The Sun.
London, England, 1835-12-24 00:00:00

PARTIAL APPLICATION of the LAW.

For some months past the Stamp Act has only had
this force, that those Proprietors of Newspapers who
had once obeyed it, would not be permitted to violate
it, but new speculators commencing with a defiance of
it, might do_ as they. pleased. ab inctepto seems
to have been the rule. Established Papers could not
throw off the Stamp, but new Journals of intelligence
and. politics have started and gone on without it. In-
deed, it is now, we believe, some months since the ap-
pearance of a new Weekly Paper with the stamp,
though formerly such Publications used to spring up
like mushrooms, and die away again after a brief exis-
tence, profitable only to the Revenue. The cause is
evident enough ; the persons who have lately started
Papers have seen no sufficient reason for burdening
themselves with the Stamp Duty, and others who may
have been disposed to embark in Newspaper specula-
tions, and who have had scruples about the violation
of the law, could not venture to compete with the lower
priced Unstarnped. The Revenue,• with which Go-
vernments have always so fine a sympathy, • has, we
suppose, begun to feel the effect of this state of things,
and a plan of proceeding for the correction of it has
been announced, which we have read with much sur-
prise. We quote from the Daily Papers :
" The work of apprehending venders of unstamped pub-
lications partaking of the character of NewspaperS, has for
a long time past been confined to-a man named Deane, and
one or two others in the employ of the Commissionors of
Stamps, and one half of the penalties awarded by the Ma-
gistrates has invariably gone into the pockets of those by
whom the offenders have been taken in charge. Within-
the last few days, however, an order has been communica-
cated to the police magistrates, setting forth that in future
a certain number of officers attached to the various esta-
blishments shall on every Saturday and Sunday use their
best exertions in order to put down the existing evil, by
• seizing all the unstamped newspapers carried about for
sale
.by the itinerant traders, who on giving their names and
abodes, and undertaking to ans leer the charge ou the following
Monday, shall be liberated ; but their property thus taken
front them, will be conveyed to the police office, and
after being marked with the said vender's name and ad-
dress, as also that of the officer by whom he was cap-
tured, the. whole of the publications will be forwarded
to the Stamp Office Commissioners, who, f they think
proper, will cause one of their servants to attend before
the magistrates to press for a conviction ; and in the
event of their not doing so, the offender will be acquitted.
The metropolitan police are not in any way to interfere
as regards the unstamped, unless -by some violent con-
duct a crowd be collected, and the public peace en-
dangered."
First, we have to ask how the agents of. police are
to distinguish between legal and illegal Publications ?
The itinerant venders are to be acquitted, indeed, if the
servants of the Stamp-office do not attend before the
Magistrates to press for a conviction ; but what is to
be the remedy of the injured party, if the Papers seized
be not illegal ? From the circumstance that the Com-
missioners of Stamps do not press the charge before
the Magistrates, what is to be inferred ? It may be
either that there is no ground whatever for the seizure,
or that the offence is not of a nature, or of a degree,
that the Commissioners would fix upon for punish-
ment. The party whose property has been seized will
be very likely to assign the former cause, that there
was no ground for the seizure, and it were a tyranny
to leave him, without an immediate remedy, under this
impression.
What can be more monstrous than to confiscate. a
man's means of livelihood, without deigning to show
the offence that has incurred the forfeiture ? The
party in such a case has a right to conclude that he
has not violated the law, and, therefore, that he has
been robbed. He may refer to the Act of Parliament,
in which it is seen that certain penalties are directed
.for offences against its provisions ; and as no dispensing
power is given to the Commissioners of Stamps in such
Act, he may unanswerably. contend that he was legally
liable to those punishments or to none, and that the
seizure must have been unwarrantable, if the penalties
were inapplicable.
In the plan of proceeding above quoted it may have
been assumed throughout (if so, certainly very incon-
siderately) that none but illegal Publications would be
seized ; but upon that supposition we have to ask
where the Stamp-office finds its dispensing power—
where it is authorized to punish some offences against_
the law, and to extend indulgence to others ? Let us
know where such an authority is found, and we will
produce abundant reason for immediately abrogating it.
It is evident, indeed, that such a power might be turned
to the worst sort of censorship of the Press that has
ever yet had existence. If the Stamp-office may, at its
discretion,. punish or tolerate unstamped Publications,
it may grant impunity to those of one political cha-
racter, and destroy all the others. Nay, more, it might
by the advantages given to the unstamped. it chose to
favour, almost extinguish the stamped Press of oppo-
site politics. It is not enough to say that the power
in these times is not likely to be carried to such a pitch
of abuse ; as it is a power which obviously might be
so abused, it should not be permitted to exist. . The
blessing of a people under a well-constituted Govern-
ment does not consist merely in present safety, but in
security. We have to do with adversaries capable of
daring attempts, and it is well to limit powers that
would be dangerous in the hands of dangerous men.
But we need not have recourse to any extreme case
in order to illustrate the unfitness of allowingto the
Stamp Office a dispensing power—a power of enforc
ing the law or not, at discretion—or according to
favour or prejudice—which the most daring tyrant in
the corrupt Parliament of former days, would not have
ventured to propose. The injustice and partiality to
which this power may serve, must be obvious, and as
well, or better, at once might the Commissioners be
authorized to require, or dispense with. Stamps, accord-
ing to their judgment or their pleasure. An impunity
is the worst mode of indulgence, and it would be far
wiser to give authority to levy a tax on some, and not
on others, than to leave fiscal offences to be punished
in some cases, and overlooked in others. Law should
be a certain rule applying to certain acts, and the