Joseph Dean (2)

A collection of British libel cases, mostly late nineteenth and early twentieth century. It deliberately omits the Tranby Croft case and Oscar Wide's case against Queensbury but includes a number of other sensational cases-- the claim that Winston Churchill deliberately misreported the Battle of Jutland, the cases of two Russian princes in regard to the murder of Rasputin as presented in the movie The Mad Monk, the trial in which Aleister Crowley failed to win damages for the claim he was a black magician, the trial of a preaching medium, and so on. Some cases are more trivial -- a policeman who sued because an ad implied his feet needed bathing in Jeyes Fluid, and a golfer who sued when his image was used to sell chocolate --but overall they are interesting. It is worth noting all these cases were tried before juries, and the author regards that as important as representing public opinion, but it would not be true in Britain today. Also, the judges in some cases seem to have ben blatantly biased, though only one behaved badly enough to justify a reversal of the result.… (mais)