My desk encyclopedia allots the subject of this book these two brief
sentences: "Zenger, John Peter ( 1697-1749), American journalist, born
Germany. His acquittal in libel trial helped further freedom of press
in America."

That represents a very sober acknowledgment of the fact that the
Zenger case established highly important precedents and is a landmark
in the history of the free press among the English-speaking peoples of
the world. With all this it is something of an anomaly that Peter Zenger
never learned to write good English. He was not a newspaper editor, but
only a printer who published the writings of others in an effort to earn
an honest living. It was the incidental cause he served, rather than his
professional work, that brought him his enduring fame.

He began his career as a printer's apprentice. He worked for William
Bradford, the only printer in New York. Zenger became Bradford's
partner, but soon established a business of his own, and since Bradford
published the weekly newspaper that supported the British governor, it
was only natural that those prominent members of the colony who op-
posed the governor should contract with Peter Zenger to print and publish
a weekly paper for the opposition. Governor Cosby, whose word was law
in the British colony of New York, was an arbitrary individual. As a
personal representative of the British king he ran things pretty much as
he pleased. His arbitrary acts helped create an opposition known as the
Popular Party. Zenger's weekly became the organ for this party. Like
other colonial newspapers of that day, it printed foreign news, literary
essays, so called poetry, and a small amount of advertising. But its most
interesting contents were the political articles attacking Governor Cosby
and the actions of his administration. All these editorial comments were
written by prominent members of the opposition party, but they were
always signed with pen names.

Zenger's was the only name associated with the new opposition journal.
Governor Cosby knew very well that Zenger was only the printer and had
nothing to do with the paper's policy. He also knew that James Alex-
ander, a brilliant leader of the political opposition, wrote or edited most
of the articles that were critical of the Cosby administration. But the law,
then as now, places responsibility on those who publish a libel--not upon
those who write it. As a newspaper reporter, I myself once profited by that
distinction. The Brooklyn Daily Eagle had to defend a one hundred
thousand dollar libel suit for an article I had written. The leader of a
religious sect that had its headquarters in Brooklyn was selling what it
called Miracle Wheat. I exposed the one dollar a pound charge for this
wheat as a fraud upon the public. That gave me the interesting task of
helping the Eagle's lawyers prove with the help of agricultural experts the
truth of my printed assertion. For today, as in the days since Peter

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