Britain's Press Scandal

[Commentary] The phone hacking scandal in Britain that has already brought down The News of the World and now hangs over at least two other newspapers has exposed a culture of illegal intrusions, systematic bribes to corrupt police officials and thuggish threats of damaging publicity to silence criminal investigators. It is not over yet. Hard lessons must be drawn. Investigations into criminal behavior must be taken to their conclusions, wherever they lead. Honest journalists — and they abound in England, as elsewhere — should not fear those inquiries. But there is one course of action the authorities most emphatically must not pursue: the new system of press regulation that Prime Minister David Cameron darkly hinted at last week. Now especially, British public life needs the disinfecting sunlight of a free press, not the chilling shadow of official oversight.