Wortman, Tunis (?–1822)
WORTMAN, TUNIS (?–1822)
A New York lawyer prominent in Tammany politics, Tunis Wortman contributed significantly to the emergence of a libertarian theory of the first amendment following the Sedition Act of 1798. His philosophic book, An Enquiry, Concerning the Liberty, and Licentiousness of the Press (1800), whose publication albert gallatin and other Jeffersonian congressmen helped underwrite, was the era's most systematic presentation of the case for an absolutist interpretion of freedom of publication (excluding personal libels). Wortman regarded prosecutions for seditious libel as incompatible with republican government.
Leonard W. Levy
(1986)
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