Paul v. Davis

Three justices disagreed with the findings of the majority. The dissenting opinion reasoned that the decision justified the conduct of police officials although their intrusive action defamed and stigmatized the respondent as a criminal. Justice Brennan, writing for the minority, reasoned publication of the pamphlets constituted an illegitimate and improper enforcement of law that assaulted constitutional safeguards. According to 42. U.S.C. 1983, citizens of every state were entitled to redress if harmful wrongdoing was the result of law enforcement and such wrongdoing deprived them from protection guaranteed by the Constitution. (The majority rejected the respondent's complaint because they reasoned that a recognizable claim under 42. U.S.C. 1983 had to involve forfeiture of a specific constitutional right resulting in deprivation according to the letter of law.) Brennan disagreed that the conduct of police officials was, as the majority reasoned, "purposeful" and performed as "official practice." The respondent was labeled as a criminal without regard to constitutional safeguards. He had never been convicted and his only offense was a single arrest. His "shoplifting" charge was dropped and he was not convicted for the offense. The minority opinion, therefore, maintained police unacceptably harmed the respondent by the distribution of 1000 pamphlets which characterized the respondent as a thief, active in shoplifting.

Justices for the minority disagreed that "mere defamation" could not be recognized as a legitimate claim under the Fourteenth Amendment. They found as improper the Court's rationalization that interest in reputation could not be considered infringement of "life, liberty and property" provisions in the Fourteenth Amendment. In his written opinion, Justice Brennan held "the enjoyment of one's good name and reputation has been recognized repeatedly in our cases as being among the most cherished of right enjoyed by a free people, and therefore as falling within the concept of personal liberty." Constitutional law provided measures to ensure no guilt could be assumed on the basis of arbitrary actions and that consequences of such conduct had to be correctable as a matter of due process of law. The publication of the flyers, then, had to be recognized as an action that negatively affected the respondent's personal interest in reputation. He had justifiable reason, therefore, to expect constitutional protection.