In 1733(or 1734), John Peter Zenger began a newspaper in New York to voice opposition to policies appointed by the colonial governor William Cosby. Upon his arrival in the colony, Cosby immediately began arguing with the colony about his salary. Zenger's New-York Weekly JOURNAL continued to publish articles that criticized the new governor, especially after he replaced the Supreme Court Chief Justice Lewis Morris with James Delancey, a member of the royal party. After being insluted, Cosby issued a proclamation condemning the newspaper's "divers scandalous, virulent, false and stedious reflections." Because of this Zenger was arrested in November of 1734 and went to trial eight months after being charged with seditious libel. He was defended by Andrew Hamilton, who directed his case directly to the jury. Zenger was found not guilty.
An example of freedom of the press is: The case of Near vs. Minnesota
In this case a newspaper criticized local officials in Minnesota. A state law existed in which authorities were allowed to close down any " malicious, scandalous, and defamatory newspaper." The state ended up using this law to enjoin the newspaper.
Later, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of Near. The Court found the injunction on the newspaper to be an "unconstitutional infringement of free speech". If false accusations appear in a newspaper, the proper remedy is a libel action.
This is a case in which freedom of the press won, showing that we do have more rights that we did 200+ years ago.
Hey Timmery! Good observations here. The 1931 Near vs. Minnesota case before the Supreme Court, as you can see, was almost an exact replay of the Zenger case from nearly 200 years earlier. Newspapers, as we can see, have many protections on their freedom to publish, though if they print stories that are truly false accusations they can be held accountable for that through "libel action" suits.
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