quarrel

In 1968, Chicago police officer Richard Nuccio shot and killed a youth named Nelson. State authorities prosecuted Nuccio and obtained a conviction for second-degree murder. The Nelson family retained petitioner Elmer Gertz, a Chicago attorney, to represent them in civil litigation against Nuccio. Respondent Robert Welch, Inc., publishes American Opinion, a monthly magazine expressing the views of the John Birch Society. In March 1969, the magazine published an article titled "FRAME-UP: Richard Nuccio And The War On Police." The article accused Gertz of participating in a Communist conspiracy to discredit local law enforcement, described him as a "Leninist" and "Communist-fronter," and claimed he had been an officer of the National Lawyers Guild, which it portrayed as a Communist organization involved in planning attacks on Chicago police during the 1968 Democratic Convention. The article contained numerous inaccuracies, including the false implication that Gertz had a criminal record. Gertz had served as an officer of the National Lawyers Guild approximately fifteen years earlier but had no involvement in planning the 1968 demonstrations. He had never been a member of the Marxist League for Industrial Democracy or the Intercollegiate Socialist Society. The managing editor of American Opinion made no effort to verify the charges against Gertz before publication and appended an editorial introduction stating that the author had conducted extensive research. Gertz filed a diversity action for libel in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. The district court ruled that the statements constituted libel per se under Illinois law. After a trial, the jury awarded Gertz $50,000 in compensatory damages. The district court later entered judgment for the defendant notwithstanding the verdict, applying the New York Times standard. The Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit affirmed. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to review the application of constitutional standards to defamation of a private individual.

The Pennsylvania Abortion Control Act of 1982, as amended in 1988 and 1989, established several requirements governing the performance of abortions within the Commonwealth. The Act required a woman seeking an abortion to provide informed consent after receiving specific information from a physician or counselor at least twenty-four hours before the procedure. It mandated that a minor obtain the informed consent of one parent, subject to a judicial bypass option. It further required a married woman to sign a statement confirming that she had notified her husband of her planned abortion, unless certain exceptions applied. The Act also imposed reporting obligations on facilities providing abortion services and defined a medical emergency exception to the various requirements. Before any of these provisions took effect, the petitioners brought suit in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. The petitioners were five abortion clinics and one physician representing himself as well as a class of physicians who provide abortion services. They sought declaratory and injunctive relief and challenged each provision as unconstitutional on its face. The District Court entered a preliminary injunction. After conducting a three-day bench trial, the District Court held all the provisions unconstitutional and entered a permanent injunction against their enforcement by Pennsylvania. The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit affirmed in part and reversed in part. It adopted the District Court's factual findings and legal analysis except with respect to the spousal notification requirement. The Court of Appeals upheld the spousal notification requirement as constitutional and applied the undue burden standard in evaluating the provisions. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to consider the constitutionality of the challenged provisions of the Pennsylvania statute.

Estelle Griswold served as Executive Director of the Planned Parenthood League of Connecticut. Dr. C. Lee Buxton served as the League's Medical Director and was a professor at Yale Medical School. Together they opened and operated a center in New Haven that was open from November 1 to November 10, 1961. At the center they gave information, instruction, and medical advice to married persons as to the means of preventing conception. They examined the wife and prescribed the best contraceptive device or material for her use. Fees were usually charged, although some couples were serviced free. The statutes involved were sections 53-32 and 54-196 of the General Statutes of Connecticut (1958 rev.). Section 53-32 made it a crime to use any drug, medicinal article or instrument for the purpose of preventing conception. Section 54-196 punished accessories as principals. The appellants were found guilty as accessories and fined $100 each. The Appellate Division of the Circuit Court affirmed the convictions. The Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut affirmed that judgment in State v. Griswold, 151 Conn. 544, 200 A. 2d 479. The United States Supreme Court noted probable jurisdiction. The appellants asserted standing to raise the constitutional rights of the married persons with whom they had a professional relationship. A criminal conviction for serving married couples removes doubts about case or controversy. The rights of husband and wife would be diluted unless considered in a suit involving those who have this kind of confidential relation to them.

Trans Union Corporation was a publicly traded diversified holding company whose principal earnings came from its railcar leasing business. During the late 1970s the company generated hundreds of millions of dollars in annual cash flow but faced difficulty utilizing accumulating investment tax credits because accelerated depreciation had reduced available taxable income. In the summer of 1980 Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Jerome W. Van Gorkom concluded that Congress would not make the credits refundable and began exploring a sale of the company. On September 13, 1980, Van Gorkom met privately with corporate takeover specialist Jay A. Pritzker at the latter's home. Without prior consultation with the Board or senior management except the controller, Van Gorkom proposed a cash-out merger at $55 per share, a figure he had selected solely because it appeared feasible for a leveraged buyout financed by Trans Union's projected cash flow and asset sales. Pritzker expressed interest and insisted that the Board act within three days. Van Gorkom called a special Board meeting for noon on September 20 with only two hours' prior notice to most directors. The ten-member Board, consisting of five inside and five outside directors, received a twenty-minute oral presentation from Van Gorkom but no copies of the proposed merger agreement and no independent valuation study. After roughly two hours of discussion the Board approved the merger agreement with Pritzker's New T Company, a wholly owned subsidiary of Marmon Group, Inc. Following public announcement of the agreement, senior management expressed strong opposition. On October 8 and 10 the Board approved amendments that permitted Trans Union to solicit competing offers during a market-test period ending February 10, 1981, although the amendments imposed strict conditions on any withdrawal from the Pritzker deal. Salomon Brothers was retained to seek alternative bids; only General Electric Credit Corporation showed sustained interest, but it declined to proceed without an extension of the February 10 deadline that Pritzker refused to grant. On February 10, 1981, Trans Union stockholders approved the merger by a vote of 69.9 percent in favor. Plaintiffs, a class of shareholders, had filed suit in December 1980 seeking rescission or damages. After trial the Court of Chancery entered judgment for the defendant directors on July 6, 1982, and the plaintiffs appealed to the Delaware Supreme Court.