The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1904-06-05


of government.
The best place to find Jefferson's
mature and real views are IN ms acts
the conspicuous part he pore IN m
cooperating the guarantee OF freedom
of the press in State constitutions;
the prominent place he gave TO TINS
in every constitution or Dill OF flSntS
he suggested or drafted; his forcing
into the Federal Constitution the pro-
vision that no laws should be passed
abridging the liberty of the press;
his sincere courageous and effective
fight against the unconstitutional ana
wicked sedition law; his recommends
tons in state papers; his inaugural
addresses and the general trend of his
writings and actions.
In his first inaugural address, Mr..
Jefferson was on the mountain top of
faith in the people and devotion to
the freedom of the press, and his con-
Victions then may be summed up in
this sentence in a letter to Charles
Yancey: Where the press is free and
every man able to read, all is SAFE.
In his first inaugural address he said:
Freedom of the press | deem cone OF
the) essential principles of cur gov
eminent and consequently Gomez
which ought to shape it's administra-
ton In the same address, among
the essential principles of government
he enumerated 1.-The diffusion of in
formation, and arrangement OF all
abuses at the bar of public reason;
freedom of religion, freedom of the
press, and freedom of the person,
under protection of the habeas cor
pus; and trial by iuries impartially Sc
lected.'
Between his first inaugural address
and the second Mr.. Jefferson and his
administration had been the recipient
of a steady stream of miSrepresenta-
ton and abuse from the press hostile
to his principles and those of the
party he had founded. In his second
inaugural he felt called upon to refer
to the studied and continued attacks,
but instead of recommending some
other measure of suppression or the
re-enactment of the Sedition law, he
used the incident to enforce his abid-
ing faith in his creed: 'The liberty of
speaking and writing guards our other
liberties" Printing has been said to
be the art preventative of arts" 1t
is equally true that the free press is
the preservative of all freedom.
In his second inaugural address, Mr..
Jefferson, while commenting with Sc
verify upon the lengths to which a
licentious press had gone in miSrep-
resenting his administration, used the
abuse of their liberty and its failure to
accomplish its purpose to injure, as
the perfect and complete Vindication
of the position he had always main
| tanned He said:
\ During this course of administra-
ton, and in order to disturb it, the
artillery of the press has been lev
elled against us, charged with what
soeVer it's RIGHTEOUSNESS could devise
| or dare. These abuses of an institu-
| ton so important to freedom and sci
ence are deeply to be regretted, mas
much as they tend to lessen its use
| fulness and to sap it's safety. They
| might, indeed, have been corrected by
! the wholesome punishments reserved
and provided by the laws of the sew
eral States against falsehood and de-
| famation; but public duties more ur-
| gent press on the time of public SER
wants, and the offenders have there
| fore been left to find their punish
ment in the public indignation.
Nor was it uninteresting to the
world, that an experiment should be
| fairly and fully made. whether free
| dom of discussion, unaided by power
is not sufficient for the propagation
and protection of truth -? Whether a
government, conducting itself in the
| true spirit of it's constitutions with
| zeal and purity, and doing no act
which it would be unwilling the whole
| WIlIJGn
down by falsehood and defamation ?
| The experiment has been tried You
have witnessed the scene. Our fell
| low-citiZens have looked on cool and
! collected. They saw the latent source
| from which these outrages proceeded
| They gathered around their public
| functionarieS; and, when the ConStitu-
| ton called them to the decision by
suffrage, they pronounced their YER
n nt n rhn hn1
we'd them, and consolatory to the
| friend of man, who believes he may
| be intrusted with his own affairs
mo inference is here intended mat
| the laws provided by the State AGAINST
| false and defamatory publications
should not be enforced. He who has
| time, renders service to public NOR
ais and public tranquility in reformin @
these abuses by the sanitary coercions
| of the law. But the experiment is
noted to prove that, since truth and
reason have maintained their ground
against false opinions, in league with
| false facts, the press confined to
truth, needs no other legal restraint.
| The public judgment will correct false
! reasonings and opinions, on a full
| hearing of all parties; and no other
! definite line can be drawn between
| the inestimable liberty of the press
and its demoralizing RIGHTEOUSNESS.
| If there be still improprieties which
this rule would not restrain, it's sup
PIGMENT must be sought in the cen
sorship of public opinion"
But, though he never WaVered i'm
| his faith i'm the blessings of a free
press, Mr.. Jefferson was so hunted bv
the hyenas of a malignant and sour
rilous personal journalism, that he
often gave expression to his sense of
outrage at the misrepresentation of
his character and views, in language
| that has been twisted into the idea
| that he came, in his latter years, to
doubt his early belief that the press
should be unrestrained. Such express
sions We're always uttered or written
| hastily while he was smartng under
what he knew to be undeserVed criti-
cism and abuse. as will be seen by
extracts from private letters written
by him. These letters were not writ
ten for publication. In them he was
| merely thinking aloud. They convey
only a passing wave of Indignation
that often causes a man to speak We
hemently to his friend of sense of