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The Bristolian

01/05/1830

Printer / Publisher: James Ackland 
Volume Number: III    Issue Number: VII
No Pages: 4
 
 
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The Bristolian

Date of Article: 01/05/1830
Printer / Publisher: James Ackland 
Address: No.4, All Saints street, Bristol
Volume Number: III    Issue Number: VII
No Pages: 4
Sourced from Dealer? No
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In contin nation of my letter to my FatherJ Recollect, gentlemen, that it is on thi » in- you have to try me, and 1 have a it to you, that if you find the to prefer a false charge against me, you ought to acquit me of my alleged falsehood and malice against the prosecutor, at Whose instance unC- i- v..? - tions that indictment has been prepared. I proceed therefore to direct your attention to that document, and I can safely assert that never was there produced in a Court of Justice, on a criminal prosecution, so egre- gious a specimen of folly, absurdity, and ma- levolence. You may need to be informed the law recognizes two descriptions of libel, viz. that charging'criminality in direct terms, and that which by the aid of an exr- la- inuendo may be shew n fairly to hear such construction. The libel for which I on my trial is of the the latter class, as yoU may have perceived on the reading of ' he indictment by the Clerk of Arraigns. Hence it is that in the indictment it has been found necessary to resort to the inuendo which is a species of " that is to say," or of parenthetical explanation. On a reference to the document you will perceive that the inuendo states/ he meaning of the couplets, to be, that Roger Moore had robbed the poor and had had a jured lie brought home to him. Now struction of the language is altogether imagi- native and fallacious— and a conviction on so unwarrantable an inuendo would be un- worthy any Jury possessing even the most moderate ability of estimating the value and weight of words in the formation of sentences. It cannot have escaped you, gentlemen, that ip. stead of the word " had," I have used the " wiirTt migfcl PcctMjiiSoT, tr- i « 1. fc,-. c. Ji of itself sufficient to have deterred the prose- cutor from the course he has pursued; but when the <*. xf" and ihe " will" are taken into account in their connective operation on the sense and in their combined demonsiration of a qualified expression, I am bound to conclude that no man who means me fairly would have penned the false inuendo put forth in the indictment, as I am, that no twelve men who could be assembled in that box and who are nut altogether ignorant of their own language can suffer themselves to be imposed upon by the equivocation so obviously apparent in the instrument which you are called upon to support by your verdict ? Gentlemen, as it regards the second couplet of lines, it is necessary that I inform vou that on the occasion of the prosecutor's application that I should be held in recognizances to keep the peace towards him, three witnesses swore in that box that they would not believe him on his oath ! — and that it was with re. ference to a contemplated prosecution of Roger Moore for a wilful and deliberate per- jury on that occasion that I penned the lines in question which distinctly refer to an after proceeding, and merely state in effect, that it ( in such prosecution) a perjured lie SHOULB BE BROUGHT HOME to him heoughttobe im- prisoned in our gaol. You are required by to take the alleged libel in its extrinsic and apparent sense;" and, it ySS " were not so bound, there would be no pro- tection for a public writer as against the ma- levolence of the most base and most infamous of mankind. So much gentlemen for the allegation of falsehood, and now let me beg youi aitention to to that of " malice." As you are not im- panelled to try whether malice may be suspected to h; ive actuated me— lor remember, you are not to convict me on suspicion, but on proof— and as you have a right to say to the prosecutor, give us the proof by which your charge is sup- ported— so you cannot bejustified in finding me •• Guilty" under the allegation of malicious in- tent unless the Prosecutor condescend to put you in possession of some facts as evidence of the accuracy of such imputation. If in wri- ting these couplets l am chargeable with malice, so also is every man who seeks the prevention or counteraction of crime by the exposure and IMir. lshment of the criminal. I am well aware SATURDAY, MAY 1, 1830. [ VOL. Ill— No, VII. MEMOIRS and CORRESPONDENCE of JAMES ACLAND, Proprietor and Editor- written bp Himself. I LIKE HONESTY IN ALL PLACES."— Judge Bayley. Printed and Published by JAMES AC'LAND ( SOLE PROPRIETOR 1111 EOITOHJ at No. 4, All Saints' street, Bristol. p— .26 that it is possible ( or any twelve men to imagine roe to have been actuated by twelve different motives— but where is the proof of malice f Has the Counsel for the prosecution instanced any? and in the absence of all proof of guilt, am j not, as every other prisoner is, to be held enti- tled to the benefit of doubt and the absence of ceitainty ? You are called upon to assume nothing; but, recollecting the solemnity of the oath you have taken, to look only to the evidence before you— to compare that evidence with the charge as set out in the indictment upon which I am arraigned, and if such charge be not fully supported by the facts proved, to do your duty and acquit yourselves of your serious responsi- bility to God and to your fellow citizens by re- turning a verdict of " not guilty." Are not the circumstances which I have detailed to you as those out of which the publication of the alleged libel sprung, and which I would prove on oath, if permitted by the prosecutor— are not those circumstances such as would naturaly lead any unprejudiced man to the conclusion that my only motive was the desire of justice, and my sole objcct the restoration Of the property of which the prosecutor and others had illegally possessed themselves ? I submit to you that such is the natural inference— and surely I have as much right to ask you to assume a commendable, as the prosecutor has to require your assumption of a criminal motive. Mr. Smith tells you I might have prosecuted his client for robbery or perjury if I had pleased. Bat the libel charges neither of these offences to the account of Mr. Moore ; and, if it did— by what right does the learned Gentleman call upon me to become the public prosecutor ofall, who, without adequate temptation to crime, are pleased to be criminals ? Is it because 1 have sometimes incurred the expence and odium of seeking an enforcement of justice, that, whether my pocket js well or ill supplied, I am to play the Quixote lest others should play the fool ? The obser vation is scarcely above contempt for its puer- ility and needs no further answer. But the question of malice having been mooted, allow THE BRISTOLIAN, me to enquire whether the conduct of Mr. allow the Defendant to persist in these miire- Moore is altogether free from suspicion under presentations — it is not usual to put the Prose- tis head. cutor in the witness box to prove the libel to be Gentlamen, I beg to acknowledge my obli- false. I appeal to the Court whether I have gations to the learned Town Clerk for a piece not given all the evidence that is necessary or of legal lore gleaned from his observations on required in cases of this description r Tuesday— and I should he ashamed of myself Sergeant Ludlow—" You certainly migh » if I could feel the slightest indisposition to avail; have P" t your client on his oath Mr. Smith, myself of so influential an authority in this and the Defendant would then have been at Court. I allude to his remark that « in a case of libert>' t0 ask him whether the libel was , rue or suspicion, when the person suspected is discovered to have resorted to a falsehood in order to a removal of the suspicion his conduct had excited, the vary circumstance of his telling ... ........ , again ask— why but that Court and you might a lie is at once a justification for increased I . ,! false." Mr. Acland—" I ask you, Gentlemen, why this was not done. There sits the prosecutor— not three yards from the witness box ; and why I ..... , be kept in the dark, did the learned Counsel suspicion, and, if guilty, an augumentation of omit to call him as a witness ? I suspsct that he bis guilt." In the case alluded to, the prisoner had a lump of sugar in his pocket and when challenged said it was an apple. Now 1 call upon you to say whether this prosecution does not, under all the circumstances of the case; savour of malice. The two fold indictment— the previous recognizances— the false inuendo— the absence of proof— the prevention of justifica- tion— the pitifulnass of the cause of prosecution with all the provocation given to the Share- holders ( the possession of whose money the prosecutor and his coadjutors cannot deny)— all these are circumstances which should be permitted to weigh in your consideration of the case, and which seem to me to warrant the con- clusion that this proceeding has emanated in the malicious feelings of Roger Moore towards myself. Ought he not to have known that the Judges of the land have over and over again observed that he who seeks redress in a Court of has a lump of malice in his pocket; he says it is justice— but the falsehood of his excuse is but an aggravation of his offence against fair play and common honesty ( much laughter). Gentlemen, it is necessary that I now address myself to you on the law as it is with reference to libel. The definition of libel is so vague and , « ncertmn that it has not Seen found possible to legislate against this as against other offences and the statute books do not contain a single effort at the construction of language with a view to the removal of the question from its present extraordinary position. Every mar. in this counlry has a natural right to think, speak, Write, print and publish what he pleases of another, and of course he is amenabU for any infraction of the existing law*. But of the criminality of an accused party, the jurors alone are the judges and have to say, first, whether they think the matter published, a libel, Law should come into Court with clean hands ? jand secon(, ly whether the indictment is And has Roger Moore done so? Have you as full evidence as you ought to have ? Could he not have supplied you with more ample means of judging of the real merits of this case } Why was he not examined as a witness— why no called to prove on oath— on HIS oath the false- hood of the charge ( as it is called) ? It is the usual course— and I speak from personal expe- rience, when I say so. sup* ported by the evidence. On a trial for the offence charged against me there is no control!- ing power over the Jury, as in other cases of alleged criminality. You are at once the Judges of the law and of the fact. Now as there is no sspecial enactment against the liberty of the press, the law of libel may cor- rectly be designated as part and parcel of the common law of the land, having its origin in I- Mr. Smith " Really the Court should not j the decision of juries— restrained by nothing THE BRISTOL! AN 103 but their oaths and tbsir consciences. The situation you now fill therefore is one of the highest importance. By your decision you will give a precedent to which future juries will be directed to look as to an authority either in the destruction or protection of the press, the liberty of the subject and of truth. The common law exists but on public opinion » indeed it may be said that common law is but another term for cemmon sense— with which quality it has been wisely supposed that jurors are as extensively gifted as judges and to which circumstance the absence of specific enactments on the subject may be safely attributed. There is, however, an act of parliament from which I beg to quote to you a paragraph and the object of which paragraph is to secure you and others similarly situated from the improper attempt of one in judicial authority to mislead, misdirect or • control you in your decision. The sentence to which I have referred is as follows:—• Jurors may give a general verdict on the whole matter and the Judge shall not require them to Jind the Defendant " Guilty " merely on the proof of publishing and on the sense ascribed to the libtl in the Indictment." It is therefore on the authority of an express law, that I t « ll you, you are entitled to pursue the course of justice in this case, unrestricted by those formalities by which in other cases of alleged criminality you are bound by your veidict to support the evi- dence laid before you. In cases of libel, the opinion of the Jury is the law of the land, and from that opinion there is no appeal. It is therefore fully within your province to determine whether on this occasion you have been fairly dealt with by the prosecutor— whether he has come into Court with clean hands— whether he has manifested a becoming disposition to deserve your verdict by an unreserved statement of all the circumstances of the present Case— and whether, if otherwise you can consistently with your oaths convict me of that which is not true — nor even attempted to be proved against me. It has been correctly laid down that no pub- lication is libellous unless it has a tendency to inflict a public injury or to impair a private right, and by this test I am content to be tried. What public injury have I inflicted by my effort to obtain the restitution of the property of thousands from the uuprincipled few who had abused their trust ? Whst private right have I imv paired by this attempt to dispossess individuals of that to which they have not a tittle of claim ? Where then is the libel? Now here, Gentlemen, but inthe indictment- iniheheartof theprosecutor and in the head of his attorney. If society is lo be afflicted with the legislation of those who would force their own unnatural construction on every innoxious expression, where personal malice may actuate or personal considerations of interest or advantage prompt them to such iniquitous purpose, no man will be safe. Suppose either of you Gentlemen were to write a letter, and by sending it through the post pub- lish it— and suppose a prosecution for libel to be subsequently instituted, the indictment having ; n it an inuendo of the effect of that to which, in this case, I have directed your attention, an in. uendo of falsehood, whereby in order to bear out the malicious charge of falsehood and malice, an interpretation directly contrary to the obvious sense of the language used is introduced ; sup- pose this possibility, and if in such case, either of you were to be tried by a Jury ignorant of the meaner of words or indifferent to the attain, ment of justice, a Gaol might await you, with- out the ptovocation of guilt or the cause of crime. Such hower is the state of things Aihieh you are asked by your verdict to sanction— such the iniquity to the perpetration of which you are called upon to become parties! 1 know it to have been held that without any Evidence of malice on my part the law will assume a sufficiency of legal malice to justify a verdict of " Guilty." I am not awart what mayorjmay not be legal malice; but I know of but one word for malice and I am ignorant of more thau one sense which can be assumed to that word. If therefore, for any sinister purpose, it should be attempted to persuade you that the jaw gives one signification for malice, and common sense another, I trust you will not saaction so ridiculons a misconstruction ol terms as to convict me of the publica; ion of a malicious libel without an iota of evidence to shew me to have been actuated by a malicious motive in such Publication. It is surely high time lhat the liberty of the subject should receive that protection from the verdict of a Jury, which shall place that vital principle of a free stale out of the reach of the disgraceful quibbles of unworthy Lawyers, and secure it from violation and destruction, under preten- ces of any description however apparency logical they may be, or under what pretences soever it may be attempted. Remember Gentlemen, that any such defini. lion of ihe term, malice, it is by no means obliga- tory on you to accept. You are, in all cases of alleged libel, as well the Judges of the law as of Ihe fafct ; and any attempt at dictating to you what is ihe law, or of persuading you what is to be deemed sufficient evidence is no more binding on you, even from the bencfcj than any opinion of mine would be if unsup- ported by argument or unrecognised by yoyr conviction of its propriety. It seems to me unnecessary that I should detain you longer, Gentlemen, than lo ask you to entertain sufficient confidence in your Constitutional piivilege as shall enable you looking at the said indictment against me— the paucity of ihe evidence adduced in its support — the qualified language of the alleged libel — and the circumstances under which it was written— to give such a verdict as your oaths will permit and as shall be consistent with a due appreciation of all the facts connected with this unprecedented prosecution. [ MEM,— To be resumed on Wednesday.] M E5i.— 1 he proceedings of the Board of Directors will be inserted in the next number. J. B. MAY, Secretary. MEM.— The Jurors of our Soveieign Lord the King may expect a letter from me.— One to Smith the Bully on Wednesday. J. A. MEM.— My best thauks are due to the kind friends who have so promptly originated a subscription for the paymeet of my expellees in the cause of Truth and Honesty, and the discbarge of the pecuniary portion of my iniquitous sentence, J. A. 28 THE BR1ST0LIAN To ARTHUR PALMER, Jun. BARRISTER AT LAW. Sis, 1 address you as a compound or almost every thing in a man that I dislike, if not despise, as a man ef mean and servile habits, • whose principle traits are distinguished by hypocrisy, conceit, empty headedness, and ingratitude, all of which are to my mind not less glaring than disgusting in jour general deportment and character. No wonder then that the Bar at large should cut you— that you should be driven from post to pillar, and that the gentlemen of both the Western and Oxsord Circuit,— should disown you, send you to the right about, and refuse all recognition of your pretentions to the character of either Barrister or Gentle- man, or that even those of your own native soil should exclude you from their society. How is this Arthur Palmer of Dowry Parade Barrister at Law._ How is it ? That amongst the whole of the members of your profe* sion, not one who values the character of a gentle- man would be seen to take you by the hand, or be heard to address you as learned friend- How is it that the whole of your fraternity, even down to its dregs have turned you up, and as it were nemine contradicente set you down at Coventry. Is it because you have made vourself as ob- noxious to them as to mankind in general, as \> ou did to that uncle who brought you up, who Maintained and supported you, in your infancy who educated you, articled you and who in your riper years vainly confiding in what he con- ceived your graiituda and integrity introduced vou into his connexions, and made you his partner and whose kind and generous bene volent and fatherly services, you ultimately requitted by ingratitude of the basest order. Ingratitude which exposed the heart of its perpetrator to be of as black a hue as the negro's skin ! Did you not, after your ends Jiad been answered after you had glutted vourself with the natural result of the generous kindness and affectionate confidence of that uncle, purloin his books of accounts, and clandestinely receive the partnership debts, in order to drive him into a dissolution of the partnership to which he had so emi- nently raised you ? Did you not by your despicable and abhorrent baseness and ingra- titude, force him into a dissolution of that partnership, and exact from him some thousand pounds as the price on his part of that peace, which but for such purchase, you would for ever have destroyed? And did you not afterwards in open day in a public street, by way of finally consummating youj . crimes, literally - spit in the face of your benefactor and friend, and tbat too when it had become notorious, that you were in point of character the mean and contemptible Lck- spittle of the day, in cases where you could turn such lickings to your own pecuniary advantage Yet it was this thing, it waj? Arthur Palmer the Barrister, « ho called upon the Magistrates of Bristol to drive me out of the city, and shut its gates against me. Poor puny, abject, despicable creature! What have I done, or said, or written but for the public good ? I have exposed rogues and roguery. 1 have lashed Vice and its abettors, and I held up the vile unprincipeled oppres- sor of his fellow man to public reprobation And what has my accuser done? Secuied his expulsion ( for reasons he best can tell,) from the society of the very caste of which he is a member, been guilty of a heartless and beastly act towards his best and only friend, an aet the perpetiation of which not a man alive with the feelings a gentleman- would ever have allowed to cross his mind, arid if my little bird whispers me truly, and I know he does , proposed once upon a time to introdube flaws into a criminal Indictment ( in which indictment the honest Isaac Cooke was professionally concerned) in order td get a Criminal surreptitiously acquitted from a just conviction of an offence of which this Arthur Painter Jun., knew him to be guilty. Ask Mr Sergant Bompass the history of this tale. Ask the Bristol Barristers. Ask the old Uncertificated Dealer and Chapman Ask his delightful son Joseph, the graceless and if they speak truly, and do not convict Palmer of the offence last aforesaid, then mv name is not James Acland. But come counseller Arthur, take it so. I beg of you, and tell me why did the Bristol Barristers exclude you from their Asso- ciation ? Why did the gentlemen of the Western Circuit, and how. and under what circum. stances, exclude vou from their Association. Why did the Leader of the Oxford Circait, when you attempted to obtrude upon it, give you to understand, that it was necessary before you were admitted amongst them that vour co » duct should be explaiaed, as well as the reasons why you had made yourself scarce in the Western Circuit ? Why did you not give the required ex- planation in preference to withdrawing yourself from the society of Gentlemen who had on that account rejected yOUr's ? Was it not because you had no satisfac- tory explanation to give ? Answer these questions Sir, and that too in a way to clear up your character; fail to do so, and 1 appeal to evirv honest and independent heart to decide which of the two ought to be driven ip. disgrace beyond the gates of the city of Bristol—> von, Arthur Palmer the Barrister cut by his bretheren— or Yours fearlessly, JAMES ACLAND. IVIKM,— I iiavt) receded a lettur from a poor rnaa of the name ot Bolwell, complaining of the miscon- duct of certain individuals, and, ai it appears to ma, with justice. It seems that he rents a sort of dog. kennel, • which is dignified with the name of a house, in Callowhill Court at £ 7, and is taxed to the Poor and Harbour rates about £ 1 13 0. per annum. Now I believe that out of Bristol, tenements the rental of which is less than ,£ 10, are not rateable, nor do 1 think they can be legally rated even in this oTer- taxed city and county ; but the authorities that be are so far above and act so boldly in defence of the law that I cannot advise a poor man to fight them on tfti » or any other point. The next question is, as to the amount of rate, and hare it seems that the Parochial authorities go hand in hand with the Magistrates in their enforcement of a system of pauperization— that of taxing thosu who are all but paupers, for purposes far other than the mere relief of actuall necessitated children of misfortune Thirty two shillings on seven pouu Is! Four shillings and sixpence in the pound exacted on the rental of a pour man for Harbour Dues, Paving and Poor's rati! '.! But this evil must, until cured, be endured. So to proceed with the case. The householder is thrown out of employment and needing relief himself cannot contribute from an empty purse towards the necessities of the Dock Company. What then? He has a table and two chairs — which are taken under an Executiou by Barrdl and two others— uid sold ! What they fetched— what balauce of cash above the demand of the R » t « - Gollector their produce may have left in the hands of the Auctioneer the poor housekeeper knows not.— He inquires of ma what he cau do to compel an account of the sale. Alas ! I much fear, if he get any, it will be but a Flemish concern— and yet I should like to see how these things are managed and to learn why it is that no account has been rendered as it ought to have been before this. It is leven weeks since the property was taken! I advise Bolwell to apply to Barr « ll to know what Auctioneer sold the table and chairs, and thea to the Auctioneer to know what they produced— and, if either of these gentlemen run restive, let him go to the fountain head, aud I hope the Mayor will assist him in his endeavors to procure justice to one who asks no more than he if fully entitled to. J. A: ' Edited hy JAMES ACLAND ( Sole Proprietor) in Bristol Goal, aud Published by him ( through his servants) at the Boistolian Office, No. 4, All 1 Saints' Street, Bristol.
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