ABSTRACT
A common law offense, seditious libel criminalizes political criticism directed at the government and its officials. Seditious libel rests on the premise that criticism harms a state by discrediting it in the eyes of its citizens. Seditious libel came to the United States through England, where the concept dates back to the Star Chamber of the seventeenth century. From England, seditious libel prosecutions spread to the American colonies. In the eighteenth century there was an effort to introduce libertarian reforms into the law of seditious libel. Spurred on by Zenger's trial, eighteenth-century libertarians argued that truth should be a defense to a seditious libel charge, one that should be assessed by a jury. Even these libertarians, however, did not criticize seditious libel, especially when the target of the criticism was not the crown but the popularly elected colonial assemblies.
