The Charter of the City of New-York; Printed by Order of the Mayor, Recorder, Aldermen and Commonalty of the City aforesaid

In 1734 John Peter Zenger, the second printer to set up shop in New York City, was arrested for publishing seditious libels directed at the colonial governor, William Cosby. Zenger was acquitted of all charges in a trial that became a landmark in American legal history: it laid the groundwork for the precedent that statements, however unflattering or defamatory, are not libelous if they can be proved true.



On his release from jail, Zenger set about completing the long-delayed printing of the second charter of the City of New York, known as the Montgomerie Charter. Perhaps as a veiled provocation toward Cosby, Zenger wrote in his newspaper, The New-York Weekly Journal, “The Printer, now having got his liberty again, designs God willing to Finish and Publish the Charter of the City of New-York next week.”