The exact limits of the power to punish for contempt of court in respect of statements or comments on the action of judges and juries, or with reference to _pending_ proceedings, have been the subject of some controversy, owing to the difficulty of reconciling the claims of the press to liberty and of the public to free discussion of the proceedings of courts of justice with the claims of the judges to due respect and of the parties to litigation that their causes should not be prejudiced before trial by outside interference. As the law now stands it is permissible to publish contemporaneous _reports_ of the proceedings in cases pending in any court (Law of Libel Amendment Act 1888, s. 3), unless the proceedings have taken place in private (_in camera_), or the court has in the interests of justice prohibited any report until the case is concluded, a course now rarely, if ever, adopted. But it is not permissible to make any comments on a pending case calculated to interfere with the due course of justice in the case, nor to publish statements about the cause or the parties calculated to have that effect. This rule applies even when the case has been tried and the jury has disagreed if a second trial is in prospect. Applications are frequently made to commit proprietors and editors who comment too freely or who undertake the task of trying in their newspapers a pending case. The courts are now slow to move unless satisfied that the statements or comments may seriously affect the course of justice, e.g. by reaching the jurors who have to try the case.