PRESS PRIVILEGES.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3502, 27 September 1882, Page 4

PRESS PRIVILEGES.

The fundamental privileges of the Press are common to every British subject, and they are freedom of speech and pen. But; in wicked hands this great privilege becomes dangerous on account of it degenerating into license. In the case of newspapers this license tends to intrude into the privacy of life, and proclaim on the housetops that which should only bo known in the home circle. Tbie is particularly noticeable in society journals. When a public man is criticised from malevolent motives as a private individual.and when his domestic actions are subjected to condemnation in order to imdermine his public reputation or character, thon the newspaper is transgressing its right and abusing its privileges. Fair or candid criticism on subjects where the ■writer feels that ho has a moral duty to perform, or to protect a legitimate public interest, comes within the privileges of a newspaper. Fair comments on the public acts of public men are allowable. But •where a journalist, writing from a caeoethes scribendi, wilfully, falsely, and maliciously injures the good name of an institution or individual, then he places himself under the ban of the law, which can be invoked against him. If comments too on public men are made a medium for private malice, or exceed the bounds of fair criticism, or by falsely imputing improper motives, even if the belief in such motives existed, they are actionable. This is a general exposition of the law on the subject, which has no respect for persons, and which is as much binding on the individnal as on the institution known as a newspaper. The tyranny of the Press is the worst species of tyranny, on account of the subjective character of its operations. And when a newspaper becomes a terror to respectability, as brigands in some countries are the scourge of the community, it is time for honest journalists to act like law-abiding people, and help to bring the offender to justice, by expressing their abhorrence of his conduct. This has been dono in Hongkong, where Press privileges have been rankly abused by a person named Fraser Smith, and he has suffered one of the coneeqiiences —legal pxinishment. This person having a printing office at his disposal started a newspaper called the Hongkong Telegraph, and commenced operations by abusing all who differed from him. His hand was against everyone, and every man's hand was against him, though many were frightened to repel his attacks. In the coarsest of language he assaulted individuals and institutions alike, and when argument failed he had recourse to the last recourse of lampoonists—that of raking up unpleasant incidents of a private nature, and throwing them in the face of the party he attacked •with unblushing effrontery. The man was a perfect nuisance. He was like a mad dog, snarling and frothing at everyone, and running ' a-muck' through the place, and biting the first man be met, and by some he was held to be a perfect terror. J3y the lower class he was admired. There is always a class who mistake Billingsgatism for fine writing, and continual journalistic swearing as exhibition of talent, and such people were the supporters of the Telegraph. He attacked Herr Bandmann most slandei-ously, aud vilified him most atrociously. Herr Bandmann then proceeded against him criminally for libel. The defendant was able to prove nothing, and he only showed that he had passed the boundary of ordinary impudence and shamefacedness. Ho was found guilty, and the Chief Justice sentenced him to two months' imprisonment. Pending, and after the pronouncing of sentence the Telegraph made two confessions of repentancejthen retracted, then printed more libel, and finally went into gnashing of teeth at the Judge, and society in general,for relegating its chief 'behind the bare.' The plaintiff in the case did good service for the colony in defending his fair fame from the aspersions of a low and unprincipled writbr, for he at once caused it to be shown that this man could not assail with impunity the characters of individuals, nor could he when once convicted escape with a nominal penalty. In passing sentence on the defendant, His Honor clearly intimated that in the case of. a journalist putting himeelf outside the pale of an honorable profession, like Mr Fraser Smith did, he would be treated like a criminal in this respect, and that his journalistic character should either mitigate or increase his sentence. The defendant had been a nuisance to the community, and bore a bad character as the conductor of his journal (so bad that no newspaper recognised him as belonging to the profession), and his lordship passed a heavier sentence on him than ho would in the case of a man who perhaps had been more sinned against than sinning. We agree with the opinion of the Judge on this point, and we heartily concur in the step he has taken to show that a course of vile slander shall meet with commensurate punishment when the offender stands guilty on one charge before the Court. The sentence of the Court meets with our approval, and we trust that it will deter journalistic outlaws and bravos of the pen from adopting such a line of conduct as that which has placed Mr Fraser Smith ' behind the bars.' —Singapore Straits Intelligence, August 9.