THE CRIMINAL ASPECT OF THE LAW OF LIBEL.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 14, Issue 747, 27 December 1869, Page 3

THE CRIMINAL ASPECT OF THE LAW OF LIBEL.

(From the Echo (Dunedin), December 4.) The members of the fourth estate have abundant reason to complain of the undue seventy with which judge and jury are apt to punish them for libels, when considered as private injuries; and we feel justilied in referring to the palpable injustice of the existing state of the law which deals with attacks on character of public offences. As the civil process offers undue inducements to those who want to make a worthless reputation a means of pecuniary profit, eo do criminal prosecutions in a far greater degree hold out temptations to those who wish to make the law the instrument of personal revenge. While saving this, we purposely exclude political libels : —those in which the state may fitly prosecute from desire to preserve public tranquility, or to protect public morals. We coaiine ourselves to those cases in which the man assumes the character of a prosecutor, and puts his assailant at the bar of a Criminal Court for aspersing his character, in the same way as if that assailant had assaulted his person or stolen his properly. We do not go so far as to advocate the abolition oi criminal process altogether. It may bo that Bach a change would involve us in ;many and serious evils, and would give undue encouragement to those who cannot pay in purse, and who would thereby be relieved from the dread of haviug to pay in person. Moreover, it would shock Shakesperian morality too rudely, if " he who steals one's purse," were liable to bo sent to prison, whilst " he who filches from ub our good name," was able to walk

jat large after having midst us " poor is* deed." Cases have occurred in wbicfe oaon have vilified women's reputation in lying letters, or have in other ways assailed their neighbor's character with a malignant mendacity, for whioh no reprobation oaa be too strongs and no punishment too severe. But these considerations only serve the more emphatically to condemn the present law. It was of criminal proceedings that the oelebrated maxim "The greater the truth the greater the libel" was first uttered ; the peace-loving policy of the Senate and the Bench agreeing that if teiling the truth were inconvenient to any one, it ought not to be told at all. Within the last few years we have indeed departed from this rule* by allowing the defendant to plead that his statements were true, and also that it was for the public advantage that the matters in question should be made known. But, as if we were half afraid of giving so much security to denouncers of wrong, we haya enacted that it' a defendant who has set up this plea fails to prove it, he may be visited with increased punishment on this account, and in one important case tried before Baron Martin, his lordship held, that this rule applied when the defendant's evidence proved some but not all of the material allegations of his plea. It has therefore been abundantly proved that this qualified indemnity falls very far short of what is wanted. A.gain and again have instances occurred in which the right has been with the man in the prisoner's dock, and the wrong with the man ia the wit-ness-box,—where consequently, justice has had a double miscarriage;—the honest and upright citizen has been branded as a criminal, while he who has offended against morality and even the law itself, has walked out of Court, if not with a reputation vindicated, at least with a longing for revenge gratified, and immunity for future wrong doings to a great extent insured. The existing law on this subject is indeed one of the most anomalous portions of a system abounding in anomalies. The risks which newspaper publishers, editors* and 'contributors run when they venture to tell an unpalatable truth, may be shown by a few actual or hypothetical cases : An irate correspondent's letter has brought an editor into tne dock. The same result has followed the denunciation of a known swindle —the exposure of a notorious fraud —the condemnation of dishonesty in high places by wealthy persons. Clerical profligacy, commercial dishonesty, flagrant immorality, and fiduciary infidelity, have all in turns made use of the criminal law, to crush, degrade, and ruin those whose zeal for their country's service, and overweening confidence in their country's jus• tice, has impelled them into open war with frauds and forgeries and shams. JSo one can deny that the state of the law as to libel, regarded as a civil tort, is none too favorable. In all reason and justice therefore, the defendant ought to have at least an equal chance of a favorable issue, when the object of the other side is to convict him of crime, as when it is simply to cast him in damages. The defendant, in a civil action for libel, can get into the box and give his version of the transaction; his reasons for believing and publishing the libel: his statement of the circumstances under which the publication took place. It, on the other hand, he bo charged with the publication as a crime, his mouth is closed, and, while the prosecutor gives his evidence on oath, any counter evidence the defendaut makes iios under the double disadvantage of its bdng uttered by a man under accusation, and without the solemnity generally attaching to sworn testimony. If the object of any proceeding bo character, the interest of the libelled, no less than that of the libeller, requires that the investigation should be thorough and impartial, so that neither party can say he has been prevented from proving any fact or circumstance which might have altered the result of the trial. There are many alterations which might easily be made in the existing law with the prospect of the best possible result in discouraging merely vexatious proceedings. We would have the truth of the matter deemed sufficient to justify its publication; and we would give the defendant the opportunity of pitting his sworn testimony against that of his accuser. If these alterations were made, prosecutions for libel would be less frequent, and the results less lamentable than at present. We should then not read of cases when honest men have been sent to prison for exposing commercial and directorial delinquency; and when the victims of usury have stood oon* demned for denouncing its device^

araify'.—Tlue Civil Service Gazette has the following interesting remarks:—" There are very few simple articles of food whiehcan fcoast so many valuable and important properties as cocoa. While acting pn the nerves as a gentle stimulant, it provides the body with some of the purest foments of nutrition, and at the same sicne corrects and invigorates the action pf the digestive organs. These beneficial depend in a great measure upon the planner of its preparation, but of late years such close attention has been given to the growth and treatment of cocoa, that there as no difficulty in securing it with every pseful quality fully developed. The singular succes which Mr Epps attained by his homeopathic preparation of cocoa has pever been surpassed by any experimentalist. Far and wide the reputation of s3pp&'s Cocoa has spread by the simple farce of its own extraordinary merits Medical men of all shades of opinion have gareed in recommending it as the safest and most beneficial article of diet for persons pf weak constitutions. This superiority of a particular mode of preparation over all others is a remarkable proof of the great resuhs to be obtained from little pauses. By a thorough knowledge of the natural laws which govern the operations pf digestion and nutrition, and by a careful application of the fine properties of wellselected cocoa, Mr Epps has provided our ■breakfast tables with a delicately flavored beverage which may save us many heavy i&OCtorP bills. It is by the judicious pf such articles of diet that a constitution may be gradually built up until strong enough to resist every tendency to disease. Hundreds of subtle maladies are floating around us ready to attack wherever there is a weak point. We may escape many a fatal shaft by keeping ourselves well forti£ed with pure blood and a properly nourished frame." 4/2