John Peter Zenger

I mean, there's some evidence.

I think that the founders thought that way on either side of the ratification of the constitution long before there's the, uh, Peter Zenger case early, like in colonial times, uh, And I talk about this in the book where the jury just wouldn't convict him because they thought the things that he had published against the royal governor were true.

You know, so that's like not a great precedent because it's basically an act of jury nullification.

They were not really respecting the existing standards, but that was a sign that in the American public mind, there really should be a truth defense.

The jury Kyan is asking for is older than any of those cases and will run straight down the road to 1776.

In August of 1735, in New York, a printer named John Peter Zenger stood trial for libel.

His newspaper, the New York Weekly Journal, had spent nearly two years printing complaints against the royal governor, William Crosby.

Zenger was arrested in November of 1734 and spent more than eight months in prison waiting for his trial.

The two lawyers behind his paper tried to defend him and were disbarred for it, and the court assigned him a lawyer who supported the governor.

As the Crown's attorney stated the law, criticism of the government was liable whether or not it was true, and the Chief Justice of the province agreed.

The laws, in my opinion, are very clear, he told the jury.

They cannot be admitted to justify a libel.

In 1721, the editor of the Mercury in Philadelphia was called before the proprietary council and ordered to apologize for a political article, and for a later offense of a similar character, he was thrown into jail.

A still more famous case was that of Peter Zenger, a New York publisher, who was arrested in 1735 for criticizing the administration.

Lawyers who ventured to defend the unlucky editor were deprived of their licenses to practice, and it became necessary to bring an attorney all the way from Philadelphia.

By this time the tension of feeling was high, and the approbation of the public was forthcoming, when the lawyer for the defense exclaimed to the jury that the very cause of liberty itself, not that of the poor printer, was on trial.

The verdict for Zenger, when it finally came, was the signal for an outburst of popular rejoicing.

Already the people of King George's province knew how precious a thing is the freedom of the press.

Thanks to the schools, few and scattered as they were, and to the vigilance of parents, a very large portion, perhaps nearly one half, of the colonists could read.

They needed somewhere to tell their side of the story, but the Gazette, of course, was controlled by Governor Cosby.

So the political opponents turned to John Peter Zenger, a German immigrant who made a modest living printing religious tracts.

The first issue of Zenger's New York Weekly Journal came out in November of 1733.

Zenger did not write the criticism of Governor Cosby himself, but he did print it, and under English law, that was enough to prosecute him for seditious libel, the crime of criticizing the government.

The verdict did not change the law, but it planted a seed.

It changed the thinking in the colonies around freedom of expression and government control.

John Peter Zenger's jury was not following the law of the time.

The law of the time protected the governor from news he didn't like.

Now our story starts before there was even a first amendment.

Back in the 1730s in colonial New York with a German American printer named Peter Zenger.

Zenger published an article criticizing New York's royal governor.

Now, for publishing the article, Zenger was put on trial for seditious libel, which outlawed publishing any statements that criticize, defame, or undermine the authority of the government.

The adversarial relationship between the press and the people in power in the United States goes back to before there even was a United States.

In fact, back in 1733, in this city, a man named John Peter Zenger began publishing New York's first independent newspaper.

It was called the New York Weekly Journal.

It was founded to compete with the colony's other newspaper, the New York Gazette, which was supportive of William Cosby, the man who was appointed by the king to be the governor of New York.

The adversarial relationship between the press and the people in power in the United States goes back to before there even was a United States.

In fact, back in 1733, in this city, a man named John Peter Zenger began publishing New York's first independent newspaper.

It was called the New York Weekly Journal.

It was founded to compete with the colony's other newspaper, the New York Gazette, which was supportive of William Cosby, the man who was appointed by the king to be the governor of New York.