A.V. Dicey on Lord Leveson’s proposed repression of freedom of expression

“The present position of the English press is marked by two features.

First, ‘the liberty of the press’, says Lord Mansfield, ‘consists in printing without any previous license, subject to the consequences of law.’ Lord Ellensborough says:

‘The law of England is a law of liberty, and consistently with this liberty we have not what is called an imprimateur; there is no such preliminary license necessary; but if a man publish a paper, he is exposed to the penal consequences, as he is in every other act, if it is illegal.’

These dicta show us at once that the so-called liberty of the press is a mere application of the general principle, that no man is punishable except for a distinct  breach of the law.  This principle is radically inconsistent with any scheme of license or censorship by which a man is hindered from writing or printing anything which he thinks fit, and is hard to reconcile even with the right on the part of the Courts to restrain the circulation of a libel, until at any rate the publisher has been convicted of publishing it…Neither the government nor the Courts have…any greater power to prevent or oversee the publication of a newspaper than the writing and sending of a letter.  Indeed, the simplest way of setting forth broadly the position of writers in the press is to say that they stand in substantially the same position as letterwriters…. secondly, press offences, in so far as the term can be used with reference to English law, are tried and punished only byu the ordinary Courts of the country, that is, by a judge and jury.’

A.V. Dicey,  The Law of the Constitution. (1885/1982) pp. 153-155.

David Cameron and George Osborne hold the high ground

Politics is an area of activity that lends itself to the gutter. Most short term incentives are for politicians to lie and cheat, in order to attract special interest support, by imposing bad  policies that will hurt freedom and mar prosperity. In too many instances – the United States is a current example – this is the road to Hell.

So it is very refreshing today to read that Britain’s two top politicians – Prime Minister David Cameron and Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne – each in his own way is holding to the high ground and paving the way for a better future for their countrymen.

David Cameron today announced his opposition to the key recommendation of the Report on the Press by Lord Leveson, an enemy of individual liberty if there ever was one. Any one who recommends that press freedom should be regulated by government is a progressive promoter of serfdom. And Leveson does so with a fervor that indicates a seriously deranged, meddlesome mind.

David Cameron’s principled stand on this issue reflects the very best of statesmanship. for he confronts enemies of freedom on both sides of the aisle. Far right Tories and far left Progressives ache to shut down free speech and impose their own bigotries on society.  Their’s is the  road to Stalin’s mis-named  USSR,  Mao’s mis-named People’s Republic of China and Hitler’s correctly named Third Reich. God damn them all.

George Osborne today announced that his austerity battle to end Britain’s debt crisis will continue despite the sea of enemies that confronts his austerity program.  Of course, a government that insists on rolling back the state in the middle of a world recession will impose short-term job losses.  Most of those job losses have a zero if not a negative marginal product, and for that reason alone, are to be applauded. Tough medicine in the short-term will bring huge benefits in the longer-term, and by the longer-term, I do not mean a time frame in which we are all dead.

In the wake of the 2008 financial crisis many British economists and financial reporters clearly have taken a turn to the hydraulic Keynesian, progressive left. I read the Financial Times daily to remind myself what Pravda used to be like before the Evil Empire disintegrated from within. Ironically, Pravda now infringes copyright in order to make my monograph on the 2008 financial crisis available for free across Russia.  With supposed friends like the FT, capitalism needs no enemies.

Well capitalism and freedom – and I surely do not extend the nouns to embrace their crony parasites – have a good friend in George Osborne.

Bravo! David Cameron and George Osborne.