The 5th U.S. Circuit Court
of Appeals recently turned down an appeal by a Texas cattleman of Oprah
Winfrey’s victory in the so-called “veggie libel” trial a couples years
ago.
In that trial, the cattlemen
sued Winfrey over her April 16, 1996 show which featured animal rights
activist Howard Lyman discussing Mad Cow disease. Lyman went on with his
usual histrionics about Mad Cow disease, with flourishes claiming that
Mad Cow could possibly kill millions of people in the United States, prompting
Winfrey to say she’d never eat another hamburger again.
Beef sales, and prices, dropped
dramatically in the wake of the show (it is frightening to think that
so many Americans get dietary advice from a day-time talk show) , and
the cattlemen sued in Texas under a law that makes disparaging a food
product a tort. Unfortunately for the cattlemen, the trial judge ruled
that the law did not apply to meat (it had originally been written to
cover fruits and vegetables specifically) and the cattlemen had to sue
Winfrey under the much stricter libel laws.
The appeal, initiated by Paul
Engler who has vowed to appeal the Winfrey verdict as far as possible,
argued that the trial judge erred in not allowing the suit to continue
under the veggie libel provision.
Hopefully this will spell the
end of this ridiculous chapter-the lawsuit’s main affect was to make the
cattlemen look like a bunch of whiners. As the Appeals Court put it,
Stripped to its essentials, the cattlemen’s complaint is that
the ‘Dangerous Food’ show did not present the mad cow issue in the light
most favorable to United States beef. This argument cannot stand.
Lyman might be a nut and Winfrey
a fool, but even nuts and fools are protected by the First Amendment (and
thankfully so — all Engler’s vindictive legal tactics have done is further
legitimize Lyman’s bizarre views).
Reference:
Oprah’s
win over cattlemen upheld. Janet McConnaughey, Associated Press, February
9, 2000.