Not much change here:


These committees quickly formed into newsletters and newspapers that circulated the entirety of the colonies. It did not take long for the press suppression in England to bleed into the colonies.

A journalist named John Peter Zenger was the publisher of the New York Weekly Journal. The Journal was an opposition to the Royal Governor’s administration. The governor had Zenger arrested on charges of libel and Zenger was imprisoned in 1734. During his trial in 1735, his defense attorney successfully argued that libel could not be established on the basis of proven fact. If the statements that were charged were true, then libel could not be claimed. This celebrated trial established an indestructible freedom of the press in America. Zenger’s trial is often seen as the cornerstone of American press freedom.

After the American Revolution, several states wrote press freedom clauses into their state constitutions. In 1791, the U.S. Constitution was amended to include a Bill of Rights, which included a provision for freedom of the press. It is a matter of debate whether this amendment was intended to prohibit prosecution for seditious libel or merely to prohibit prior restraint has been a matter of controversy.

When countries go to war, everyone feels the impact. The press is no exception.
Irresponsible reporting by journalists during the Civil War led military commanders on both sides to appeal to publishers. They begged the publishers to voluntarily suppress news stories that were of strategic importance to the war. These pleas fell upon deaf ears and the military was forced to impose restrictions on the press. These restrictions kept journalists out of battle zones and away from the action as much as possible. They also limited access to general staff and the President.

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I may not be perfect, but parts of me are excellent!