The Origins of a Free Press in Prerevolutionary ... - Web Publishing

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colonial legislature in 1770, he spent several months in jail for seditious libel, and
became the local darling of American libertarians. Popular opinion tied his case to
similar governmental action against Wilkes in England. He was released only when
the legislative session was ended. 75 Wilkes’ fight for liberty were closely linked—in
the colonists’ minds—with their own struggles. They viewed the British ministry’s
efforts to stifle Wilkes the politician and Wilkes the publisher as an example of a
corrupt ministry’s threat to liberty, similar to the threats to their own liberties,
including their freedom of the press. Wilkes’ travails supplied a very real and
pragmatic example of why a free press needed to be shielded from a potentially
corrupt government.
The British newspapers also had some visible changes prior to the American
Revolution. The political writing and the concept of freedom of the press seen on
the pages underwent a transformation following King George III’s ascension to the
throne in 1760. As politics became more radical and reform-oriented, the
newspapers became more critical and public opinion became more important.
Political journalism became harsher, historian Eckhart Hellmuth noted, as writers
blurred the line between the public and private spheres. Private lives of those in
power were now a fair target for criticism. Social groups beyond the elites were also
taking part in political discourse, and a popular political culture was forming.
Hellmuth saw Wilkes and the controversies surrounding him as an essential
stimulation of this popular criticism. Hellmuth tied a shifting concept of press
liberty in Britain with this broadening political sphere and press freedom developed
beyond Cato’s ideal in this period. Intrinsic to this development was the evolving
concept of the sovereignty of the people, with Parliament viewed as simply their
representatives. The press was seen as deriving their authority to criticize
government from that sovereignty. Such a medium was part of the crucial balance
75 Maier, “John Wilkes,” 385-386. See also Levy, Emergence, 80-82.