The Press: New Laws in France

In the welter of legal reforms pushed through by Charles de Gaulle when he took over France's destiny last year, two new laws set the press to trembling. One decreed imprisonment or fines for anyone publishing "by act, word or writing that which throws discredit on jurisdictional act or decision." The other authorized the same punishment for "whoever publishes before the intervention of the definitive jurisdictional decision comment tending to exercise pressures on the declarations of witnesses or on the decisions of judges."

What did the new laws mean? Seeking to find out, newsmen had their worst fears confirmed: no photographs of...

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