ENGLISH

Early French and German Defenses of Freedom of the Press

By John Christian Laursen , Elie Luzac , Johan Van Der Zande

Book information

Publisher
Brill Academic Pub
Year
2003
ISBN
9004130179, 9789004130173
ISSN
0920-8607
LCC
PN4748.F7 E27 2003
Google Books ID
ocGALE2SRYUC
Open Library ID
OL22553207M
Language
english
Format
PDF
Filesize
1 MB (1267850 bytes)
Series
Brill's Studies in Intellectual History 113
Pages
187\187
Orientation
yes
Scanned
no
Time added
2012-02-04 16:00:00

Description

This volume contains English translations of two important early French and German defences of freedom of the press. Almost unknown in the English-speaking world, these texts demonstrate that freedom of the press was an important issue in other parts of Europe in the early modern period, giving rise to articulate theories. Elie Luzac's "Essay on Freedom of Expression" (1749) defended freedom of the press for atheists on natural law and other grounds. Carl Friedrich Bahrdt's "On Freedom of the Press and its Limits" (1787) drew on natural law, religious rhetoric and political journalism to make the case for understanding freedom of the press as a human right. Together, these texts show that the French and German traditions included their own intellectual resources for defending modern rights, before the American Bill of Rights and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man.

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