JOURNALISM IN FRANCE.

Bush Advocate, Volume V, Issue 354, 16 August 1890, Page 10

JOURNALISM IN FRANCE.

Tbe'JVtfto YoikHsf aJd^ European; editioi contains the following': — > . The ourtain was rung down on 'the "Affaire Mermeity to-A&j. Act I. of thfr comedy, it may be" necdssary to recall, oonsisted in the publication in the Cocafdei a Boulangist evening, paper, of advance ex* tracts from tho volume, in which were recapitulated the' sittingg of the bigCoutfc-oi Inquiry by which Boulanger and hi* aocomplicefl, Koehefort and Dillon/ wet's tried and condemned. Senators fretted a,nd famed until the powers that then were should arraign for theft, or complicity therein* . the persona who had had a hand in the publication of the docnmenta in questioni .. So the ourtain rose on Act 11. , in which. Odile Warrion, an employe of the office in which was printed the High Court volum^ Kervi3he and Terrail Mermeix, respectively editor and editor in chief of the Cocarde t were tried and convicted by a trio ofPariff police-court judges. Terrail Mormebf, wW m the interval has blossomed forth into a representative of the popular suffrage -of Paris, appealed against the sentence of four months' imprisonment passed upon him. Thus the third and final act opened in theAssize Court of the Seine. HOW THE THING WAS DOJTB. The stuffy little court-room was packed with an audience composed in main of journalists. Odile Warrion, whfc. wa£ the first examined, reported how— fired with the idea of doing good service to the Boulangist cause, to which, he waa attached— he had secreted one of tfc4 volumes as it left the hands of the binder^ and had it taken to the offices of the Gocardß, There Kerviobe had received the book. Mer» mcix then told of receiving the volume front Kerviehe and having it printed, without asking how Kerviche had obtained possession of it. Kerviche himself stated that he -had not considered' it necessary to ask 'Warrion how he had got the book. A GtfcSnOK FOB JOURNALISTS. The interest of the public in the casein, reality began only when the first ■of the; witnesses for the defence- wtfs- called} for thereal question at- issue was' whether A journafißt is or is not required <to be inquisitive tegarding the manner in which the copy he publishes has* been obtained. Mennetx! had the approbation ' of the majority of his .colleagues of the Fads Press, without distinction of polities. One after, another editors and journalists' of high ' standing deposed' in his favour. After lievin and Ferry,- of the Frauce, M. Humbert, journalist and municipal councillor, ■ declared he w«ul& have done just as Mermelx ' had donfij M. Dienesohau, editor of the Jibfatir, said' tbAt aU he'f desired to know regarding documents brought him was that they ware authentic; he did not consider it absolutely, necessary to osoertein whether they had been stolen or not, M. Comely, of the Gauhiti having given expression to similar views, Arthur Meyexy ■ I editor of the same journal, said his only carewould have been to publish the document in advance of his confreres. The judge asked, v But if the documents had been stolen P" "I should have published, it first of all,**" replied Meyer, "as it is my duty as a journalist to consider my readersabove everything.*' M. Clovis Hiigues defined the publication in question, not as a theft, but as a political appropriation ; while Camille Dreyfus, deputy editor of the NtHon, and Hector Pessard, thedramatic critic, also absolved Mermeix of all blame. M. Sarcey caused' some amusement by hinting that any of the magistratessitting in judgment on Mermeix, would not hesitate to shake hands with him on meeting; him in the drawingroom of a mutual friend,, and inferred that consequently they believed Mermeix to be an honest man. A TBEDIOT OF ACQUITTAL. After Emmanuel Areme, Lockroy and Portals, editors of the Tetttpsmi Soleil ; Herbrard, Senator, and EdouardHerve,Academi» cian, followed the example of the previous--witnesses by stating that in their opinion Mermeix's action was not — from the journalistic point of view — reprehensible. That it was not reprehensible from the legal point of view the jury decided after a fe.w minutes* deliberation by returning a verdiot of " n«t guilty" in favour of all three prisoners. In the case of Warrion this decision wasbased on the fact that he had acted merely ia. obedience to his political leanings, and not from mercenary motives.