Section I. Private Libel usually treated as a Tort

A libel is such a writing or picture as either defames an individual (‘private’ libel) or injures religion, government or morals (‘public’ libel).

We have already seen that most crimes are also torts. But the most conspicuous illustration of this is afforded by the defamatory, or private, libel. It is a crime which not only is a tort, but is constantly treated as such in actual practice. For it is only a misdemeanour, and accordingly not affected by the rule which delayed, and therefore usually frustrated, civil proceedings for crimes that were of the degree of felonies. And again, it is a crime which, unlike most others, is often committed by persons whose pecuniary means are large enough to enable them to pay whatever compensation a civil court may award. Hence libels are much more frequently followed up by civil than by criminal proceedings. And the judges have desired to see indictments for defamation restricted to those cases in which the libel is sufficiently aggravated, either by its intrinsic gravity or its public nature (e.g. libels on persons in a public position, or tending to defame persons of influence in foreign countries so as to interfere with pacific relations) or where the offensive statements are repeated by numbers of persons of small means, so that a civil action would not afford their victim any adequate remedy or means of terminating the mischief. A prosecution should not be employed in a mere squabble between two individuals. It is not however, incumbent on the prosecution to prove that the libel would have been unusually likely to provoke the wrath of the person defamed.

Section 2. Fundamental Principles Common to the Civil and Criminal Law

It is sufficient for the purposes of the present volume to indicate briefly the fundamental principles which are common to both the civil and the criminal law of libel, and then explain the distinguishing features of the latter aspect of this wrong.