14. ID.; ID.; ID.

; FALSE NEWSPAPER REPORT MUST CONSTITUTE A

CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER TO THE ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE; CASE AT

BENCH. — The majority punishes respondent for publishing "stories shown to be

false . . . stories that he made no effort whatsoever to verify and which, after

being denounced as lies, he has refused, or is unable to substantiate." The

undue weight given to the falsity alone of respondent's columns is unsettling.

For after finding respondent's columns as false, the majority did not go any

further to determine whether these falsehoods constitute a clear and present

danger to the administration of justice. This libertarian test was originally

espoused by Mr. Justice Holmes in Schenck v. United States where he ruled "the

question in every case is whether the words used are used in such

circumstances and are of such nature as to create and present danger that they

will bring about the substantive evils that the State has a right to prevent." We

have adopted this libertarian test as early as 1948 in Primicias v. Fugoso and

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which we reiterated, among others, in the leading case of Navarro v. Villegas,

and the companion cases of Reyes v. Bagatsing, and Ruiz v. Gordon. In the case

at bench, I cannot perceive how the respondent's column on the alleged

Hongkong trip of some justices could have brought about the substantive evil

of subverting our orderly administration of justice. There is nothing in the

record, however, showing the degree how respondent's false report degraded

the administration of justice. The evidence from which this conclusion can be

deduced is nil. The standing of respondent as journalist is not shown. The

extent of readership of respondent is not known. His credibility has not been

proved. Indeed, nothing in the record shows that any person lost faith in our

system of justice because of his said report. In a similar vein, I reject the

conclusion that respondent's report about the birthday party of Atty. Veto

attended by some justices and judges seriously eroded our administration of

knowingly foisted a falsehood to degrade our administration of justice, we

should be slow in citing him for contempt.

DECISION

NARVASA, C.J p:

Liability for published statements demonstrably false or misleading,

and derogatory of the courts and individual judges, is what is involved in the

proceeding at bar — than which, upon its facts, there is perhaps no more

appropriate setting for an inquiry into the limits of press freedom as it

relates to public comment about the courts and their workings within a

constitutional order.

1. Basic Postulates

To resolve the issue raised by those facts, application of fairly

elementary and self-evident postulates is all that is needed, these being:

1) that the utterance or publication by a person of falsehoods

or half-truths, or of slanted or distorted versions of facts — or

accusations which he made no bona fide effort previously to verify, and

which he does not or disdains to prove — cannot be justified as a

legitimate exercise of the freedom of speech and of the press

guaranteed by the Constitution, and cannot be deemed an activity

shielded from sanction by that constitutional guaranty;

2) that such utterance or publication is also violative of "The

Philippine Journalist's Code of Ethics" which inter alia commands the

journalist to "scrupulously report and interpret the news, taking care

not to suppress essential facts nor to distort the truth by improper

omission or emphasis," and makes it his duty "to air the other side and

to correct substantive errors promptly;" 1

to the dignity and reputation of a Court or of the judge presiding over

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it, or degrades or tends to place the courts in disrepute and disgrace or

otherwise to debase the administration of justice, constitutes contempt

of court and is punishable as such after due proceedings; and

4) that prescinding from the obvious proposition that any

aggrieved party may file a complaint to declare the utterer or writer in

contempt, the initiation of appropriate contempt proceedings against

the latter by the court is not only its prerogative but indeed its duty,

imposed by the overmastering need to preserve and protect its

authority and the integrity, independence and dignity of the nation's

judicial system.

2. Antecedents

This proceeding treats of Emiliano P. Jurado, a journalist who writes in a

newspaper of general circulation, the "Manila Standard." He describes

himself as a columnist, who "incidentally happens to be a lawyer," remarking

that while he values his membership in the law profession, "such

membership is neither a critical nor indispensable adjunct in the exercise of

his occupation as a newspaperman." 2 His column in the "Manila Standard" is

entitled "Opinion." LibLex

Jurado had been writing about alleged improprieties and irregularities

in the judiciary over several months (from about October, 1992 to March,

1993). Other journalists had also been making reports or comments on the

same subject. At the same time, anonymous communications were being

extensively circulated, by hand and through the mail, about alleged venality

and corruption in the courts. And all these were being repeatedly and

insistently adverted to by certain sectors of society.

extraordinary step. He issued Administrative Order No. 11-93 dated January

25, 1993, "Creating an Ad Hoc Committee to Investigate Reports of

Corruption in the Judiciary," 3 reading as follows: