Los Angeles herald. [microfilm reel] (Los Angeles [Calif.]) 1900-1911, 1910-01-27
COURT QUASHES
LIBEL CHARGES
PANAMA CANAL INDICTMENT
DISMISSED
PROSECUTION DECLARED TO BE
UNCONSTITUTIONAL
Press Publishing Company, Accused
by Roosevelt of Criminal Falslf-
cation, Liberated by United
States Court
ASSOCIATED Pressl


NEW YORK, Jan. 26.-The indict
ment against the Press Publishing
company, publishers of the New York
World, charging Joseph Pulitzer and
others with criminal libel against
Theodore Roosevelt, President Taft and
others, was quashed today in the
United States district court.
Judge Hough ruled that the statute
upon which the indictment rested was
not sufficient authority, or, in other
words, that the court had no juris-
diction.
Delaney Nicoll, counsel for the de-
PENDANTS, interpreted the decision as a
signal victory for the freedom of the
press.
THE curiously ingenious mind" he
said, that brought to life for the first
time in So years the law under which
this prosecution was begun, has re-
tired to private life, but has left this
legacy behind it.
This is not a prosecution brought
by aggrieVed or injured private indi-
viduals; it was begun by the president
of the United States in an attempt
to show that libel had been commit
ted upon the American people.
"The statute under which this suit
was brought was drafted to punish Of
lenses not covered by laws in the
section in which they were committed.
In constituting the statute, it is not
for US to consider what fair-minded
attorney general might do under
it: it is for us to consider what can
be done with it.
1--WE had better have the sedition
law or even the star chamber again
than such monstrous practise as the
government advocated in this proceed
ing
President Roosevelt, in his message
of December Is, 1908, to congress, thus
characterized the publications of which
he complained:
at is idle to say that the known
character of Mr.. Pulitzer and his news
paper are such that the statements
in that paper will be believed by no
body; unfortunately, thousands of per-
sons are ill-informed in this respect
and believe the statements they see in
print, even though they appear in a
newspaper published by Mr.. Pulitzer.
"These statements are aalse lin
every particular from beginning to
end. The wickedness of the ISLANDERS
is only surpassed by their faulty. So
utterly baseless are the stories that
apparently they represent in part
merely matter collected for campaign
purposes and In part stories originally
blackmail
ct do not believe we should concern
ourselves with the particular individ-
uals who wrote the lying and libelous
articles. The real offender is Joseph
Pulitzer, editor and proprietor of the
World. 1t should not be left to a pri-
waite citizen to sue Mr.. Pulitzer for
libel. He should be prosecuted by the
governmental authorities.
There is nothing to choose between
a public servant who betrays his trust
a public servant who is guilty OF
blackmail or theft, or financial dis
honesty of any kind. and man guilty
as Mr.. Joseph Pulitzer has been gull
ty in this, instance. 1t is, therefore
a high national duty to bring to JUS
tice this villiher of the American
people,
Judge Hough, in rendering his deci-
sion, said, in part:
1T is charged here that the crime