Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1913-01-21
Newspaper Regulation.

The following bill introduced by Mr..
Rembert last Friday, is understood to
embody Governor Bleasers ideas Of a
proper law to regulate the right Of a
person aggrieved by a newspaper to
reply thereto:
Section 1. That whenever a news
paper, magazine or periodical printed
or published in this state shall print
or publish, either in its editorial or
news columns, an article or articles
written by any editor reporter, corre-
spondent or any other person or per-
sons whomsoever, which article or ar
ticles shall make an attack or make
any charge or charges or in any way
effect the character, standing in the
community, or conduct Of any person
or persons, whether private citizens or
public officers, such newspapers, mag
azines or periodicals shall publish in
the same shall be furnished, the an
swer, denial, explanation or defence Of
said person or persons, without max
ing said person or persons pay there
for, and the said answer, denial, eX-
planation or defence shall be given the
same prominence in said newspaper,
magazine or periodical ss the article
or articles containing said charge or
charges.
Section 2. Any editor, manager or
other officer or person in authority of
newspapers, magazines, or periodical
who shall refuse or neglect or be re-
sponsible for the failure to print and
publish said answer, denial, explana-
ton or defence Of said person or per-
sons attacked or charged as set out in
Section l Of this act shall be deemed
guilty Of a misdemeanor, and upon
conviction thereof shall be subject to
a fine Of not less than $500 and i'm
prisonment in the county jail of not
less than thirty days: Provided, how
ever, that no newspaper, magazine or
periodical shall be required to publish
or print any article whatsoever, which
shall contain obscene or profane Ian
guage.
We are unable to see in the forego-
ing anything beyond what we have al
ways understood to be the common
law, and there is certainly nothing in
it that goes beyond the practice that
The Enquirer has always voluntarily
followed.
1t is the practice in this Office to
print a reply to a correction of any
alleged Misrepresentation that may be
made of any one, and we have never
in all the history Of the paper, refused
to publish any article submitted in
good faith, merely for the purpose Of
refuting or differing from any view or
opinion we may have expressed. That
has always been our idea of one of the
highest duties of an honest selfre-
specting newspaper and 80 far as we
are concerned this proposed act is in
no wise Objectionable.
In times past, we have received from
i'll tempered correspondents communi-
cations presumably based upon some
thing Objectionable and evidently in
tended to be personally offensive and
insulting. Some Of these communi-
cations have been of g. nature that
would have warranted and justified
their being ignored; but nevertheless
we have seen proper to give them
space, with or without reply as in our
judgment seemed best; but always in
the belief that the public was fully
reach just judgment. More than once
in our experience, people who thought
they were literally annihilating us,
have found instead that they were only
injuring themselves to an extent that
would be beyond our capacity even If
we were inclined to try to injure them
More than once also we have had the
experience of having people claim the
right to come into the paper on the
ground of alleged Misrepresentation
when their own statement of what
they claimed to have said was so iden-
tical with what we had said they said,
that they themselves were unable to
explain to a disinterested third party
the difference. Such a procedure as
this is explainable on two or three
theories. One is that the people re-
ferred to, are so well pleased with what
they may have said or done in the first
instance that they want to see it re-
peated and another is they use the pre-
text of alleged Misrepresentation in
order to get in a lot of new matter at
the expense of the newspaper and for
the benefit of the writer.
Another practice that is sometimes
followed for the embarrassment of
small papers with limited mechanical
facilities is like this. The party who
claims to have been aggrieved, and
rightly maybe, writes long reply, and
knowing the hour at which the paper