As a result of this, within a week, Mr. James Short made a motion
for and injunction against the photographer, restraining the sale of the
photographs in question, on the ground that such sale, being of copies of
a document vital to a cause now pending in the Court, those copies having
been obtained through the instrumentality of an officer of the court, Dr.
Probate, the sale thereof amounted to a contempt, inasmuch as, if for no
other reason, the photographer who obtained them became technically, and
for that purpose only, an officer of the Court, and had, therefore, no
right to part with them, or any of them, without the leave of the Court.
It will be remembered that this motion gave rise to some very delicate
questions connected with the powers of the Court in such a matter, and
also incidentally with the law of photographic copyright. It is also
memorable for the unanimous and luminous judgment finally delivered by
the Lords Justices of Appeal, whereby the sale of the photographs was
stopped, and the photographer was held to have been guilty of a technical
contempt. This judgment contained perhaps the most searching and learned
definition of constructive contempt that has yet been formulated: but for
the text of this, I must refer the student to the law reports, because,
as it took two hours to deliver, I fear that it would, notwithstanding
its many beauties, be thought too long for the purpose of this history.
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