...accommodation to the idea of natural equality at the heart of American thought. 105. Blackstone concedes, "The liberty of the press is indeed essential to the nature of a free state. . . ." (See the passage from Laws of England, 4:151-53, reproduced in the text at chap. 5, n. 3, above.)...

...the press meant. William Blackstone, in his Commentaries on the Laws of England, concluded in 1769, "The liberty of the press is indeed essential to the...upon publications, and not in freedom from censure from criminal matter when published." In America, Thomas Hutchinson, chief justice in Massachusetts,...

...construes the First Amendment as enacting Blackstone's statement that "the liberty of the press . . . consists in laying no previous restraints upon publications...from censure for criminal matter when published." The line where legitimate suppression begins is fixed chronologically at the time of publication. The...

...by others. They were avid readers of Blackstone's Commentaries, published in 1765, which explained: "The liberty of the press is indeed essential to the...censure for criminal matter when published. Every free man has an undoubted right to lay what sentiments he pleases before the public; to forbid this...

...newspaper or book publisher wished to publish. This had been acknowledged since the eighteenth century. "The liberty of the press is indeed essential to the...this consists in laying no previous restraints upon publication," William Blackstone pronounced in his legendary Commentaries on the Laws of England in...

...published only with one."33 The limited nature of this right is captured in Blackstone's observation that "[t]he liberty of the press is, indeed, essential...this consists in laying no previous restraints upon publication, and not in freedom from censure for criminal matters when published." "Every freeman has...

...Commentaries on the Law of England, published in 1769, which argued that the "liberty of speech . . . consists in laying no previous restraints upon publications,...from censure for criminal matter when published." As Steven Helle of the University of Illinois points out, one can argue both ends against the middle...

...for the government to punish "improper, mischievous, or illegal" expression. Blackstone commented, The liberty of the press is indeed essential to the nature of a free state; but this consists of laying no previous restraint upon publications, and not in freedom from censure for criminal matter...

...19(2), the Supreme Court as custodian of our constitutional conscience has declared: "Every free citizen has an undoubted right to lay what sentiments he pleases before the public. Freedom to one's view is the lifeline of any democratic institution and any attempt to stifle, suffocate...

...Adam's pernicious Sedition Act of 1798 was based on a 1769 commentary saying "liberty of the press . . . consists in laying no previous restraints upon publications...from censure for criminal matter when published." Madison believed it a "mockery to say that no law should be passed preventing publications from being...