The Sun.
London, England, 1857-01-31 00:00:00

TIIE LAW

OF LIBEL.

(Prom the Times.)
The title of journalists to publish reports of
-public meetings must bo set at rest. Either West-
minster-hall or Parliament must review and settle
the question. It cannot be suffered to remain in:
the doubtful position in which the hasty decision
of "Davison v. Duncan" has just placed it.
When Lord Campbell, during the conversation
which preceded the judgment, asked, " Was this
a meeting at which the public had a right to be
present ?" and added, " a good deal might depend
on that," he had, with characteristic sagacity,
seized upon the real point of the case. Unfortta-
nately he let it go again. When he came to deliver
the judgment of the Court he had confused himself
with certain of the rusty fictions which still lie
about Westminster-hail, and he talked Jike John
Doe and Richard Roe in an old action of ejectment.
In truth, the situation was an embarrassing one.
The Court of Queen's Bench had not the courage
to sweep away the half adverse precedents of evil
times, and to go back to the old common law of
England, which punished the inventor and not the
repeater—they had not the courage to say that the
celebrated resolution in Lord Northampton's case
is still law, and to clear that great legal landmark
of the rust and barnacles which little men and
later times have suffered to adhere to it.
Therefore was it necessary to cover a bad deci-
sion with bad reasons. We have dealt with the
law of the case upon a former occasion. The rea-
sons, however, are worthy of some further obsess
'ration. We are not about to discuss lengthily the
often-repeated fiction of the all-absorbing interest
which the public have in reading reports of trials
rather than reports of any other proceedings. No
doubt, the Lord Chief Justice in this rather re-
peated what he found other judges had said than
what he had deliberately considered. Lord Camp-
bell, when he does consider the origin of this excep-
tion, will confess that it %list have been introduced
by the judges, not for the benefit of the public, but
for their own convenience, in that it protected their
own reports. It was not for the public, but for
" Durnford and East" and their voluminous
descendants, that this exception was invented.
When the old common law rule, as laid down by
eleven English judges in the time of Sir Edward
Coke, was abrogated, the convenience of the Courts
required this exception, and it was made. We
hope to hear no more of this "public convenience,"
unless the judges are disposed to deal honestly with
it as a principle, and to extend it to all eases where
this exigence exists.
The only reason for this judgment which deserves
any real attention is rather legislatorial than legal.
The judges say that no privilege, to publish the
proceedings of a public meeting exists, because
they think it ought to exist, and they think it
eught not to exist because, if it- did, "a fair ac-
count might be published of what took place at a
public meeting, whatever injury it might do to
private character." Now, any worthy citizen who
happened to be in court, and heard the Lord Chief
Justice of England talking thus carefully and ten-
derly of private character, would naturally conclude
that he lived under laws which shielded his reputa-
tion and punished any man who might defame him.
Nothing can be more unfounded. Private charac-
ters are no more protected by the English law than
polecats. If your words should injure a man's
pocket or threaten his liberty the law will interfere,
but in other respects character is fair game to all
speakers, either in public or private. Calumnies
so gross that they would make a Quaker take the
utterer by the throat are innocent in the ear of a
British judge.
Are you a malignant man and much a coward,
fond of revenge, yet loth to pay for it ; and do you
hate your neighbours on the right and on the left ?
Go to your parish vestry, or to your club, and exert
your legal privileges. Your right hand neighbour
happens, as you know, to be a religious and moral
man, who shames you by his virtuous life, and
who places all his happiness in his domestic rela-
tions. Get up in your place in the vestry and
relate your sorrows, -in that you have the misfor-
tune to live next to a man who is in the habitual
commission of adultery, and whose daughter is—
you may use the foulest word the English language
has for a woman—the law will justify you. Of
your left band neighlAsur you may say that he is a
forsworn man, and, if you do not live in the
city of London, you may add that he is " a
cuckoldy old rogue." No one shall molest you.
The police, if you shall find it necessary to require
their aid, shall be bound to keep the peace while
you 'deliver yourself of these accusations. If any
one should be so ill-advised as to seek any remedy
at law, the Court will protect you. The very judges
who were so terrified at the danger likely to arise to
private character shall turn your assailants out of
court and make him pay your costs of defending
yourself. If you should feel your vindictiveness
whetted by anything that may have fallen from
the husband in his indignation, or the father in
his wrath, or from the daughter in her despair,
call a meeting at the Freemasons' or the London
Tavern under some other pretence, and, when
thousands are assembled, introduce the anec-
dotes, with names and circumstances, as an illustra-
tion of your speech. It is for you to consider
whether you will wound deeper by inventing what
is false or revealing what is true. It is alike in
the eye of the law. True or false, Lord Campbell
will be bound to throw over you the protection of
the judicial ermine. As a man be will no doubt
think unkindly of you and sr •ik harshly to you,
but as a judge he will allow you to take out execu-
tion for your costs and lock up both your neigh-
bours, if they happen not to be able to pay you.
This is the law of England, and it is to preserve
this law that the judges throw upon the press the
burden of being the guardians of private character.
It is we who are to weigh the expressions as they
fall ; it is we who, at our own peril, are to decide
whether aught that has been said is likely to move
hatred or contempt against any other person.
And then, when all has been done,—when the
report has been carefully screened clear' of every
personal allusion, when every accusation—rightly
or wrongly made—has been scrupulously excerpted,
some local circumstance may possibly give a libel-
lous character to some innocent sentence, and an
" innuendo" in the declaration will make the con-
nection complete and the damages sure.
But, if the press is silent, is private character
therefore secure ? In our days reputation stands
side by side with honour. Character is a more
delicate thing than it was with the sturdy middle
class of bygone days. A slander may have worked
its end, and its victim may be walking abroad
among his fellows unconscious that the plague-spot
is upon him. A malicious word may do more
certain wrong than a lie graven on the base of a
column. If a man be an honourable man he would
wish that if an imputation be made against him it
should not be whispered in a corner, or passed
along from mouth to ear, but made publicly and
in print, where he could recognise it and destroy
it. Surely the judges, for the sake of the dignity
of their office and of the law they administer, will
seek to obtain an alteration in our defamation law
as now administered ? It cannot be their pleasure
to sit as judge without power to punish tae most
odious crimes which man can commit against his
fellow. Some change there must be. The changes
we ask for are these :
Abolish the distinction between words publicly
and advisedly spoken and the same words when
written.
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