The Sun.
London, England, 1833-11-30 00:00:00

Government for this responsible office. The
Irish Commission is represented in the House
of Commons by Mr. Sergeant Perrin ; the
Scotch Commission by Mr. Abercrombie, as
representative for Edinburgh; and the borough
of Huddersfield would return a representative of
the country at large by electing Mr. Blackburne,
in preference to such persons as Mr. Sadler and
young Mr. Wortley. It is rarely that the con-
stituency of a borough has the opportunity Of
conferring on a fellow-townsman an honourable
local distinction so intimately connected with
the political interests of the nation. We should
hope that the reformers of Huddersfield would
unite to support Mr. Blackburne, whose local
and political claims to their confidence must, at
this moment, he superior to those of any other
public man.—Morning Chronicle.
The libel case of Hunt v. the True Sun,
which was to have taken place yesterday, in the
Court of Exchequer, did not come on ; but we
understand that it will positively take place to-
day, and that it will illustrate, in a most forcible
and singular manner, the present state of the
law of libel, and the almost utter impossibility
of a journalist guarding himself from actions of
the kind alluded to, and at the same time fairly
doing his duty to the public. What the verdict
may be, it would no doubt be as libellous for us
to imagine, as it would probably be to attempt,
pendente lite, a definition of the well-known
word " Fudge," on which we are informed
that the whole merits of the case will rest ; and
we shall not, therefore, attempt either the one or
the other ; but we trust that we may, with all
due safety from the fangs of the law, declare
that the pro,fs of its gross injustice and uncer-
tainty continue to pour in upon us in an abun-
dance which renders it imperative upon us to call
the attention of the public most seriously to
the subject, and to entreat it to consider it as a
question, not of newspaper justice only, but of
national freedom and national good. In addition
to the cases which we stated yesterday, as evi-
dencing at once both the tyranny and the uncer-
tainty of the law of libel, we have now before us
the trial of Mr. Barrett, the proprietor of the
Dublin Patriot, for the republication of a letter
of Mr. O'Connell which had previously appeared
in the True Sun. Mr. Barrett was found guilty,
and although the verdict was accompanied by a
strong recommendation to mercy, acid the judg-
ment, which is postponed to next Term, may, in
consequence, be lenient; yet the injustice of the
prosecution is not the less glaring. The prose-
cution would have cost Mr. Barrett, even if he

had been acquitted, a sum of not less than
2501. or 300/.—in all probability double that
amount ; but this is not all the injustice, al-
though the very fact of the entailment of
such expense furnishes an irrefragible proof of
the power of the law, as it exists at present,
to enable the wealthy to tyrannize over the
comparatively poor, upon the exhibition of any
charge against the latter, however innocent
they may be of it: for as the letter appeared
originally in the True Sun, if we understand the
matter rightly, that journal ought to have been
first summoned to answer for it—and, father,
as Mr. O'Connell never denied its authenticity,
he ought, as a man and a gentleman, to have
come forward, and to have acquitted both, if he
could, of the responsibility of its insertion. Mr.
O'Connell, has not done so—the True Sun has
not been proceeded against—and Mr. Barrett, the
least guilty of the three sinners, is, by the glo-
rious liberty of the law of libel, entitled to the
benefit of bearing the punishment of all ! Is
not this an excellent law, which punishes the
least guilty of threel
parties, and leaves the other

two untoucned ? But this is not the only illus-
tration of the beauties of the law of libel. We
have not before us any report of the trial of
the Marquis of Sligo v. Cavendish, which
took place the other day ; but, if we are
rightly informed, the Marquis has obtained a
verdict of 250/. damages against the latter, and
that, too, after having, by a previous action, suc-
ceeded in procuring a long period of incarceration
for him ! The defendant, by the action brought
against him, that of indictment, is first pre-
cluded from exhibiting the truth as evidence in
his favour I—he is incarcerated because he
cannot I—and when he has suffered sufficiently
from prison torture, he is condemned to suffer in
purse also ! Verily, if this be not Star Cham-
ber practice, when or where is it, or was it, to
be found ? But we have done. If the press
be valuable to the people of England, they will
protect it ; they will come forward as one
man, and denounce the flagitious law by
which its energies are crushed and its use-
fulness abridged—they will commence imme-
diately, and they will hold public meetings, and
add meeting to meeting until justice shall be
done, both to it and to them. The period of
the meeting of Parliament approaches, and no
time ought to be lost in so good a cause, either
by the press or by the people—let both be but
true to themselves and to one another, and the
greatest blot upon the statute book will be wiped
nut in less than the first month of the sitting of
Parliament. The City of London ought to
take the lead in an affair of so much import-
ance ; but the first gun that is fired, wherever it
may be stationed, will, we doubt not, decide
the battle.—Morning Advertiser.