PUBLISHED EVERY WEDNESDAY & SATURDAY. SATURDAY, JULY, 16, 1881.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume IX, Issue 961, 16 July 1881, Page 2

PUBLISHED EVERY WEDNESDAY & SATURDAY. SATURDAY, JULY, 16, 1881.

Looking at the matter dispassionately, and without being influenced in the slightest by a knowledge of the parties in question, there can be but one effect on the mind of any unprejudiced person as to the yerdict of acquittal in the libel case Rees v. Wickham, namely, that of profound astonishment; while it serves to make still more obscure the extremely hazy and indefinite state of the law of libel. We say law of libel, simply as the phrase goes; but the case just disposed of leaves an inference that what really constitutes libellous utterances is based more on a capricious interpretation of what that law is, than the amount of justice demanded at the hands of a public defamer. Henceforth it will be useless to look for protection from defamation of character to the law of libel. There is, practically, no law of libel; or if there is, we find it so variously contracted, or distorted in its application, as to make it one of the most terrible engines of oppression—terrible in its uncertainty —on the one hand, and anything but an aegis of protection from calumny on the other. There is something in this decision which carries with it matter of more serious moment, and is fraught with more far-stretching consequences to the public generally than may, at first, appear. Elsewhere, we have printed, from our contemporary, the fell text of the Information laid by Mr Rees against Mr Wickham ; a careful perusal of which will show how far we are justified in making these remarks. And so as to make the position of affairs as clear and intelligible as possible, we have had telegraphed to us, a verbatim report of the Judge’s address to the jury, which will also be found in another column.

it is our duty and desire purposely to omit all attempt to shew that Mr Rees was right, or that Mr Wickham was wrong. But our manifest duty most imperatively calls on us to draw attention to the possibilities of what

may happen to a man who,- having been maligned, seeks protection or redress from the “ law of libel.” According to Mr Justice Gillies’ dicta, and the finding of the jury, one man may call another a swindler. He may impute to him fraud and dishonesty, and accuse him of unscrupulously endeavoring to obtain money under false pretences, and by wilful mis-represen-tations —with impunity. These allegations were not denied by the defence, nor were they proved to be true, or justifiable. The issue, therefore, does not, of course, imply that Mr Rees has done all these things ; but it is an emphatic declaration that a man may be accused of the vilest epithet s known in language, and extenuation is found in the plea that they are “ fair and reasonable.” We should like to know what the consequences would be to anyone who laid the one hundredth part of lhe aforesaid accusations to the charge of one of the judges. Those well acquainted with what Mr Justice Gillies calls “ the whole of the history of this colony,” and are well up in the knowledge of “ parties,” —political and otherwise —will form their own conclusions on his Honor’s summing up ; and in this connection we cannot avoid the remark that a somewhat too great stress was laid on the political aspect of Native affairs. The mind of the jury was thereby diverted from the true cause of a personal injury, to the minor necessity for vicarious expiation, through the sufferings of Mr. Rees, for involving himself in a system which had been condemned. The question was not so much that Mr. Rees had been grossly libelled, as that he had acted contrary to what some hold as not conducing to the welfare of the Nat ives. That, we make bold to say, is still a moot point, and its introduction was quite irrelevant to the issue. Suppose, for instance, a man is tried for murder, entailing capital punishment ; or for any crime, where flogging is enjoined. We know that many humane, but misguided persons, do not believe in hanging, or in the use of the cat ; but do we ever find a Judge drawing attention to these things, and so probably raise a feeling of commiseration for the accused in the mind of the jury? We do not say this was His Honor’s object in referring to Native matters exterior to the four corners of the charge of libel ; but that it had the effect we indicate, in the finding of the jury, there can be no reasonable doubt. No jury on earth could have found a different verdict in the face of such a summing up; while the Judge’s own expression of opinion—that even if the “ whole of the language had “ been written in the way the latter “ parties conceived ” —that is, injuriously—would, probably, determine the jury in a desire to give the defendant the benefit —not of doubt, but of a consciousness that, although Mr. Wickham had libelled Mr. Rees in a degree, it was not of such a criminal nature as demanded his incarceration, involving a lasting disgrace, and, probably, the life-long ruin of his prospects. Hitherto, it has been held to be a time-honored tenet in ethical law that it is not necessary to call a man hard names to prove that he is wrong; nor to impute scoundrelly intentions, personally dishonorable, to demonstrate that his action is detrimental to the public interests. Villification and slander are proof of neither guilt nor wrong-doing. And these, it must be remembered, are the only weapons the most prominent of Mr Rees’ adversaries have fought him with. They have never attacked the scheme he propounded. Nay, they candidly give him credit for having built a vessel he cannot command. He may lack the essentials to good administration ; he may, let us say, be thoroughly incompetent; but are we to be told from the Grand Forum of Supreme Justice that incompetency and inability to achieve success are but other names for calumnies calculated to do a permanent injury to the fair fame of men ? There are too many points of interest in the Judge’s remarks, to deal with now ; and we shall take opportunity to refer to them again.