nce of the crime; that having
in one's possession one or more seditious or libellous writings, whether
written or printed, if their contents be not communicated or made known
to one or more persons, then the possessor is not criminal in a legal
point of view. It is true that Hawkins was cited to prove that having
in one's possession a known published libel is _prima facie_ evidence
of publication against such possessors; admitting this authority, it
seems not to touch the case before us, unless those libels were
published within this District. They purport on the face of them to
have been printed in _New York_, and there published, so far as sending
them abroad, within that state, from the printing office, and putting
them into the hands of others amounts to a publication within this
District; and no evidence has been offered that the traverser ever
distributed a single copy or imparted their contents to any person
within this District saving the one charged in the first count. Hawkins
surely did not mean that having a copy of a libel published in a foreign
country in one's possession, was evidence of publication in another
state or country where the possessor of such copy may be found: for
example, a libel against the British government printed and published
in France would be no publication in England, to charge a person found
in England with one or more copies of such libels in his possession,
with the guilt of publishing such libel against the laws of England.
It is true, in times of great excitement in England, when the rebellious
principles of France were gaining ground and endangering the very
existence of the government, the Scottish courts did condemn and send
to Botany bay, Muir and Palmer for having in their possession a printed
copy of Thomas Paine's Rights of Man. It is very long since I read the
case; indeed shortly after we first obtained the information of their
trial, and shortly indeed after the trial; but I have never heard the
judgment of the court in their case spoken of but with reprobation. I
cannot remember the particulars of the case. The evidence was, that the
book had been reprinted and published in Great Britain. If so, that case
is stronger than that of having a printed copy in possession of a libel
published only in a foreign country; and so far, if such be the fact, it
is sustained by the dictum in Hawkins, but this dictum is not itself
sustained, as far as I could judge from the authorities