The Accurate News and Information Act was a statute passed by the Legislative Assembly of Alberta, Canada, in 1937, at the instigation of William Aberhart's Social Credit government. Aberhart and the Social Credit League had been in a stormy relationship with the press since before the 1935 election, in which they were elected to government. Virtually all of Alberta's newspapers—especially the Calgary Herald—were critical of Social Credit, as were a number of publications from elsewhere in Canada. Even the American media had greeted Aberhart's election with derision. The act would have required newspapers to print "clarifications" of stories that a committee of Social Credit legislators deemed inaccurate. It would also have required them to reveal their sources on demand. Though the act won easy passage through the Social Credit-dominated legislature, Lieutenant-Governor of Alberta John C. Bowen reserved royal assent until the Supreme Court of Canada evaluated the act's legality. In 1938's Reference re Alberta Statutes, the court found that it was unconstitutional, and it was never signed into law.
Read the rest of this article: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accurate_News_and_Information_Act> _______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries: 1500: Spanish navigator, explorer, and conquistador Vicente Yáñez Pinzón reached the north coast of what today is Brazil. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vicente_Y%C3%A1%C3%B1ez_Pinz%C3%B3n> 1788: Captain Arthur Phillip and the British First Fleet landed at Sydney Cove on the shore of Port Jackson in present-day Sydney, establishing the first permanent European settlement in Australia. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Phillip> 1808: Governor of New South Wales William Bligh was deposed by the New South Wales Corps in the only successful armed takeover of government in Australia's recorded history. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rum_Rebellion> 1905: The Cullinan Diamond, the largest rough gem-quality diamond ever found at 3,106.75 carats (621.35 g), was discovered at the Premier Mine in Cullinan, Gauteng, South Africa. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cullinan_Diamond> 1950: Indian independence movement: India officially became a republic under a new constitution, with Rajendra Prasad as its first president. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rajendra_Prasad> _____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day: furcate (v): To fork or branch out <http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/furcate> ___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day: I do believe that man is a rope between animal and superman. But the superman I'm thinking of isn't Nietzsche's. The real superhuman, man or woman, is the person who's rid himself of all prejudices, neuroses, and psychoses, who realizes his full potential as a human being, who acts naturally on the basis of gentleness, compassion, and love, who thinks for himself and refuses to follow the herd. That's the genuine dyed-in-the-wool superman. --Philip José Farmer <http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Philip_Jos%C3%A9_Farmer> _______________________________________________ Wikipedia Daily Article mailing list. To unsubscribe, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/daily-article-l Questions or comments? Contact [email protected]
