Il palladio dei diritti del popolo. La libertà di stampa come contropotere in Kant e negli scritti rivoluzionari

When, in 1793, Kant described the «freedom of the pen» as «the sole palladium of the rights of the people», he was using a widely known expression, that had been circulating for almost a century: the term «palladium» had in fact been used - like terms with similar meanings, such as «bulwark», «guardian» or «sentinel» - to qualify freedom of expression and freedom of the press, in different years, countries and contexts, within conceptual constellations that had provided the theoretical arsenal to the American Independents and the French Revolutionaries and in which English republicanism was intertwined with Lockian theory of natural rights and with the thought of Montesquieu and Rousseau. This article reconstructs some stretches of the paths that, in England, in the overseas colonies and in France, characterised the circulation and reinterpretation of political theories that identified freedom of expression and of the press with a sui generis right, placed as a guardian of all others and able to protect them from the abuses of constituted power. It was a right that citizens held within, but also against the state, and therefore at the same time a fragile and powerful right, frowned upon by governments because of its intrinsic link with the right of resistance and, therefore, its potentially subversive nature. Thus, since 1698, Matthew Tindal's arguments in favour of freedom of the press have included the thesis of the essentially dialogical nature of knowledge (and the consequent identification of rational activity with a public process) and the insinuation that it was opposed by governments dedicated to activities that feared the light of day. The motto of revolutionary France, according to which «publicity is the safeguard of the people», also concentrated these two aspects: «publicity» could be understood as meaning both the transparency of political and governmental action, as opposed to the opacity and secrecy of despotic regimes, and freedom of expression and the press, as opposed to preventive censorship and sometimes even to the subsequent sanctioning of authors. As for Kant's position, it is appropriate to read Kant's texts taking into account, from time to time, the current political situation, the meaning that, within this, the different possible stances would have taken and the professional and judicial consequences that - by virtue of the rules in force on censorship - each of these stances would have entailed for its supporter. For Kant, too, the question of freedom of thought coincided with the philosophical question of the very nature of human knowledge and, at the same time, with the political claim to a power of the people, permanently opposed to that of the state and able to monitor it, judge it and, ultimately, overturn it.