figure just by becoming involved in or associated with a matter that attracts public attention. To accept such reasoning would in effect re-establish the doctrine advanced by the plurality opinion in Rosenbloom v. Metromedia, Inc., 403 U.S. 29, 44 (1971), which concluded that the New York Times standard should extend to defamatory falsehoods relating to private persons if the statements involved matters of public or general concern. We repudiated this proposition in Gertz and in Firestone, however, and we reject it again today." ( Wolston v. Reader's Digest Assn., Inc., supra, 443 U.S. 157, 167.) The following language is also apposite: "It is difficult to determine with precision the 'public controversy' into which petitioner is alleged to have thrust himself. Certainly, there was no public controversy or debate in 1958 about the desirability of permitting Soviet espionage in the United States; all responsible United States citizens understandably were and are opposed to it. Respondents urge, and the Court of Appeals apparently agreed, that the public controversy involved the propriety of the actions of law enforcement officials in investigating and prosecuting suspected Soviet agents . . . . We may accept, arguendo, respondents' characterization of the 'public controversy' involved in this case, for it is clear that petitioner fails to meet the other criteria established in Gertz for public-figure status." ( Id. at p. 166, fn. 8.) In Wolston v. Reader's Digest Assn., Inc. (1979) Wolston, who had been interrogated about the activities of Soviet intelligence agents in the United States, failed to respond to a grand jury subpoena, subsequently pled guilty to contempt charges, and was sentenced. These proceedings received considerable newspaper publicity but Wolston then returned to relative obscurity until 15 years later when a publisher named him as a Soviet agent. In holding that Wolston was not a public figure, the United States Supreme Court said at page 167 61 L.Ed.2d at page 460: "Petitioner's failure to appear before the grand jury and citation for contempt no doubt were 'newsworthy,' but the simple fact that these events attracted media attention also is not conclusive of the public figure issue. A private individual is not automatically transformed into a public figure just by becoming involved in or associated with a matter that attracts public attention."