PRESS OPINIONS.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1082, 22 March 1911, Page 6

PRESS OPINIONS.

STRONG PROTESTS AGAINST SECRECY. SEASONS DEMANDED. i Quite a number of papers outEide Wel- ; lington have interested themselves in the :■ -.case as the result of the disclosures made ;by The Dominion. , The■ following opin;'ions are additional to those already published from oiir exchanges, the headings •being those chosen .by our contemporaries ■gs appropriate to the occasion:— , "The Veil of Secrecy," "The Otago Daily Times," of March 20, under the above heading, refers to the matter as follows:— "Upon what grounds it has been '■■ thought fit to interdict the publication of -airy reference in the law reports to the case to which tho public attention" has low been pointedly directed in Wellington - -we do not know. No explanation ha-s. been offered to the press of the reasons ■which fender it desirable in the opinion '. jof the Court that the- proceedings should be kept as private' as possible. But certainly the case .does not seem to come irithin the category of those in which ■private interests only are involved, and, U so, the nrohibition which the Court ■has placed upon the publication of any ; report of the proceedings in connection ■with it may well be said to be opposed to tho public interest. There is a wider aspect of the miestion that is raised by this incident, and it is one that closely ; concerns the community as a whole. It ; consists in the existence of an exceedingly dangerous tendency on the part of those in authority to encroach upon the free- ' doin of tho press and, indirectly, to inter- ; fere with the liberties of the public. We .' see proof of this in tho legislation enacted and the legislation proposed to prohibit the publication by the press of various : kinds of .news. There are certain classes of cases in the courts in connection with ■which the publication of the evidence . may :be prohibited. As decent newspapers have no desire to report. proceedings of this' description further than', as it is their .duty to do', to publish the' results,' they' ; ere not. affected'by the legislation which .'is, indeed, directed almost wholly against one particular publication. The fapt, ■ however, that this ■ prohibitive.\ legislation is in force may very readily be made the pretext some day for an undesirable extension of its application, jiist as. the authority the. judges now possess to forbid tho publication of evidence in divorcei cases—in (itself a power that, so ' long as'it is 'discreetly exercised, is rightly reposed in the Court—has been occasionally stretched in such a way.. as perhaps to give some colour to the sus- . picion that one rule may operate in such ; cases for the influential and another rule for the uniufluential. The prohibition, again, that has been placed upon tho , publication of certain information relative to racing events is in itself a small ' thing, but we have seen the attempt to drive the wedge, of which it represented the thin end, into the liberties of , the ! -press, to an outrageous extent, as for instance in the effort of the Government to gag the newspapers of . the Dominion in the interval between the first and tho eecond ballots at Parliamentary elections. These incidents sufficiently, servo to illustrate the existence of an undemocratic tendency to interfere with the exercise by journalists of their discre- ; tion in the conduct of their newspapers and to curtail the enjoyment by the Dress «f its liberty. And as any attack upon tne-Jiberty of the press involves also an attack upon public freedom, the tendency is one to be jealously watched by the people of the Dominion."

"A Dangerous Precedent." From tho Dunedin "Star" of March 18: "A good deal at surprise and disquiet has . been occasioned by. the reports— nece'sshnly vague, but sufficiently suggestive—ivhieh have been circulated in reference to certain peculiar -methods recently adopted ;iri 'the administration of justice at Wellington. . . . We should ba sorry to.condemn any judicial action without knowing all the circumstances, but in this matter the salient.point is that no imagi.na.ble .circumstances the complete suppression of information .which the Chiff Justice appears to 'have sanctioned—nay, emphatically ordered. Even in divorce cases, or ether cases involving \insavoury details, the Judges are pot in the habit (if they have the power) "if forbidding the publication of. the name's of the parties or the character of the suit or charge,. and so far as the power of the Court itself in regard to criminal, or other cases is concerned, it may be pointed out that authority to clear the Court is given only where the presiding Judge is of opinion that, 'the interests of public morality' require such a course to be adopted. Even then, bo it noted, there is'a most important reservation: certain persons (including 'any accredited , newspaper reporter") may remain. (Crimes Act, Section 432.) As.it happons. however, we have sufficient knowledge of this Wellington affair to enable us,to eay that at is not a divorce case or anything of n cognate sort. It is a matter connected with money, and incidentally it may not be entirely without political associations. We shall say no more' at ~pre=flnt, beyond remarking that we find it difficult even to conceive how the Chief ; Justice can satisfactorily justify his obscurantist action. Eut there will be more to say by and by."

"Gauging the Press." "The action of the Chief Justice in excluding the press during the hearing of a case in the Supremo Court in Wellington" (says the "Southland Times," of the 18th instant) "is one that ought not to be allowed to pass without protest, for not only was the press excluded, but the publication of the names of the case was also forbiddbu. For the present we are not concerned with the motives that actuated the Chief Justice in taking such a drastic step, but the principle involved, and the trespassing on rights which have hitherto been regarded as inalienable, must of necessity cause every thoughtful member of the community to view with ularm a proceeding which may not bo Regarded in any sense but as being engSrely retrogressive. When it is recalled to mind that for many years, the British people fought to the death against pernicious- secret tribunals which had eo cruelly affected them, and that after a prolonged struggle this incubus which had been strangling their liberties was successfully throttled, anything that even faintly rcsemblos an encroachment upon liberties so hardly won must be viewed with anxiety and alarm. For, after all, tho exclusion of the press is but th(bf thin edge of the wedge, and it is for the people now to take up the stand that not only shall the wedge be driven in no further, but that their desire is that the wedge shall be removed forthwith and for all time. In other countries at the present time the people are strenuously fighting for this same liberty, and ■ we ,ffho.\have already succeeded jn...obtaining

what others are vainly striving to get should realise the importance ol holding fast to it. The suppression of law news constitutes a very grave danger. The recognition of the right of the press is the surest guarantee of just administration, and in tho event of n wrong being done there is no surer means of righting it than by Hie publicity which the press assures, Herein lies a most serious danger.- 'In the caso of a miscarriage of justice, tho press acts as an appellant, but if-causes' similar to the one under notice, or any causes at all, are taken in secret there can be no safeguard against a miscarriage, there is no one who can take up the case for tho person or persons who. may be wronged. Another feature in connection .with tho incident has been dealt with by the Christchurch 'Star,' and it is that the exclusion of the reporters will in itself defeat the end which the Chief Justico no doubt had in view. Gossip will soon do ils deadly work, and probably before long the embellishments that will be added will so grossly exaggerate the character of the case that it will have assumed sensational dimensions before the last word has been said regarding it. In tho interests of morality and justice the press should not be excluded from our law courts, and such an infringement on the rights of the people, which the newspapers in such cases represent, should not be tolerated.

"The Mysterious Court Case." The Auckland "Herald" 'says: "All Judges are human, and beingUniinan, are liable to err. liven Cnief Justices cannot claim complete exemption irom the frailty common to mortals. We may therefore ask with diie respect to the Supreme Court Bench of New Zealand what extraordinary necessity can justify the edict recently issued in Wellington forbidding not merely the publication of proceedings in a case before the Supreme Court, but even the publication of the names and the facts? It says much for the' law-abidingness of the press of the Dominion that this arbitrary edict has been obeyed, but. it is preposterous to imagine ■ that this tentative obedience closes the situation as it has developed in ai Court presided over by Sir Mobert Stout, for every instinct of a free press and a free peoplo revolts against the methods of Star Chambers and Venetian tribunals. There must be some more tangible reason given for such procedure than the. purely pedantic' explanation that tho Bench can do as it chooses and exact secrecy when it. wills."

"Secret Trials," The "Dannevirke News" of March 20, discussing the case, comments as under: "Tho Chief Justice forbade publication of the judgment, after the pressmen requested his consent by letter. We have no doubt but that the Chief Justice is actuated by the very highest motives in dealing with this case in camera, but secret trial is one that should be discountenanced in British. Courts of Justice. The secret trial savours of the Star Chamber, and it gives the public the uneasy feeling that-there,is, one law for the rich and another for the poor. In some Court cases it is a righ,t and proper thing that details should not be published, but when these unfortunate affairs are under judicial .consideration the reporters are very rarely asked to withdraw, although the doors uiay be closed to the public.' Judges, as a rule, trust the representatives of the press, and the respectable journals of tlie Dominion pride themselves on the confidence that is reposed in them. -Newspapers generally desire to "keep : 'their"'pb'g , es' clean, and may be depended on not to publish details that would disgust' tho bulk of their readers.. A Court of Justice, however, is a public institution, and if a. man seeks relief from it, he should not expect his particular legal business to be Conducted privately. The. King of Grjat Britain set a very.fine example in this respect. The tr'aducor, Mylitui, made his first appearance before a secret tribunal, but a public trial quickly followed. Whatever was the nature of the secret tribunal, King , George, ■ knew the national sentiment too well to tolerate snch a method, j of clearing., his ,namo,from calHe brought:his-tradiicer out into the clear light of a British Criminal Court, and made him tell his vile story in the open. There was no attempt to hush up unpleasant details. Precedent is the guiding star of the Law Courts of the British Empire, and our Judges will have to grope a long way before they will be able to fiiid an argument in favour of secrecy to set against the stand made for public. trial in the name of the King."