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영어

The supreme court suggested a new judgement standard on July 8, 2003, starting with the judgement of Sentence 2002다64384 that reporting on the morality or integrity of public officials shall not be easily asked for the responsibility unless ‘a malicious or highly improper attack.’ However, there has been academic dispute around the expression of ‘a malicious or highly improper attack,’ and the Supreme Court has not clearly revealed the legal meaning, which aggravates the confusion. In order to resolve the dissonance of basic rights regarding the so-called contradiction of general personal rights and freedom of speech, principals such as those of Rechtgut indicate sentence applying principle of proportion came up with the very existence of basic rights and principal of constitutional state, the constitutional principal. The principle of proportionality involves object legitimacy, suitability and necessity of means, and balance of Rechtgut; the court requires evaluation in each stage of basic right conflicts in concrete case. In particular, the process of sentencing in cases related to press activity, such as the cause of exemption of Article 310 of the Criminal Code, is on the rise as a problem of application of the principle of proportion. It is suspicious that the supreme court has strived to concentrate on ‘considerableness’ of the demonstration connected to the authenticity but has been inadvertent in applying the 'public benefit' of Article 310 of the Criminal Code by acknowledging public benefit of the report in most processes of balancing personal rights and freedom of speech. Since the Constitutional Court emphasizes the need for differentiating judgement of standards related to public matters in 2000, and the Supreme Court introduced coverage of ‘uncertain judging standard’ and ‘a malicious or highly improper attack’ in the process of accepting such a proposal, we are now facing another problem with interpretation and meaning of 'notable considerableness,' though we recognize the need to introduce a differentiated judgement standard related to public matters or public figures. The Supreme Court is applying ‘noticeable considerableness’ on restricted subjects such as public officials, politicians, or journalists, and there are influential opinions that understand this as the introduction of an independent cause of exemption. However, if the principle of ‘noticeable considerableness’ is understood as a cause of exemption applied only to subjects restricted through formalization of public figures, this may damage the task of optimal realization for the benefit and protection of the law for basic rights in individual cases in which a constitutional principle is pursued as a proportional balancing test. Therefore, the supreme court’s legal principle of ‘noticeably considerableness’ is a potential interpretation guideline in the process of specific proportional balancing of public cases, and the ultimate conclusion in applying the new judgement standard may be the value of human dignity as the highest principle and interpretational principle in the constitution.

한국어

우리 대법원은 2003. 7. 8. 선고 2002다64384 판결을 시작으로 공직자의 도덕성, 청렴성에 관한 보도의 경우에는 그 보도가 ‘악의적이거나 현저히 상당성을 잃은 공격’이 아닌 한 쉽게 책임을 추궁하여서는 아니된다는 새로운 판단 기준을 제시하였다. 하지만 ‘악의적이거나 현저히 상당성을 잃은 공격’이라는 표현을 둘러싸고 학계에서는 논의가 서로 대립되고 있는 가운데 대법원이 그 법적 의미를 명확히 밝히지 않은 상태여서 혼란이 더욱 가중되고 있는 실정이다. 지금까지 누적된 판례에서 알 수 있듯이 대법원은 공직자, 정치인, 언론사 등으로 대상을 한정해 ‘현저한 상당성’ 법리를 적용하고 있으며, 이를 두고 독자적 위법성조각사유의 탄생으로 이해하는 유력한 견해가 제기되기도 한다. 하지만 ‘현저한 상당성’ 법리가 공적 존재의 유형화를 통해 제한된 대상에만 적용되는 위법성조각사유로 이해된다면 이는 비례적 법익형량이라는 헌법원리가 추구하는 개별적 사안에서의 기본권 법익의 최적실현이라는 과제를 훼손하는 결과를 가져오게 될 것이다. 따라서 대법원의 ‘현저한 상당성’ 법리는 공적 사안에 관한 구체적 비례형량 과정에서 활용될 수 있는 하나의 잠정적 해석지침으로 이해하여야 하며, 새로운 판단기준을 적용함에 있어서 최종 귀착점은 헌법상 최고의 원리이자 해석원칙인 인간의 존엄성이라는 가치라고 할 것이다.