Law on the Freedom of the Press of 29 July 1881
Encyclopedia
The Law on the Freedom of the Press of 29 July 1881 , often called the Press Law of 1881, is a law that defines the freedoms and responsibilities of the media and publishers in France
. It provides a legal framework for publications and regulates the display of advertisements on public roads. Although it has been amended several times since its enactment, it remains in force to the present day.
It is often regarded as the foundational legal statement on freedom of the press
and freedom of speech
in France, inspired by Article 11 of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen of 26 August 1789. At the same time, the law imposes legal obligations on publishers and criminalises certain specific behaviours (called "press offences"), particularly concerning defamation.
in 1881 by the then-dominant Opportunist Republicans
who sought to liberalise the press and promote free public discussion. The new law swept away a swathe of earlier statutes, stating at the outset the principle that "Printing and publication are free".
Prior to 1881, French law had a complex and unclear set of laws that regulated public commentary. Slander was regulated by a thicket of jurisprudence
that had grown during the century, and numerous laws had been enacted to regulate the press and public censorship at various points during the republican and monarchist regimes of the 19th century. In total, 42 different laws containing 325 separate clauses regulating the press were in force, having been passed over a period of 75 years by ten different governments. Slander against public officials attacked in their public functions was criminalised under a law of 1819, but by 1880 the distinction between private and public affronts had become far from clear. The free exercise of published speech was further limited by onerous requirements to obtain prior authorisation from the government and deposit a sum of "caution money".
In addition, the law regulates advertising and permits property owners to forbid the posting of advertisements on their properties. References to the law are frequently seen on French walls where signs proclaim "Defense d'afficher - loi du 29 Juillet 1881" ("posters forbidden - law of 29 July 1881").
An insult (injures) is defined as "an outrageous express, terms of despise or invectives that do not charge any fact to the insulted person."
As originally enacted, the law distinguished between levels of offence and between public officials and private citizens. Defamation of private citizens was treated far less seriously than that of injuring public officials; defaming a man in his public capacity could be punished by a year's imprisonment and a fine of 3,000 franc
s, while injuring a private citizen could cost as little as 18 francs or six days in prison.
Any statement made in parliament, judicial tribunals or (by implication) administrative councils was exempted from punishment, thereby immunising public officials from liability for slandering colleagues. The law also included differing requirements for protecting public and private individuals. Courts were required to determine the truth of slanderous accusations against public officials, but where private citizens were the victims of slander the law directed magistrates to assess only the degree of offence contained in the slander, specifically forbidding investigation into the truth of the charges. The intention of the legislators was essentially to protect the personal privacy of the accused party.
.
The law provides a number of defences, particularly when reporting on matters of public interest or concern. Truth of the defamatory statement is available as a defence in most libel cases other than those concerning the privacy of the plaintiff. Where privacy is infringed, truth is not an absolute defence, though some latitude is permitted if the plaintiff is a public figure. A plea of good faith is permitted by the courts in circumstances where the issues at stake concern matters of public interest. A defendant may be acquitted on that basis if the court is satisfied that the defendant has carried out at least a basic verification of the source of the information on which the defamatory statement is based.
Racially defamatory comments and incitement to racial hatred were criminalised when the law was amended by the Law of 1 July 1972. The French parliament further amended the Press Law in 2004 to make it a crime to discriminate against or defame individuals on the basis of their sexual orientation. Such offences are punished by jail terms of between six months and a year and a fine of between €22,500 and €45,000.
, Le Petit Parisien
, Le Journal and Le Matin
- selling a million copies every day.
The liberalisation of the law of defamation had a less positive effect, enabling an upsurge in personal innuendo and vague allegations. The sociologist Gabriel Tarde
commented that "Pornography and slander have become the life-blood of the newspaper." French readers were treated to a daily diet of rumour, speculation and character assassination presented as "echos" and "faits divers". The French press became increasingly dominated by sensationalist and even malicious reporting as it abused the freedoms granted by the 1881 law to "slander and incite to violence with almost total impunity." The writer Emile Zola
personified the mixed benefits of the freedom granted by the law. It enabled him to publish his famous denunciation J'accuse
in the newspaper L'Aurore
in 1898, something that would have been forbidden 20 years previously, but the torrent of lurid newspaper accusations against the unjustly imprisoned Alfred Dreyfus
led Zola to denounce the press as being
The excessive liberalisation of the French press is held by some to have contributed to the "decadence" that crippled the Third Republic in the 1930s. Raymund Kuhn suggests that towards the end of the Third Republic in the late 1930s, abuses of the Press Law's freedoms "contribute[d] to the destabilisation of the political system when economic crisis and political scandal rocked the regime."
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
. It provides a legal framework for publications and regulates the display of advertisements on public roads. Although it has been amended several times since its enactment, it remains in force to the present day.
It is often regarded as the foundational legal statement on freedom of the press
Freedom of the press
Freedom of the press or freedom of the media is the freedom of communication and expression through vehicles including various electronic media and published materials...
and freedom of speech
Freedom of speech
Freedom of speech is the freedom to speak freely without censorship. The term freedom of expression is sometimes used synonymously, but includes any act of seeking, receiving and imparting information or ideas, regardless of the medium used...
in France, inspired by Article 11 of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen of 26 August 1789. At the same time, the law imposes legal obligations on publishers and criminalises certain specific behaviours (called "press offences"), particularly concerning defamation.
History
The Press Law was passed under the French Third RepublicFrench Third Republic
The French Third Republic was the republican government of France from 1870, when the Second French Empire collapsed due to the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, to 1940, when France was overrun by Nazi Germany during World War II, resulting in the German and Italian occupations of France...
in 1881 by the then-dominant Opportunist Republicans
Opportunist Republicans
The Opportunist Republicans , also known as the Moderates , were a faction of French Republicans who believed, after the proclamation of the Third Republic in 1870, that the regime could only be consolidated by successive phases...
who sought to liberalise the press and promote free public discussion. The new law swept away a swathe of earlier statutes, stating at the outset the principle that "Printing and publication are free".
Prior to 1881, French law had a complex and unclear set of laws that regulated public commentary. Slander was regulated by a thicket of jurisprudence
Jurisprudence
Jurisprudence is the theory and philosophy of law. Scholars of jurisprudence, or legal theorists , hope to obtain a deeper understanding of the nature of law, of legal reasoning, legal systems and of legal institutions...
that had grown during the century, and numerous laws had been enacted to regulate the press and public censorship at various points during the republican and monarchist regimes of the 19th century. In total, 42 different laws containing 325 separate clauses regulating the press were in force, having been passed over a period of 75 years by ten different governments. Slander against public officials attacked in their public functions was criminalised under a law of 1819, but by 1880 the distinction between private and public affronts had become far from clear. The free exercise of published speech was further limited by onerous requirements to obtain prior authorisation from the government and deposit a sum of "caution money".
Key principles
In place of the confusing mass of legislation that preceded it, the Press Law established a number of basic principles. Publishing was liberalised, with the law requiring only that publishers present their names to the authorities and deposit two copies of every work. The authorities were denied the power to suppress newspapers and the offence of délits d'opinion (crimes of opinion, or types of prohibited speech) was abolished. This had previously enabled prosecutions of critics of the government, monarchy and church, or of those who argued for controversial ideas on property rights. The scope of libel was severely reduced, with the criteria for defamation being much more tightly defined. A limited number of "press offences" was retained, including outraging public morals, and insulting high-ranking public officials including the President of the Republic, heads of foreign states and ambassadors. The law also provided a right of reply for persons to respond to articles in which they were featured.In addition, the law regulates advertising and permits property owners to forbid the posting of advertisements on their properties. References to the law are frequently seen on French walls where signs proclaim "Defense d'afficher - loi du 29 Juillet 1881" ("posters forbidden - law of 29 July 1881").
Defamation
One of the most important reforms instituted by the Press Law was a major reduction in the previously extensive range of activities deemed libelous. Libel is defined concisely as "any allegation or imputation of fact striking a blow at the honour or the consideration of a person or a body to which that fact is imputed." It is generally possible to defend oneself from a libel accusation by demonstrating that the libelous facts are true, though this is not accepted in all cases.An insult (injures) is defined as "an outrageous express, terms of despise or invectives that do not charge any fact to the insulted person."
As originally enacted, the law distinguished between levels of offence and between public officials and private citizens. Defamation of private citizens was treated far less seriously than that of injuring public officials; defaming a man in his public capacity could be punished by a year's imprisonment and a fine of 3,000 franc
Franc
The franc is the name of several currency units, most notably the Swiss franc, still a major world currency today due to the prominence of Swiss financial institutions and the former currency of France, the French franc until the Euro was adopted in 1999...
s, while injuring a private citizen could cost as little as 18 francs or six days in prison.
Any statement made in parliament, judicial tribunals or (by implication) administrative councils was exempted from punishment, thereby immunising public officials from liability for slandering colleagues. The law also included differing requirements for protecting public and private individuals. Courts were required to determine the truth of slanderous accusations against public officials, but where private citizens were the victims of slander the law directed magistrates to assess only the degree of offence contained in the slander, specifically forbidding investigation into the truth of the charges. The intention of the legislators was essentially to protect the personal privacy of the accused party.
Scope and defences
As enacted, the Press Law's scope was defined as covering "the press, printing, book sales, periodical press, posters, retailing, street sales, crimes, offences, prosecutions, punishment, and temporary provisions." It applies to statements made publicly, whether through oral or printed means. In recent years, French courts have repeatedly ruled that the law also applies to defamatory content communicated via the World Wide WebWorld Wide Web
The World Wide Web is a system of interlinked hypertext documents accessed via the Internet...
.
The law provides a number of defences, particularly when reporting on matters of public interest or concern. Truth of the defamatory statement is available as a defence in most libel cases other than those concerning the privacy of the plaintiff. Where privacy is infringed, truth is not an absolute defence, though some latitude is permitted if the plaintiff is a public figure. A plea of good faith is permitted by the courts in circumstances where the issues at stake concern matters of public interest. A defendant may be acquitted on that basis if the court is satisfied that the defendant has carried out at least a basic verification of the source of the information on which the defamatory statement is based.
Amendments
Some of the more liberal aspects of the 1881 law were overturned in 1944 following the Liberation of France, when new restrictions were introduced on press ownership (with the intention of preventing the concentration of ownership) and greater transparency was introduced in a newspaper's finances and direction.Racially defamatory comments and incitement to racial hatred were criminalised when the law was amended by the Law of 1 July 1972. The French parliament further amended the Press Law in 2004 to make it a crime to discriminate against or defame individuals on the basis of their sexual orientation. Such offences are punished by jail terms of between six months and a year and a fine of between €22,500 and €45,000.
Effects of the law
The passage of the law had an immediate effect, promoting a rapid expansion in the size and range of the French mass media. In 1882, 3,800 periodical publications were published in France; a decade later, aided by the freedoms granted in 1881, that figure had expanded to 6,000. The citizens of Paris found their choice of newspapers expanding from 23 in 1881 to 60 by 1899. By 1914, a total of 309 daily newspapers were being published in France, with four of those dailies - Le Petit JournalLe Petit Journal
Le Petit Journal was a daily Parisian newspaper published from 1863 to 1944. It was founded by Moïse Polydore Millaud. In its columns were published several serial novels of Émile Gaboriau and of Ponson du Terrail.- Publishing :...
, Le Petit Parisien
Le Petit Parisien
Le Petit Parisien was a prominent French newspaper during the French Third Republic. It was published between 1876 and 1944, and its circulation was over 2 million after the First World War.-Publishing:...
, Le Journal and Le Matin
Le Matin
Le Matin is a daily newspaper published by Edipresse in Lausanne, Switzerland. The French language tabloid has a circulation of 69,350 and a readership of 331,000.The Sunday edition Le Matin dimanche has a circulation of 207,945....
- selling a million copies every day.
The liberalisation of the law of defamation had a less positive effect, enabling an upsurge in personal innuendo and vague allegations. The sociologist Gabriel Tarde
Gabriel Tarde
Jean-Gabriel De Tarde or Gabriel Tarde in short French sociologist, criminologist and social psychologist who conceived sociology as based on small psychological interactions among individuals , the fundamental forces being imitation and innovation.- Theory :Among the concepts...
commented that "Pornography and slander have become the life-blood of the newspaper." French readers were treated to a daily diet of rumour, speculation and character assassination presented as "echos" and "faits divers". The French press became increasingly dominated by sensationalist and even malicious reporting as it abused the freedoms granted by the 1881 law to "slander and incite to violence with almost total impunity." The writer Emile Zola
Émile Zola
Émile François Zola was a French writer, the most important exemplar of the literary school of naturalism and an important contributor to the development of theatrical naturalism...
personified the mixed benefits of the freedom granted by the law. It enabled him to publish his famous denunciation J'accuse
J'accuse (letter)
"J'accuse" was an open letter published on January 13, 1898, in the newspaper L'Aurore by the influential writer Émile Zola.In the letter, Zola addressed President of France Félix Faure, and accused the government of anti-Semitism and the unlawful jailing of Alfred Dreyfus, a French Army General...
in the newspaper L'Aurore
L'Aurore
L’Aurore was a literary, liberal, and socialist newspaper published in Paris, France, from 1897 to 1914. Its most famous headline was Émile Zola’s “J'Accuse”, concerning the Dreyfus Affair. It was published by eventual Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau.- External links:* Digitized issues of...
in 1898, something that would have been forbidden 20 years previously, but the torrent of lurid newspaper accusations against the unjustly imprisoned Alfred Dreyfus
Alfred Dreyfus
Alfred Dreyfus was a French artillery officer of Jewish background whose trial and conviction in 1894 on charges of treason became one of the most tense political dramas in modern French and European history...
led Zola to denounce the press as being
- "a gutter press in heat, making its money out of pathological curiosity, perverting the masses ... higher up on the scale the popular newspapers, selling for a souSouSou may refer to:* Sou , a type of food pastry* Sou , a film by Theodore Ushev for Shorts in Motion: The Art of Seduction* Solidus #France, French slang for coins...
... inspire atrocious passions ... [as well as] the higher so-called serious and honest press ... recording all with scrupulous care, whether it be true or false."
The excessive liberalisation of the French press is held by some to have contributed to the "decadence" that crippled the Third Republic in the 1930s. Raymund Kuhn suggests that towards the end of the Third Republic in the late 1930s, abuses of the Press Law's freedoms "contribute[d] to the destabilisation of the political system when economic crisis and political scandal rocked the regime."
External links
- Text of the law (in French)