Conceived in Liberty Volume 2 - Ludwig von Mises Institute

printing of the votes or debates of the legislature without prior authorization
by the Speaker. Thus, even prior censorship on publication continued
throughout the colonial period in the vital field of information on the
proceedings of the legislature. In 1753, the printer Hugh Gaine published
the king's instructions to the new governor of New York as well as the
latter's speech to the Assembly. Immediately the Assembly summoned
Gaine and demanded to know how he dared print any part of the proceedings
without license or prior approval. Humbly abasing himself, the startled
Gaine was released by the Assembly but only after it forced him to pay the
costs of the case.
A more serious case occurred in 1756, when James Parker published an
article on the depressed conditions of the country in his New York Gazette.
The Assembly took this to be a grave reflection on itself, and summarily
voted Parker and his assistant to be guilty of high misdemeanor and contempt
of authority. Seized and hauled into the Assembly, the frightened
Parker and his aide abjectly confessed their guilt and begged pardon, and
showed their good faith by informing on the Reverend Hezekiah Watkins
of Newburgh as author of the offending article. Despite their abasement,
the editors were put into jail for a week by the Assembly, which also moved,
of course, for the immediate arrest of the unfortunate minister. The Reverend
Mr. Watkins proved to be no more heroic than his editors, begging
forgiveness for his misplaced zeal. He too was jailed by the Assembly.
Watkins was discharged the next day but only after being forced to pay the
costs of his case.
Two years later, Samuel Townsend, justice of the peace in Queens County,
sent a petition to the Speaker of the lower house asking for relief for some
refugees stationed on Long Island. The Speaker denounced Townsend's
letter as "insolent" and the Assembly then promptly ordered his appearance.
When Townsend bravely failed to heed the summons, he was cited for
contempt, seized, and hauled before the Assembly. Townsend surprisingly
failed to show the usual abject humility. The enraged Assembly voted him
clearly guilty of a high misdemeanor and "most daring insult" and threw him
into prison. In this atmosphere, Townsend had ample opportunity to reflect
on the error of his ways, and soon sent the house a profound apology and a
promise to avoid all such misconduct in the future. The Assembly then
graciously released Judge Townsend.
It is certainly significant that of the hapless defendants appearing before
the New York Assembly twenty years after Zenger, none bothered to justify
himself on the basis of liberty of the press. Editor James Parker, battling
for his own conception of freedom of the press in 1759, summoned up the
most enlightened of American opinion: "Liberty truly reigns," wrote Parker,
where "everyone hath a privilege of declaring his sentiments upon all topics
with the utmost freedom, provided he does it with proper decency and a just
150