ABSTRACT
Let me begin by offering a few navigational aids to steer your passage through the discussion that follows. I am using ‘privilege’ primarily in its historical sense, which is also its technical sense: thus when Members of Parliament under Charles I asserted their right to speak freely and without fear of arrest, the right they claimed was a parliamentary privilege, the exercise of which was essential to the performance of their duties to their shires and boroughs, and to the realm. Their claim was not based on the proposition that ‘It’s a free country, isn’t it?’ and they would not have extended it beyond the halls of Parliament. In fact, unlicensed reporting of proceedings in Parliament remained a breach of privilege until the 1770sas it was also in the American colonies, where the legislatures were keenly conscious of their privileges.
