Liberty of the Press

Feilding Star, Volume VIII, Issue 63, 27 November 1886, Page 5 (Supplement)

Liberty of the Press

Chief Justice Coleridge recently delivered an important judgment in England regarding the right of a newspaper to continue referenco to matters which may already be the subject of a libel action. The 'Spectator' makes the following interesting comments on the law as laid down by the Judge: — The Courts are sometimes inclined to be too much influenced by such fears as that juries will be affected in case of pendingactions by comments in the newspapers It is therefore particularly satisfactory that in the present case the Queen's Bench Division has refused to make a precedent for stopping a newspaper on any side issue, from (according to its contention) exposing a great and dangerons public scandal ; and has, instead, declared that comment can only be stopped after the articles have been proved libellous by a verdict given in the main action. Were interim in junctions freely granted in oases of alleged newspaper libel?, a very heavy blow might be struck at the liberty of the Press. A newspaper cannot always expose a pubhc wrong in one issue, and it would lie a very serious infringement of its freedom if, apart from the merits of a case it were liable to be muzzled the moment an action for libel was begun Such a result would entirely do away with the principles upon which the liberty of the Press exists in England That principle, as Black stone has so well said, " consists in laying no previous restraint upon publications." Blackstone's words are, indeed, bo weighty and so clear that it would riot fee out of place to quote all other sentence from the 'Commentaries. ' 'Every free man,' he says, ' has an undoubted right to lay what sentiments he pleases before the public. To forbid this is to destroy the freedom of the Press ; but if he publishes what is improper, mischievous, or illegal, he must take the consequences of his own temerity.' With such a principle wo should havH thought that very few people would be found to quarrel.