§ The following Protest was entered on the Journals:
§ "Dissentient,
§ "Because we believe, that by a seasonable exertion of the laws, as they at present exist, the Press cannot be abused to any bad purpose, without incurring a suitable punishment.
§ "Because any extension of the power of punishment now vested in the Courts of Law, with respect to cases of Libel, appears to us, therefore, to be un-necessary.
§ "Because the offence of publishing a Libel is, more than any other that is known to our law, undefined and uncertain. Publications which at one time may be considered innocent and even laudable, may at another, according to circumstances, and the different views of 748 Public Accusers, of Judges and of Juries, be thought deserving of punishment; and thus the author or publisher of any writing, dictated by the purest intentions, on a matter of public interest, without any example to warn, any definition to instruct, or any authority to guide him, may expose himself to the penalty of being "banished from the United Kingdom, and all other parts of his Majesty's dominions, for such term as the Court, in which such conviction shall take place, shall order; or be transported to such place as shall be appointed by his Majesty for the transportation of offenders, for any term not exceeding seven years."
§ "Because the fear of being subjected to the punishment of a common felon, thus suspended over the head of any person who may have been once convicted of publishing a libel, to which mere inadvertence may subject him, and against which no degree of caution can afford him complete security, must necessarily deter him from the fearless exercise of the right, which has hitherto been the proud prerogative of Englishmen, of freely discussing public measures, and endeavouring to warn his countrymen against the dangerous encroachments of power. "Because this Bill, therefore, so inconsistent with the policy of our law, and with the practice of our ancestors, appears to us to be a most dangerous invasion of the just freedom of the Press, and to be subversive, in one of their main defences, of the rights, and liberties which were secured to us by progressive struggles through a long succession of ages, and at length asserted, declared, and as we bad fondly hoped, firmly established for ever, by the Revolution of 1688.
| (Signed) | |
| GREY. | JERSEY. |
| AUGUSTUS FREDRSKING. | MINTO. |
| YARBOROUGH. | |
| ERSKINE. | LANSDOWNE. |
| THANET. | COWPER. |
| ALBEMARLE. | LAUDERDALE. |
| KING. | ROSSLYN. |
| AUCKLAND. | CLIFTON (DARNLEY). |
| VASSALL HOLLAND. |