edom of the press: but if he publishes what is improper,
mischievous, or illegal, he must take the consequence of his own
temerity. To subject the press to the restrictive power of a licenser,
as was formerly done, both before and since the revolution, is to
subject all freedom of sentiment to the prejudices of one man, and make
him the arbitrary and infallible judge of all controverted points in
learning, religion and government. But to punish (as the law does at
present) any dangerous or offensive writings, which, when published,
shall on a fair and impartial trial be adjudged of a pernicious
tendency, is necessary for the preservation of peace and good order, of
government and religion, the only solid foundations of civil liberty.
Thus, the will of individuals is still left free: the abuse only of that
free will is the object of legal punishment. Neither is any restraint
hereby laid upon freedom of thought or inquiry: liberty of private
sentiment is still left; the disseminating, or making public, of bad
sentiments, destructive to the ends of society, is the crime which
society corrects."[67]

EFFECT OF AMENDMENT I ON THE COMMON LAW

Blackstone was declaring the Common Law of his day, and it was no
intention of the framers of Amendment I to change that law. "The
historic antecedents of the First Amendment preclude the notion that its
purpose was to give unqualified immunity to every expression that
touched on matters within the range of political interest. The
Massachusetts Constitution of 1780 guaranteed free speech; yet there are
records of at least three convictions for political libels obtained
between 1799 and 1803. The Pennsylvania Constitution of 1790 and the
Delaware Constitution of 1792 expressly imposed liability for abuse of
the right of free speech. Madison's own State put on its books in 1792 a
statute confining the abusive exercise of the right of utterance. And it
deserves to be noted that in writing to John Adams' wife, Jefferson did
not rest his condemnation of the Sedition Act of 1798 on his belief in
unrestrained utterance as to political matter. The First Amendment, he
argued, reflected a limitation upon Federal power, leaving the right to
enforce restrictions on speech to the States.[68] * * * 'The law is
perfectly well settled,' this Court said over fifty years ago, 'that the
first ten amendments to the Constitution, commonly known as the Bill of
Rights, were not intended to lay down any nove