with able and spicy articles assailing the acts of the Governor-written, probably, by William Smith and James Alexander, the two prominent lawyers of New York. The Governor, and those members of his council who were his satellites, were not long in bringing themselves into the belief that these articles were actionable; and thus it happened that the first great libel suit tried in this city was instituted by the Government, in 1734, against Zenger. 1734. The latter, in a pamphlet which he wrote afterward upon his trial, quaintly says:* "As there was but one Printer in the Province of New York that printed a public News Paper, I was in Hopes, if I undertook to publish another, I might make it worth my while, and I soon found that my Hopes were not groundless. My first paper was printed November 15th, 1733, and I continued printing and publishing of them (I thought to the satisfaction of every body) till the January following, when the Chief Justice was pleased to animadvert upon the Doctrine of Libels in a long charge given in that term to the Grand Jury."

Zenger was thereupon imprisoned on Sunday, the 17th of November, 1734, by virtue of a warrant from the Governor and Council; and a concurrence of the House of Representatives in the prosecution was requested. The House, however, declined by laying the request of the Council upon the table. The Governor and Council then ordered the libelous papers to be burned by the common hangman or whipper, near the pillory. But both the common whipper and the common hangman were officers of the Corporation, not of the Crown, and they declined officiating at the illumination. The papers were therefore

* This pamphlet, which is excedingly rare, is a large 8vo (51⁄2 x 91⁄2 inches) of 39 pages. It is entitled: A Brief Narrative of the Case and Trial of John Peter Zenger, Printer of the New York Weekly Journal:-New York Printed: Lancaster re-printed, and sold by W. Dunlap, at the New Printing Offices, Queen Street, 1736.

burned by the Sheriff's negro servant at the order of the Governor.* An ineffectual attempt was next made to procure an indictment against Zenger, but the Grand Jury refused to find a bill. The Attorney-General was then directed to file no information against him for printing the libels, and he was consequently kept in prison until another term. His counsel offered exceptions to the commissions of the judges, which the latter not only refused to hear, but excluded his counsel, Messrs. Smith and Alexander, from the bar. Zenger then obtained other counsel -John Chambers of New York, and Andrew Hamilton of Philadelphia. The trial at length came on and excited great interest. The truth, under the old English law of libel, could never be given in evidence, and was of course excluded on the present trial. Hamilton, nevertheless, tried the case with consummate ability. He showed the jury that they were the judges as well of the law as the fact, and Zenger was acquitted. "The jury," says Zenger in relating the result of the trial," withdrew, and in a small time returned, and being asked by the clerk whether they were agreed upon their verdict and whether John

* In the pamphlet before alluded to, Zenger gives the following account of this proceeding:

"At a council held at Fort George in New York the 2d of November, 1734, present, His Excellency William Cosby, Captain-General and Governor-in-Chief, &c., · r. Clark, Mr. Harrison, Dr. Colden" [a note says Dr. Colden was that day at Esopus, ninety miles away], "Mr. Livingston, Mr. Kennedy, the Chief Justice, Mr. Cortlandt, Mr. Lane, Mr. Horsmanden:

"Whereas, By an order of the Board of this day, some of John Peter Zenger's journals, entitled the New York Weekly Journal, Nos. 7, 47, 48, 49, were ordered to be burned by the hands of the common hangman or whipper, near the pillory of this city, on Wednesday, the 6th inst., between the hours of eleven and twelve. It is therefore ordered that the Mayor and Magistrates of this city do attend at the burning of the several papers or journals aforesaid, numbered as above-mentioned. FRED. MORRIS, D. Cl. Con.

"TO ROBERT LURTING, Esq., Mayor of the City of New York, &c." (The Aldermen protested vigorously against the execution of this order, and refused to instruct the Sheriff to execute it. The Sheriff burned the papers, however, or "delivered them into the hands of his own negro, and ordered him to put them into the fire, which he did.")

Peter Zenger was guilty of printing and publishing the libels in the information mentioned, they answered by Thomas Hunt, their foreman, NOT GUILTY, upon which there were three huzzas in the hall, which was crowded with people, and the next day I was discharged from imprisonment."

Immediately after the trial the Corporation voted the freedom of the city in a magnificent gold box* to Andrew Hamilton, "for the remarkable service done to this city and colony, by his defense of the rights of mankind and the liberty of the press."

Twenty years afterward, however, the Government organ itself fell under the displeasure of the reigning powers. Upon the relinquishment of his paper in 1743, it was resumed by James Parker under the double title of the New York Gazette and Weekly Post Boy. In 1753, ten years afterward, Parker took a partner by the name of William Wayman. But neither of the partners, nor both of them together, possessed the indomitable spirit of John Peter Zenger. Having in March, 1756, published an article reflecting upon the people of Ulster and Orange counties, the Assembly, entertaining a high regard for the majesty of the people, took offense thereat, and both the editors were taken into custody by the sergeant-atarms. What the precise nature of the insult upon the sovereign people of those counties was, does not appear. But the editors behaved in a craven manner. They acknowledged their fault, begged pardon of the House, and paid the costs of the proceedings, in addition to all which

* This gold box was five ounces and a half in weight and inclosed the seal of the said Freedom. On its lid were engraved the arms of the City of New York and these mottoes: On the outer part of the lid, DEMERSÆ LEGES— TIMEFACTA LIBERTAS-HÆC TANDEM EMERGUNT. On the inner side of the lid, NON NUMMIS-VIRTUTE PARATUR. On the front of the rim, ITA CUIQUE

EVENIAT UT DE REPUBLICA MERUIT. adds Zenger,

Which freedom and box," naively

was presented in the manner that had been directed, and grate

fully accepted by the said Andrew Hamilton, Esquire."

they gave up the name of the author. He proved to be none other than the Rev. Hezekiah Watkins, a missionary to the County of Ulster, residing at Newburg. The reverend gentleman was accordingly arrested, brought to New York, and voted guilty of a high misdemeanor and contempt of the authority of the House. Of what persuasion was this Mr. Watkins does not appear. But neither Luther, nor Calvin, nor Hugh Latimer would have betrayed the right of free discussion as he did by begging the pardon of the House, standing to receive a reprimand, paying the fees, and promising to be more circumspect in future-for the purpose of obtaining his discharge. This case affords the most singular instance of the exercise of the doubtful power of punishing for what are called contempts on record. A court has unquestionably a right to protect itself from indignity while in session, and so has a legislative body, although the power of punishing for such an offense without trial by jury is now gravely questioned. But for a legislative body to extend the mantle of its protection over its constituency in such a matter is an exercise of power of which, even in the annals of the Star Chamber, when presided over by Archbishop Laud, it is difficult to find a parallel. Sure it is that a people, then or now, who would elect such members to the Legislature deserve nothing else than contempt. From the establishment, however, of the independence of the country until the present day there has been no attempt to fetter the press by censors or by law; while the old English law of libel, which prevailed until the beginning of the present century, has been so modified as to allow the truth in all cases to be given in evidence. For the attainment of this great end the country is indebted, more than to all other men, to the early and bosom friend of the late venerable Dr. NottAlexander Hamilton.

1743.

At length the incessant quarrels of the weak and avaricious Cosby with the people and their representatives was suddenly terminated by his death in 1736. March, 1736. On his decease, Mr. George Clarke, long a member of the Council, after a brief struggle with Mr. Van Dam for the presidency, succeeded to the direction of the government, and, being shortly afterward commissioned as Lieutenant-Governor, continued at the head of the colonial administration from the autumn of 1736 to that of 1743. Mr. Clarke was remotely connected by marriage with the family of Lord Clarendon, having been sent over as Secretary of the colony in the reign of Queen Anne. Being, moreover, a man of strong common sense and of uncommon tact, and, by reason of his long residence in the colony and the several official stations he had held, well acquainted with its affairs, his administration-certainly until toward its close was comparatively popular, and, all circumstances considered, eminently successful. In the brief struggle for power between himself and Mr. Van Dam, the latter had been sustained by the popular party, while the officers of the Crown and the partisans of Cosby, with few, if any, exceptions, adhered to Mr. Clarke.

This

difficulty, however, had been speedily ended by a royal confirmation of the somewhat doubtful authority assumed by Mr. Clarke. His own course, moreover, on taking the seals of office, was conciliatory. In his first speech to the General Assembly, he referred in temperate language to the unhappy divisions which had of late disturbed the colony, and which he thought it was then a favorable moment to heal. The English flour-market having been overstocked by large supplies furnished from the other colonies, the attention of the Assembly was directed to the expediency of encouraging domestic manufactures in various departments of industry. To the