Journalistic Privilege Overview
Court Decisions and Legislative Proposals
Journalists, the Supreme Court has written, claim "that to gather news it is often necessary to agree either not to identify the source of information published or to publish only part of the facts revealed, or both; that the reporter is nevertheless forced to reveal these confidences to a grand jury, the source so identified and other confidential sources of information, all to the detriment of the free flow of information protected by the First Amendment." Though the Supreme Court concluded that the First Amendment does not provide a journalists’ privilege, 49 States have adopted them, and bills to adopt…
