The National Register. — London, England, 1811-03-17 00:00:00

t THE N . SPRING ASSIZES. 'Xs t ;emt - t. soseLINCOLN. PROSECUTION Ecift A LIBEL. THE KING V. DRAKARD. 'Wednesday morning the trial of the traverse came on, before the Hon. Baron Woos and a Special Jury; the Grand Jury, be fore whom the indictment was laid, having on Tuesday found a true bill. It had been expected that the proceedings would be carried on in the nature of an information er officio by the AT -10 KNEYGLNERAL,but the trial was proceeded in in the com mon way of indictment. Only six special jurymen of the pan nel answered to their names, but a tales being prayed, the fol lowing gentlemen were sworn : George Uppleby, Esq. J. Ellis (Cherry Whittingham) Wm. Graburn, Esq. Thomas Brown John Richardson, Esq. Christopher Norwood --:` " • John Green, Esq, George Sanders John Manners, Esq. John Coulson • • John Elliott, Esq. William Mossop. • The pleadings were opened by Mr. REYNOLDS, and the case was stated by CI.ARKE, who, with Serjeant VAUGHAN and Mr. READER, conducted the prosecution. The libel was stated to have been published in the paper called Drakard's Stamford News, of the 24th of August last, and to be embodied in some observations headed " One Thousand Lashes," tending to create disaffection amongst the soldiers, to alienate their regard from their officers, and to occasion a general prejudice to the military service of the country, by holding up the.discipline of the army to abhorrence, and deterring his Majesty's subjects entering the. ran. - The publication, Mr. Clarke stated, was of a nature so dangerous, that no : good man who heard it read, could restrain his resentment or hesitate in his judgment upon it ; and' he thought the Attorney• General would have been grossly derelict of his duty, had he not proceeded to prosecute thdauthor. He then read various passages of the libel com plained of, commenting with severity as he proceeded. The tendency and 'object of such a doctrine, he maintained, could only be to breed mutiny, subvert the military establishment of the country, and make us, by. the disaffection of our soldiery, an easy conquest to our implacable enemy ; and he called upon the Jury by their verdict to pronounce their sense of the heinous ness of the publication laid before them. The printing and publishing of the libel were prrred by the production of a copy of the paper. Mr. BROUGHAM rose, and on behalf of the defendant, ad dressed the Jury in a speech of two hours and a quarter. After some observations upon the ingenious and sophistical manner in which, he said, the advocate for the prosecution had tortured the tendency of the alleged libel, and the intention of the author, he alluded to the late trial of the Messrs. Hunts, in London , _ for publishing the greater eart.of the article which was the subject of this prosecution, in tlik ir . Paper called The - Examiner. They had copied and adopted three-fourths of the disquisition on mili tary discipline, from the defendant's Paper; and on trial for the alleged offence of so doing, had, by a Jury of their country, been acquitted of crin,tinality : 46 and," said Mr. Brougham, " can that be innocent in Westminster which is criminal in Lincoln' shire ?" The Learned Gentleman proceeded to assert the right of Englishmen to form and deliver their opinions upon any sub. sect upon which they chose to exercise their judgment. lie beg ged to be informed since when it was (that he might know the xra, for the purpose of cursing it), that an Englishman, feeling strongly upon an interesting subject, Might not strongly and freely ewpress his opinion The right of forming an opinion was incontestible ; and was it to be told to any man, that ,he . must adopt a particular form of words in exp ressin g it ? The publication before the -Jury was a piece of reasoning in support, of an honest judgment; and was the defend ant to be visited with two years imprisonment in a dungeon, because, in support of his opinion, he had not argued dully, supported it feebly, and illustrated it obscurely ? Surely not. Whatever were the in conveniences of warm expressions, we must submit to them, if sse would have discussioo at all; and as to popular clamour, in a free country it was desirable rather than not, as tending /o a right understanding of affairs, and a just appreciation of mea sures. " Uproar in England Is wholsome ; whilst* in France," said Mr. Brougham, " every whisper .is pestilential.," The beneficial consequences of discussion like that now complaincd of was, that in attacking the flaws and blots of our establish. Ments, it produced something nearer perfection : such discus- *ion was the inalienable right of Englishmen ; and the most vital part of the Constitution under which they lived. In palliation of that part of the libel which * in strong terms re p robated the military system of flogging; called it a greater curse than the In quisition, and the must heart-rending tyranny on this side hell, the learned Counsel read passages in the publication of Sir Robert Wilson en the subject of military punishments, in which AL REGISTER: flogging was condemned in equally strong terms. When.lie concluded, a considerable clapping was set up in the Court. 'I . he Judge, with great indignation, censured this indecency, and threatened one person, whom he selected from the crowd) with imprisonment fur the Eence. Mr. CLARKE, rising,to reply to the defence, observed, that a stronger proof of the evil tendency and influence of the publica tion of the defendant could not be shown, than in the gross at tempt which had been just made to overawe by popular clamour, and to bear down the free agency of the Jury. Abe defence made for the present defendant, he said, was ever the sort of defence made for men of similar sentiments and conduct : the advocate who had defended the author of The Ri gilts of Max, had taken precisely the same ground, and pleaded the same rights. The allusion of the Learned Gentleman to the trial of the Messrs. Hunts, gave him (Mr. Clarke) a right he had not assumed before, of making those very persons-witness ageinst the defendant ; for although their will .) say all they dare say was not to be doubted, it was a powerful ieeeurnstance against the present defendant, that in copying the artrie from his paper for which they had•been prosecuted, they had ou.ltted the strongest parts of it, and thus shewn their own judgmenr of the libellous tendency of the original. The present prosecu: therefore, was for a libel infinitely . stronger than those men Lad dared to publish ; and yet the opinion of the eniinent Judge elio tried the cause in which they were eliminated was, that eve:. their softened `‘publicatien was a seditious and mischievous libel. Al luding to the 'liberty of the press, about wh; muc been advanced, the Learneel. Gentlemen said, that too much wes assumed un :er that mis-used phrase : in France and other cotta tries the liberty of the press etieted Hot, because Licensers were appointed to controul it; and this.exeznption, from the :exit - - ference of the Licensers in England, was what rightly was under stood by the liberty of the press.: it was not to supposed that any man was to print whatever his seditious views or a ma - nant disposition might suggest, and to call thatehehberty of the press which her bad a right to enjoy uninterruptedly--no such thing ; the press was a free agent to all,, but every man must answer for his use of it; and it was the office of a I dry to stand between the liberty and the licentioosness of it. Aa to the pub lication before the Court, read a& it was, in put:she-houses, by illiterate persons, incapable of deep thinking, it was not to be re garded in the same light as Sir Roberrt Wileun's publication, which was meant for the librariei of men of judgment : its bane was unaccompanied by any antigoteeand night do inconceiv able mischief. It was a strange Way of encouraging.the English soldier, to hold him out eas a degraded slave, cut off from the pale of the Constitution, and below the level of his fellow-iub jects. Notwithstanding the boasted excellence of the system of Buonaparte, whose service the defendant so much admired, our soldiers never yet had met those of the Tyrant without .proving the superiority of their courage, nidtheir love for their offil:ers ; and if they were not reduced or seduced,. by such persons as the author of the pres'entellbel, would still repel the enemy add save their country ; but If: they were to be insulted and taunted, or taught that they bled for those whee treated them only with cruelty, whilst Buonaparte respected his soldiers a!id made their condition superior—the safety of the country was nu longer. to be regarded as certain. Th. Judge, ,served, that they had ' the de his client the co He but, addressed Jury - to at befog that and . nifxed up wl ruin 'feeling for the publication before „ reasonably be supposed ; to _laye actuated t writ,_. he fared that. many persons in this countrtikirejendeaciotiring to itisist the enemy in his.projec..t. of disgusttpg the peppy ivith institu tions by which they were governed. .!:Alth restiet ko fbr ob servations of the Leatuiid Cientientari (;%Tr: subject of military he could trot tit 'thiratc•tini.speeCh of this day would have'been better 4611vOted it . that lititttitirable House of which he is a' Menib'el'c he hoped be ihottld see him agitate the subject thvre,',,if h4iit •tiot, ferrcd that the Genthiniati di4l:6o(o)kiri as .b thej..tirn ed Judge then alluded to the'Ci s d riiinerty,'m an Instance of the extra4tclinarf tenaper for libelling which Ivati-piqgvalent„ and the eatravagant notiuu4' which prevailed about the right of egarucu as GC, ... he Judge, in his address to the Jury ' observed, that they heard a very eloquent and powerfulitarangue in favour bf defendant, and the Learned Counsel had dune his duty io :Rent: it was the duty of the Ju'ry, to.consut 'the justice of country. The I-earned Counsel hvd• asked, Whether - what innocent at Westminster should .be criminal at LitiCain? (the Judge) did nut wish to spec disrespettfull y Juries,-- , of Jurics, , he might be permitted to siai plat the eintlernen he then reseed were nut to -be bpll: Vy.tl4. cotglucs 'of MI tither (, and he thought thent:t 4 1 . 11 cOmPetept as thieretlired t Westminster, o forM alhst ifdginelit in the matter W . -Might ge them. " am soy.cy," sdtdstr Oebige Wooil; to say, we live in ap age whe i n the ll* :of thel re fs !host Idalously ahusvd, and. lits4ll4 Is tiecurrie a tra44.l 2 l Viblent inflamnvtqy expression, he ' added,'tere:,tiOt t'obe'riiixed with discussion, and to Oils tinder the •eldirot 'feeling the public good. Let the:. Jtiry, examito;Othe puhlie4tion )re them, mat see whether any gOod Mutivelould retisbnably muposecl , .to haye *uated.tbe.wrifer. It wasioilii t fti4red .Ink a d ~ ~. - 161