705 



CENSORSHIP OF THE PRESS. 



CENSORSHIP OF THE PRESS. 



7C6 



Authors or printers had the option of submitting their manuscripts 

 to the examination of the censors previous to printing. But even after 

 being examined, approved, and printed, a work could be seized and its 

 sale stopped by the minister of police, who was however to forward it 

 with his remarks within twenty-four hours to the council of state, 

 which judged finally upon it. A well-known instance of this occurred 

 with regard to Madame de StaeTs book on Germany, which was seized 

 after having been examined and printed, and the whole edition was 

 destroyed. " Your 'book is not French, and we are not reduced to 

 seek for models among the nations which you admire," was the minister 

 of police's (Savary) reply to Madame de Stael's remonstrances on the 

 subject. 



Books printed abroad could not be imported into France without 

 permission from the director-general. 



The police had the censorship of dramatic works intended for the 

 stage. Only one newspaper was allowed in each department, with the 

 exception of Paris, subject to the approbation of the respective prefects. 

 Such was the condition of the press in France during the latter years 

 of Napoleon's empire. 



At the first restoration of the Bourbons, in 1814, an article of the 

 charter of Louis XVIII., acknowledged that " Frenchmen had the 

 right of publishing their opinions by means of the press, conformably 

 however to the laws enacted for the repression of any abuse of the 

 liberty of the press." Soon after, the Abbe" de Montesquieu, Minister 

 of the Interior, procured the passing of a law by the chambers, by 

 which all works consisting of less than twenty sheets were subjected 

 to a previous censorship. A council of twenty censors was appointed. 

 The office of director-general of the press was retained. Every printer 

 was obliged to give notice of each work that he intended to print, and 

 to deposit two copies of it, when printed, at the director's office, before 

 he published the work. 



When Napoleon returned from Elba, in 1815, he did not enforce the 

 previous censorship, because, said he, they had published whatever 

 they pleased against him under the Bourbons, and the matter was now 

 exhausted. The other regulations however concerning printing and 

 publishing were maintained, and the press and the emperor were often 

 at variance during the hundred days. The previous censorship was 

 temporarily re-established and abolished again under the second resto- 

 ration of Louis XVIII. After Charles X. came to the throne, he 

 abolished the previous censorship altogether, and by so doing he gained 

 a momentary popularity with the Parisians. But the first of the 

 ordonnances, signed the 25th of July, 1830, suspended the liberty of the 

 periodical press ; no journal was to be henceforth published without a 

 special authorisation of the government, which was to be renewed 

 every three months. All pamphlets or works under twenty sheets of 

 letter-press, were made subject to the same authorisation. The ordon- 

 nancea however were resisted, and the revolution of July was the result. 

 The revised charter which was afterwards promulgated, ' Charte de 

 1830,' in its seventh article says, " Frenchmen have the right of pub- 

 lishing and printing their opinions, conformably to the laws. The 

 censorship shall never be re-established." New laws, however, were 

 enacted to repress the abuses of the press, among which the law 

 of the 9th of September, 1835, embodies or refers to many of the 

 former laws of the Empire and the Restoration. It specifies the 

 crimes and misdmeanours committed by means of the press, and assigns 

 the penalty to each. The proprietors of political journals are obliged 

 to deposit a considerable sum in the treasury as a security for their 

 good behaviour. One hundred thousand francs (four thousand pounds 

 sterling) is the deposit required for a daily Paris newspaper, and one 

 half the sum for a weekly paper. 



Little alteration, or at most only for a short time, was made by the 

 revolution of 1848. Under the empire the previous censorship of all 

 works below a certain size still exists. The deposition of a large sum 

 before the publication of a newspaper is still required ; and a specially 

 appointed minister has the power of warning a newspaper of having 

 committed an offence, and the issuing of three such warnings is to be 

 followed by suppression. Works after publication may be seized, and 

 their sale forbidden ; and foreign works and newspapers are liable to 

 be seized at any time on the order of this minister. 



The absolute monarchies of Europe, Russia, Austria, Prussia, and 

 the Italian States^ retain the obligatory previous censorship of the press, 

 which is derived from the" very principle of their government, that of 

 parental authority over their subjects. In some of the Italian States 

 (Rome and Naples, for instance) there is a double censorship ; one by 

 an ecclesiastical and the other by a political censor. But even then it 

 happens sometimes that after a work has passed the censorship and 

 obtained the " imprimatur," something obnoxious is discovered which 

 had escaped the censor's penetration, and the book is seized and 

 confiscated. 



In the republics of Switzerland, the censorship existed before the 

 organic changes which have taken place in most of the cantons since 

 1830. All previous censorship is abolished; but the laws in some 

 of the cantons are very restrictive of the liberty of the press, and 

 especially of the newspaper press, on matters of religion. Generally 

 speaking, the press is freest in the Protestant cantons. 



The liberty of the; German prrs* v.ni..] n.rording to the spirit of 

 tli different government*. As early as 1570, by a decree of the 

 empire, printing-presses were only permitted in towns which were the 

 ARTS AfTD 8CI. DIV. VOL. IL 



residences of sovereign princes; and every printer was required, if 

 called upon, to take an oath to print only what was just, honourable, 

 and altogether fitting. During the Thirty Years' War an universal 

 freedom prevailed ; but on the conclusion of the Peace of Westphalia, 

 the " massacre of the press " was again a matter of complaint. In 

 Saxony, Prussia, Hanover, and the Free Towns considerable freedom 

 was allowed, while in Austria and Bavaria the regulations were very 

 stringent ; and in all it depended on the government, and was nowhere 

 recognised as an inalienable right of the people. During the war which 

 ended in the downfall of Napoleon, reforms of all kinds were promised 

 to the people, and especially freedom of the press. This promise was 

 very imperfectly fulfilled, but the censorship was removed in several of 

 the minor states. The political agitation of Europe after the downfall 

 of Napoleon, however, caused the German rulers to hold a congress at 

 Karlsbad in 1819, by which the German periodical press was enslaved by 

 the decision that all books or other printed publications under twenty 

 sheets should be subjected to a censorship. The spirit which directed 

 this censorship was most arbitrary and harsh, and led to collisions of 

 the most dangerous kind between the representative bodies of the 

 state and the rulers. Nor was the liberty of the press for books above 

 twenty sheets respected, and political authors especially experienced 

 many persecutions, while strangely enough religious matters might be 

 treated with perfect freedom. 



After the French revolution of 1830, the people of Germany rose in 

 arms, demanding constitutional rights, and above all a free press, and the 

 rulers were in some states compelled to grant their claims. Again, how- 

 ever, when the people had been quieted, measures were taken to revoke 

 all these privileges. On June 28, 1832, the Diet resolved that care should 

 be taken to compel the editors of newspapers and other political produc- 

 tions to keep within proper limits in publishing the debates of the 

 representative bodies; and the Diet of 1836 declared that editors of 

 newpapers and political writers should publish no account of such 

 debates, except those published in the government papers, or extracts 

 from them. Since that time there has been a visible reaction against 

 the freedom of the press, though the censorship is much more severe 

 against political and historical publications than against other works. 

 During the revolutionary disturbances in Germany in 1848, the first 

 demand, in almost every country where a rising took place, was for an 

 emancipation of the press from its restrictions. It was uniformly 

 granted, and it was voted by the Bundes Versamrnlung in the sitting 

 of March 3. Even Austria agreed to it, with a promise that the 

 censure should not be again established ; and throughout Germany the 

 only requisition was that the printers' and publishers' names should 

 be always printed, and that they should be answerable for infractions 

 of law. But as early as March, 1849, Austria set the example of abro- 

 gating these privileges ; the other states lost no time in following it, 

 and by the end of 1850 the old system of censorship and supervision 

 had been thoroughly restored. In Austria the newspaper press is under 

 the direct control of the government ; and in Prussia a large deposit is 

 required before a newspaper can be published, and the minister has 

 the power of appointing a working editor. 



By the Spanish constitution of 1837, "all Spaniards may print and 

 publish their thoughts freely, without previous censorship, but subject 

 to the laws. The determination of offences by means of the press 

 belongs exclusively to juries empanelled for that purpose ; " but this 

 regulation, always imperfectly observed, was superseded by a law passed 

 in 1850, and though by it no previous censorship was established, 

 books and newspapers are liable to be seized if they contain anything 

 offensive to the government. 



The constitution of Portugal establishes no previous censorship, but 

 refers to the laws for repressing the abuses of the press. 



By the constitution of the kingdom of Greece of 1827, " the Hellenes 

 have the right of publishing freely their thoughts by means of the 

 press, abstaining however, 1, from attacking the principles of the 

 Christian religion; 2, offending decency and morality; 3, indulging in 

 personal insult and calumny." 



The Swedish constitution of 1809, promulgated under King Charles 

 XIII., enacts that the states of the kingdom in every new Diet shall 

 appoint a committee of six members, well informed persons, among 

 whom must be two jurists, for the purpose of maintaining the liberty of 

 the press. The committee will examine all MSS. which shall be laid 

 beforeyt by any author or bookseller ; and if the committee declares 

 that the work is fit to be printed, the author and publisher are thence- 

 forth discharged from all further responsibility. The Chancellor of 

 Justice of the State is by right President of the Committee. But this 

 is a voluntary, and not an obligatory, previous censorship. Persons 

 guilty of libel and other offences by means of the press are tried by a 

 jury. By a law enacted by the Diet in 1812, a newspaper which 

 insults or defames a foreign government friendly to Sweden, is liable 

 to be suppressed by order of the chancellor, without any other formality. 

 This has occurred repeatedly, but then the paper appears again the 

 next day under a slightly altered title; for instance, the Argus is 

 suppressed, but is continued under the title of Argus II. or Argus III. 



The constitution of Norway proclaimed in the Storthing of Eidswold, 

 November, 1814, enacts that no one shall be prosecuted for his printed 

 writings, unless he wilfully and evidently manifests or encourages 

 others to manifest disobedience to the laws, contempt for religion, 

 morality, or the constitutional powers, or resistance to the constitu- 



II 



