THE LAW OF LIBEL.

Southland Times, Issue 895, 7 February 1868, Page 2

THE LAW OF LIBEL.

(From the Times, 28th November.) The Libel Bill, of which the second reading has been postponed till February 12, was described by SirColman O'Loghlen as identical with the measure introduced by himself last session. So far as its principle is concerned, the statement is doubtless correct, but it contains one important provision which is not to be found in the former Bill as amended by the Select Committee. The essential reform embodied in both is simple and modest enough. Hitherto the law has left editors and proprietors of newspapers liable to an action for libellous .matter, unless they can show that it was inserted without actual malice or gross negligence, and that a full apology has since appeared in the same journal. Instead of this rule it is now proposed to relieve them from liability for a faithful report of the proceedings at a public meeting "lawfully assembled for a lawful purpose, open to reporters for the public newspapers, and at which a reporter was present," provided the report was published " bona fide, without actual malice, and in the ordinary course of business." In other words, the defendant would no longer hare to prove that the insertion of such a report was an oversight, though he must satisfy a muliplicity of other conditions in order to establish his defence. In any case, he is to loose the benefit of the Act if he shall refuse or omit to publish an explanation or contradiction of the alleged libel immediately afterwards in a mode as conspicuous as the libel itself. Thus far the two bills are the same, but there is a new clause in that of the present session, which has been considered important enough to have a " part" to itself. This clause' deserves the more attention since it was entertained and rejected by the Select Committee moved by Sir Colraan O'Loghlen in committee of the whole House last June, and withdrawn after considerable discussion It enacts that "no action or prosecution shall be maintainable for the publication of any defamatory matter in any newspaper, periodical, or other publication, if such defamatory matter shall form a portion of a true and fair report of a debate in either House of Parliament." It amounts, in fact, to an exten-.. sion of the so-called " privilege of Parliament" to Parliamentary reports, and the obvious objection to it is that it leaves the party aggrieved by language used in Parliament altogether without remedy. It is true that, as Parliament is a lawful assembly convened for a lawful purpose, newspapers are less interested than Messrs Hansard in acquiring this privilege. They would, probably, be adequately protected under other clauses of the Bill. Still it makes some difference, whether the burden of disapproving malice is cast upon the defendants, and whether they can be compelled to insert " conspicuous" explanations and contradictions, as in the instance of ordinary reports. The point may not be very material in practice, but a new doctrine, however salutary, should not be recognised without due consideration. The more general question raised by Sir Hobert Collier involves some difficulty. The object of the Bill is not to deprive the public of any safeguard they may now possess against defamation, but to shift the responsibility from the reporter to the speaker. It is therefore provided by the j third section (from which Parliament is exempted by an express reservation) that a person uttering a slander at a public meeting which is afterwards reported, and declining to publish an apology for it, shall be liable to an action for libel. Wow, there is a well-known distinction between the law of libel and the law of slander. Oral defamation is practically not actionable, except where it imputes an indictable offence, or is calculated to inflict pecuniary damage. Written defamation is actionable, not only in these cases, but where it " tends to degrade a man in the opinion of his neighbors, or to make him ridiculous." Of course, the assumption underlying this legal distinction is, that speaking implies less deliberation than writing, and, for that reason, is not so likely to cause permanent injury to character. Such an assumption is in accordance with common sense, and we are disposed to agree with Sir Bobert Collier that " some allowance ought to be made for words uttered in the heat of debate, and which do not seriously express the intention of the speaker." But, then, why should the speaker object to publish the apology required by this very section, which, it must be remembered, affects public meetings only, and not private conversation ? If a line is to be drawn between two kinds of defamation, venial which falls short of " slander " in the technical sense, though it be proclaimed on the housetops with a full intention of its being circulated all over the world. -Invective and sarcasm may be ornaments of debate, but they should be used subject to the liability of compulsory retraction when they overstep a certain limit. Such weapons are seldom employed impromptu, and when they are so employed with misi*hievions effect, there ought to be no hesitation about apologising. If this be granted, it is surely demonstrable that it is better to cut off the sources of defamation at the fountain head. It is quite as easy for a, speaker to weigh his words as for an editor to play the part of a censor and take the sting out of them by mutilation, while the latter process is but a halfremedy at the best. Sir Colman O'Loghlen need hardly have been at the pains to repel the insinuation that his Bill is a " Press-Bill." A Press. Bill it assuredly is, though it may contain supplementary clauses amending the procedure in cases of libel, but it is not the less a Bill in the interest of the public. For one individual who stands any chance

of being abused at a public meeting in the course of hid lifetime, there are thousands who like to know all that passes on important occasions, and would cease to buy a newspaper which never ran the risk of an action for libel. For ourselves, we have no special indulgence to ask, and are well content with the law as it now stands. Libellous speeches are seldom made at such meetings as we report, and litigious persons, moreover, think more than once before they proceed to extremities against those who are not to be intimidated into submission by the fear of costs. It is, in one respect, otherwise with our provincial contemporaries, and we are not surprised to hear that an Association, comprising more than one hundred proprietors of country newspapers has passed an unanimous resolution in support of the Bill. Personality is notoriously more rife and virulent in smaller circles of society, and even party spirit runs higher in the provinces than in the metropolis. A journalist in some towns is lucky if he has not enemies on the watch for any slip he may make in the report of meetings where, perhaps, the most violent language was exchanged between two political rivals. Sir Colman O'Loghlen quoted a case in which th jury gave but a farthing damages, but the newspaper proprietor had to pay £400 costs — a result quite sufficient to satisfy a malicious plaintiff, to whom money may be no object. He may even proceed by indictment without incurring the risk of costs, and the eighth section of this Bill is designed to check a power which may so easily be perverted to purposes of oppression. Mr Locke would have gone further, and proposed in Committee on the original Bill to exact security for costs, on the application of the defendant, from any person bringing an action against a newspaper. It was justly felt, however, that a provision of this kind would savour too much of protection, and the present Bill is all the stronger without it. The opposition which deterred Sir Colman from pressing the second reading on "Wednesday last, was justified by grounds wholly independent of* the merits of the Bill, and there is every prospect of its becoming law next year.