The Sun.
London, England, 1835-08-24 00:00:00

THE FRENCH KING AND THE

PRESS.

(From Roebuck's Pamphlet of yesterday.)

Louis Phillippe, King of the French, finds the Press ex-
tremely troublesome. He therefore hates it as cordially as
the London pickpocket hates a Metropolitan policeman. In
this hatred his French Majesty's Ministers fully participate.
Accordingly, they determine to put down the object of their
most unholy aversion.
The means by which they design to accomplish this end is
a Penal Law of uncommon severity. This law first lays
down, in vague and general terms—so that any construction
can be adopted by a subservient Judge—what the French
King and the French House of Lords do not like to have
said of them, and then it inflicts enormous penalties, in the
shape of fines and imprisonment, upon those who write what
is forbidden. .

Now, mark what clumsy workmen these same Frenchmen
must be. Why do they not take a lesson out of our book ?
They should not inflict enormous fines. Fines are ob-
noxious. Besides, it is an open and direct attack upon the
Liberty of the Press, which is more obnoxious still. The
French Ministry should have consulted Mr. Spring Rice. He
would have explained to them—" in an impressive speech, ex-
ceeding two hours and a half in length"—that there is nothing
like a fourpenny stamp, as a means of preventing the mass of
the people from dabbling in the affairs of their betters. He
would have reasoned as follows to the French Minister who
consulted him :
" You cannot, surely, desire to deprive your Respectacle
Classes' of the privilege of reading papers, and of having
papers written for them ? All you can possibly wish is to
check the vile habit of reading, which, I am sorry to say, is
rapidly spreading, both in your country and in mine, among
those who would be better occupied in attending to their
work, and in conducting themselves lowly and reverently
towards their betters ! I see, you nod assent. Well, then,
all you have to do is to raise the price of the newspaper be-
yond the reach of those whom you desire to exclude. This
done, and you may depend upon it all those seditious Repub-
Iran writers, whom you are now proposing to make martyrs
of, would either starve, or would (and this my experience tells
me is more likely) adapt their lucubration to the more limited
class of readers—in other words, to the ruling few. Once
accomplish this, and you will require no Penal Laws against
the Press. You will find it your most useful instrument—
your most obsequious slave. For a confirmation of what I
say, look at our Press. They all write for those who can
afford a seven-penny paper. The people have only one
stamped paper on their side, and that is dragging on a lin-
gering existence for want of buyers. It is true that some of
the Conservative Press seem to be against the party in power.
They desire the places we have got. But whenever a ques-
tion arises between the Aristocracy and the People, we know
that both the Whig and Tory sections of the Aristocratic
Papers will unite against those troublesome Radicals, whom
the Tories hate nearly as much as we do. Indeed, not
being compelled to conceal their hate, as we are, they seem
to hate them more.

" Should you introduce a measure of this kind, all you have
to do is to swear it is a purely financial question—that
you want money, and that you must have it, and that on
that ground alone you propose a stamp of eight sous. If
there be any show of opposition in the Chamber, cite the
case of England. Whatever peculiar beauty of our Con-
stitution it may be the reigning fashion to admire, attri-
bute it boldly to the operation of the Stamp-duty on News-.
papers. This done, and I pledge myself that the 50,000
readers, which some of your Daily Papers, I am told, enjoy,
would immediately dwindle down to some 6 or 7,000 of the
richer class. This is not all the ackantage you would gain.
The tone of the Papers would change with the limitation of
readers. Articles would be written to please the dominant
few; and, as I said before, you would require no penal law
against Republican writers, simply because no Republican
writers could gain a livelihood.
" In this country we are pestered with breakers of the law,
who are now become so numerous and so openly encouraged,
that we dare not prosecute them. It is a long time, however,
before the People can bring their minds to such a course, and
although the Unstamped Press is now our greatest curse, and
will, before long, succeed in destroying the Stamp-dute, be
assured it is a thing of slow growth. Thus, yen, and the
several Ministries which may succeed you, will enjoy, at least,
half a century of freedom from the annoying meddling of the
People in the affairs of the Government. You will of course
be somewhat troubled with petitions and deputations, but no-
thing is easier than to put them off. Promise them anything
to quiet them, and it is easy to explain, as we call it, when the
time for performing., or rather for breaking, the promise shall
have arrived. This is my plan, and I .find it invariably suc-
cessful."
This is the kind of advice the P:ench Miai7ter would have
get fri honc.-;t Cl)anfzlior of the Exchequer.
The sci;erne has been triad in thi; count 7, an has succeeded
the heart's content of the Ari,toeri!7y, for half a century.

A fool-penny Stamp is a rr
LW, which must

rt-e Fvientine gag than A ponal

•rtti-ic f-om it

everity.

CArLISLT IVOE