united-states california defamation
Can a governing body be held accountable for defamatory statements?
<p>San Francisco just passed a <a href="https://sfgov.legistar.com/View.ashx?M=F&amp;ID=7568748&amp;GUID=DF64490F-D8BC-4BF7-A43D-287F02BECCCA" rel="nofollow noreferrer">resolution</a> declaring the NRA to be a domestic terrorist organization. Agree or disagree with the NRA, it can hardly be defined as a domestic terrorist organization, at least not as <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2331" rel="nofollow noreferrer">defined under federal law</a>:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>(5) the term “domestic terrorism” means activities that—</p>
  
  <p>(A) involve acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the
  criminal laws of the United States or of any State;</p>
  
  <p>(B) appear to be intended—</p>
  
  <p>(i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population;</p>
  
  <p>(ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or
  coercion; or</p>
  
  <p>(iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction,
  assassination, or kidnapping; and</p>
  
  <p>(C) occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United
  States;</p>
</blockquote>

<p>1) Can a resolution passed by a governing body be defamatory?</p>

<p>2) If it can be defamatory, is there legal recourse for the organization or its members?</p>

<p>The issue at hand is a long-standing gap in the tort of defamation, there are no judicial remedies for when the government speaks about you in a defamatory way.</p>

<p>This is due to a doctrine called <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_immunity" rel="nofollow noreferrer">sovereign immunity</a>:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>Sovereign immunity, or crown immunity, is a legal doctrine by which the sovereign or state cannot commit a legal wrong and is immune from civil suit or criminal prosecution, strictly speaking in modern texts in its own courts.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>Although most states have waived their immunity from tort claims under sovereign immunity, a resolution is a governmental function which under municipal tort immunity prevents states/cities from civil claims such as the tort of defamation.</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>Immunity of a governmental agency from a tort action.</p>
</blockquote>

<p><a href="https://www.mwl-law.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/MUNICIPAL-COUNTY-LOCAL-GOVERNMENTAL-LIABILITY-CHART-00212510.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">More information about "municipal tort immunity"</a></p>

<p><strong>Historical information:</strong></p>

<p>Governments were at one point held to account in the same way as a company would have been until a case known as Bailey v. New York(1842).</p>

<h2>No</h2>
<p>The states inherited the right of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parliamentary_privilege" rel="nofollow noreferrer">parliamentary privilege</a> from English law and it is enshrined in the US Constitution under the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speech_or_Debate_Clause" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Speech or Debate Clause</a> (Article I, Section 6, Clause 1):</p>
<blockquote>
<p>...shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, be privileged from Arrest during their attendance at the Session of their Respective Houses, and in going to and from the same; and for any Speech or Debate in either House, <strong>they shall not be questioned in any other Place</strong>.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This means you cannot take legislators to court for what they do in the House.</p>
<p>There is a strong argument to made that a state that did not give its legislators this protection would not have a republican government as required to be a state.</p>
