In its 1964 landmark decision in New York Times v. Sullivan, the Supreme Court of the United States held the First Amendment requires public officials to prove “actual malice” before recovering damages for harm to their reputation in a state-law defamation suit. Before that decision, the Supreme Court had not recognized a true interrelation between the common law tort of defamation and First Amendment protection of free speech. Defamation, in almost all cases, was a strict liability tort, requiring that a plaintiff prove the defendant published to a third party a defamatory statement of and concerning the plaintiff.

      This Note analyzes the South Carolina Supreme Court’s recent treatment of the actual malice doctrine in Anderson v. Augusta Chronicle, 365 S.C. 589, 619 S.E.2d 428 (2005). Part II discusses the development of the actual malice standard introduced in Sullivan. Parts III through V address the legal and practical ramifications of the holding and reasoning in Anderson. Finally, Part VI addresses the prophesy of confusion articulated by the Sullivan concurrences and how Anderson has brought that prophesy to fulfillment in South Carolina defamation jurisprudence.