What important right did john peter zenger's trial establish in the colonies?

Answer 1

When John Peter Zenger, a New York newspaper publisher, was arrested and charged with seditious libel in 1735, journalists had no protection. If the king or the royal governor disliked something a newspaper published, the editor could be arrested. That almost cost Zenger his life. But the result of the trial was a ruling that a journalist could not be punished for reporting something that was the truth, even if the truth was not popular with those in power. Years later, the Zenger trial led to one of the rights in the First Amendment of the Constitution: Freedom of the Press. (By the way, back in the old days, a newspaper could not publish without a printing press, and so, the term "the press" was used to refer to what we today would call "the media.")