The Sun.
London, England, 1845-08-14 00:00:00

Otrniitg

LONDON, THURSDAY, AUGUST 14, 1845.

There is no profession, no business, no trade, no
calling, we sincerely. believe, so much exposed as the,
which it is our misfortune to follow, to misrepresenta
tion of motives, and misconception of opinions and prin-
ciples, in all cases where these happen to be adverse to
the pretensions or the interests—as in many cases they
necessarily must be—of some one class or other, whose
sensitiveness is so extreme that the mere force of con-
sciousness often makes them cry out, before, even, they
are so much as, intentionally, hinted at But journalism
is also the most devoted of vocations. They whose
property is embarked in it are marked out for the prey
of those whose honest efforts are directed to extracting a
furtive property out of it. The state of the law is so
anomalous, on all that regards the press, that it drops
almost all the favorite presumptions in dealing with any
charges that are preferred against newspapers, which it
would recognize in dealing with charges against any
class of her MAJESTY'S subjects, not connected with
them. The rule being, as to all other persons, to put
the most favourable construction on motives, the ex-
ception is taken against owners, editors, and writers in
the public papers. The absence of all equity in this
invidious distinction may be illustrated by the considera-
tion that if an editor do not display all vigilance
in announcing, as they occur, new cases of misde-
meanour, fraud, or other offences, of which it is necessary,
either for the protection of their interests or the gratifi
cation of their curiosity, that the public should be in.
formed; and the most uncompromising boldness in de-
nouncing such delinquencies and holding up the parties
who are proved guilty of them to the reprobation of the
virtuous and the honest ;—that editor is rendered con-
temptible, not to say infamous, in the eyes of his coun-
trymen by his moral pusillanimity, If, on the other
hand, he fearlessly discharge his most reeponsible and
important task, and, either in the hurry of composition,
or the interruptions and distractions of bis business, he
happen; out of a great variety of facts proved on the
trial to assume one, by mistake, as proved, which was
only implied, no proof upon it having been gone into,
he is liable to an action for such oversight, although, in
the first place, the mistake may not in the slightest
degree affect the merits of the case against the party so
proceeding against him, and although, in the second, the
inference may be irresistible that the fact is precisely
identical with the assumption. One of the most sin-
gular and vexatious liabilities to which an editor may
subj« ct a newspaper, in the total absence of all design
to give offence, and in the discharge of his habitual
duty, has just been afforded by an action brought against
a respectable and well-known provincial journal, under
the following circumstances :—Two parties, a Mr. DEW
, (air, state agent in the Strand), and another iedividual re-
&ding at Bayswater, were stated, in an account given by
the Times newspaper, to have been brought up before
the magistrate, at the MarlborOugh-street police-office,
charged with being concerned in an illegal negotiation
for the sale of an East India cadetship, in violation of
the 40th Geo. 111., which makes such a proceeding a
misdemeanour. The Times report, in describing the
history of the transaction (which it is not necessary here
to go into), affirmed that the gentleman by whose in-
influence and credit it was represented, to a Mr. COP-
PARD, that the cadetship could be obtained was a Mr.
SHANK, who had once been a Director of the East India
Company ; and that on the production of a certain do-
cument, "purporting to be signed by that gentleman,"
Mr. cOPPARD paid down 1,05 Uh iu the nature of "con-
sideration money." Evidence was called to disprove this
signature. The Brighton Guardian, in transferring an