The Newspaper Stamp duties Act contains a provision which many
of' our contemporaries overlooked, and thereby rendered themselves liable to a heavy amount of penalties. It was decreed by the wise men, who appear to think it a part of statecraft, to annoy the press in small things as well as great, that " the day of the week, month, and year," on which a paper is published, shall be added to the imprint at the end of the paper, under a penalty of 20/. for each copy sold, without such addition. This is a piece of gratuitous annoyance. The date of every paper is to be found on its first page, and in most of the daily papers at the top of each page, as well as just before the leading article. Yet this was not sufficient ; and it must be again repeated at the end of the paper. This is miserable legislation—of no use or advantage whatever to anybody, simply troublesome, and indicative of the disposition to fetter the press, and lay traps for its conductors by multiplying the chances of incurring penalties. Fortunately the Stamp-office authorities alone can proceed for the recovery of the sums forfeited ; which, on a paper circulating 6000 copies, would amount to 120,000/. for one day. The penalties to which the Morning Chronicle rendered itself liable on Thursday and Friday, by ignorance of this provision, are no less than a quarter of a million I Of course no Government would think of enforcing such a law ; but then, why stupidly enact it ? The motive was the common and paltry one of plaguing the press. The three Tory " comrognes," Times, Standard, and Post, had been more watchful than their brethren, and escaped the snare. The Times, yesterday morning, had a coarse chuckle over it, at the expense of the Ministers and their too confiding organs.
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