judgment: firstly, that, & even if the Attorney General of a Colony has power to file an ex officio information, which the Chief Justice says in the absence of direct authority or precedent he should infer he had not, the Acting Attorney General (say in the absence of the Attorney General, or during the time when the Office may be vacant between two appointments) has no power to file such an information:
Secondly, that the Crown under Ordinance 4 of 1857 Section 83 is liable for costs in matters criminal as well as civil.
As matters now stand, if an emergency arose for the Acting Attorney General to take measures, say for prosecuting the publisher of a gross libel on the Government or a seditious libel, the Executive would have to proceed knowing that the decision would be against them merely on a point of procedure, and with costs.
As the judgment deals with these as abstract propositions, it appears to me to call for serious consideration.
It is fortunate that the decision of the Chief Justice Lobo (given in Augusta v. ..., since the one in Augusta v. Jamit), where a Portuguese Judge of Macao proceeded as a private prosecutor against the Editor of a paper for libel published in this Colony, laying down as it does that it is no offence against the Law to libel a foreigner not...