On Aug. 11 police in Marion, Kansas, raided the office of The Marion County Record as well as the homes of the paper’s publisher and a city counselor member. Police confiscated computers, cell phones and files from the small-town newspaper. The police chief, Gideon Cody, cited an illegal records search of a local business owner by reporter Deb Gruver as grounds for the search. However, the publisher of the Record believes the search was in retaliation of an investigation into Chief Cody earlier in the year as well as investigations into actions of the mayor.While newspapers and First Amendment organizations have condemned the raid, historically speaking, this is not the first time a paper has come under scrutiny for printing a story. As far back as John Adams’ Alien and Sedition Acts to the Pentagon Papers to as recently as Donald Trump’s claim of “fake news” there has been some assemblance of conflict over what can and should be published. In fact, for the case most cited for establishing freedom of the press in America we must go back to colonial New York when any negative claims against a representative of the crown could be considered libel.In 1735, newspaper publisher John Peter Zenger stood trial for libel. The case revolved around the 1732 appointment of Brigadier- General William Cosby as governor of New York. Cosby’s predecessor had died and because it would take time for Cosby to reach New York, an interim governor was appointed in his stead. When Cosby finally arrived, he was not happy with the salary he received from the New York Legislature and tried to force the interim governor to turn over half of the money he earned because after all he was just really doing Cosby’s job. When the intern refused, Cosby took him to court. This was just the first of many tyrannical acts Cosby committed while in office that caught the attention of the press.(As a side note, all colonial legislators paid the salaries to royal governors, giving the legislators a good deal of power. One of the main reasons for the American Revolution was when taxes like the Stamp Act were paid directly to Parliament instead of colonial legislators, Parliament began paying for British officials. No taxation without representation was never about paying too high taxes, it was about who was collecting the taxes and paying salaries because colonists were losing the ...
