The Judicial History of Individual Liberty. fundamental principles of government. In a preface to the Dialogue the Dean said: "If the doctrines which it slightly touches in a manner suited to the nature of a dialogue be 'seditious, treasonable and diabolical,' Lord Somers was an incendiary, Locke a traitor, and the Convention Parliament a
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Erskine defended on the ground that the publication was innocent; and he insisted that it was the province of the jury to determine the fact. Justice Buller charged the jury, however, in accordance with the rules laid down by his predecessors, that the only issues for them to determine
LORD CHIEF JUSTICE KENYON.
pandemonium. But if those names are the glory and boast of England, and if that con vention secured our liberty and happiness, then the doctrines in question are not only just and rational, but constitutional and salu tary; and the reproachful epithets belong wholly to the system of those who so grossly misapplied it."
were the fact of publication and the meaning of the innuendoes. If they found a verdict of guilty, it was still open to the defendant, he said, to move in arrest of judgment upon the ground that there was no criminality in the publication. The jury returned a verdict of "guilty of publishing only. Thereupon a long discussion ensued between court,
