This is an appeal by plaintiff from a judgment for defendants, entered upon plaintiff’s failure to amend after a general demurrer was sustained to plaintiff’s first amended petition in quo warranto.

Defendants were insurance companies authorized to do and doing business in the State of California. Included in the business of defendants was the writing of policies of insurance covering negligence of automobile drivers.

In the first amended petition in quo warranto, plaintiff alleged that defendants did cause to be published in various nationally distributed magazines, including “Life” and “The Saturday Evening Post,” advertisements relating to the subject of excessive jury verdicts.

Attached to the amended petition were photostatic copies of the advertisements upon which plaintiff’s petition was based.

On the first advertisement so set forth (marked Exhibit “A”), appears the picture of a woman holding a letter in her hand and beneath the picture appears the following:

On the next advertisement (marked Exhibit “B”) appears the picture of a jury being sworn to try a case, below which appears the following:

The third advertisement (marked Exhibit “0”) presents the picture of an officer sitting outside a closed jury room, and below which appears the following:

In the fourth advertisement (marked Exhibit “D”) is found a photograph of a father and son engaged in conversation, and below which appears the following:

Exhibit “E,” also attached to plaintiff’s petition, is a page taken from “Shop Talk,” a publication apparently sponsored by “American-Associated Insurance Companies,” of St. Louis, Missouri. The page contains an article upon the campaign being conducted “To combat the important problem of unjust jury awards,” and in the lower left-hand corner reference is made to the above-mentioned advertisements in “Life” and “Saturday Evening Post,” with the comment:

It was further charged in the petition that the foregoing publications amounted to a contempt of the judicial process and a conspiracy formed with the intent to corrupt jurors.

The petition prayed for a restraint against further publication of said or similar matter or forfeiture of defendants’ corporate rights in the State of California, or that defendants be required to pay a suitable fine as punishment.

Defendants filed a general demurrer on the grounds that the petition sought to violate and suppress respondents’ right of freedom of speech and of the press guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States and by the Constitution of the State of California, and that the facts alleged were insufficient to show a violation of Penal Code, section 95, a contempt of the judicial process or a conspiracy or intent to corrupt jurors, or grounds for a proceeding in quo warranto. The demurrer was sustained with leave to amend. Plaintiff declined to amend and a judgment of dismissal was entered.

The theory of appellant in this proceeding is thus stated in its brief: "This appellant is the State of California, and if the conduct of a corporation, the creature of this State, is in violation of its penal statutes, this appellant, the State of California, may bring an action against the offending corporation for dissolution, fine, restraining order, etc., or any combination of these remedies.” (Corp. Code, § 4690; Code Civ. Proc., § 803.)

Because we regard it as the main if not determinative issue presented by this controversy, we shall first give consideration to respondents’ claim that their demurrer was properly sustained because this proceeding constitutes a form of prior restraint upon publication barred by the free speech and free press provisions of the federal and state Constitutions (U.S. Const., Amend. I and XIV, § 1; Cal. Const., art. I, § 9).

Prom time immemorial the most conspicuous feature of history has been the struggle between liberty and authority. Undoubtedly, the framers of our Constitution and Bill of Rights, as well as those who brought into being our own California Constitution, recognized that at the- time of the adoption of these immortal documents, as in ages past, we are not without tragic proof that the exacted power of some governments to ignore the inalienable right of the individual to liberty of conscience and freedom of expression is the handmaiden of tyranny. In America, we have always felt and vigorously asserted that free speech is a natural and inherent right, and that it, and freedom of the press, are among the most sacred and vital rights of mankind. While the constitutional guarantee above referred to is a fundamental one and is couched in the broadest language, the right thus guaranteed is, of course, not without limit. One such limitation is that no person is permitted to impede or interfere with the orderly administration of justice. But, however intemperate the language, false the charges, or unfair the criticism, they do not admit of judicial restraint or punishment unless there is an immediate, clear and present danger imperiling the administration of justice. The foregoing principles have been firmly established in the recent decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States, and, interpreting as they do, a provision of the federal Constitution, are binding upon us.

In Bridges v. California, consolidated with Times-Mirror Co. v. Superior Court, 314 U.S. 252 [ 62 S.Ct. 190 , 86 L.Ed. 192 , 159 A.L.R. 1346 ], both petitioners had been found guilty of contempt and the Supreme Court of California had affirmed (Bridges v. Superior Court, 14 Cal.2d 464 [ 94 P.2d 983 ]; Times-Mirror Co. v. Superior Court, 15 Cal.2d 99 [ 98 P.2d 1029 ].)

In the case of the newspaper, the facts were that two labor union members had been convicted of assault and the trial judge had pending before him applications for probation. Under these circumstances the newspaper discussed the merits of the case at length in its editorial columns, denounced practices relating to the behavior of the accused, and closed with the observation ( 314 U.S. 252, 272 ), “Judge A. A. Scott will make a serious mistake if he grants probation to Matthew Shannon and Kennan Holmes. This community needs the example of their assignment to the jute mill.”

In the Bridges case, a motion for a new trial was pending in a labor dispute case. During the pendency of that motion Bridges telegraphed to the Secretary of Labor condemning the decision as “outrageous,” and threatened he would call a Pacific Coast strike unless a new trial were granted.

In commenting upon the aforesaid cases, Mr. Presiding Justice Peters, speaking for the court in Turkington v. Municipal Court, 85 Cal.App.2d 631, 642, 643, 644 [ 193 P.2d 795 ], said: “In both eases the comment was about a pending case, and in both cases strong, intemperate and untrue remarks were made. The Supreme Court of the United States assumed that in both cases the accused were attempting to influence the course of pending litigation in the trial court. In both cases the trial court found, and the Supreme Court of California affirmed the finding, that the acts had a reasonable tendency to interfere with the orderly administration of justice. Nevertheless, the judgment was reversed, the Supreme Court holding that, as a matter of law, the comments did not present a clear and present danger to the orderly administration of justice. The majority of the court (the decision was 5 to 4) pointed out that prior decisions had established the rule that the constitutional right to free speech must be protected unless the comments about a court or judge are of such a nature ‘as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils. ’ (P. 261 [314 U. S.].) At page 262 [314 U.S.] it is stated:

Six years after rendition of the Bridges decision the Supreme Court reaffirmed the reasoning and conclusion therein contained in the case of Pennekamp v. Florida, 328 U.S. 331 [ 66 S.Ct. 1029 , 90 L.Ed. 1295 ].

In the case just cited, Mr. Justice Frankfurter, discussing the responsibility of the press at pages 365, 366, had this to say:

It would serve no useful purpose to here present a detailed analysis of other cases supporting the foregoing doctrine. Suffice it to say that the above principles are enunciated and approved in the eases of Craig v. Harney, 331 U.S. 367, 376 [ 67 S.Ct. 1249 , 91 L.Ed 1546]; Baltimore Radio Show v. State, 193 Md. 300 [ 67 A.2d 497 ], certiorari denied, 338 U.S. 912 [ 70 S.Ct. 252 , 94 L.Ed. 562 ]; Near v. Minnesota ex rel. Olson, 283 U.S. 697 [ 51 S.Ct. 625 , 75 L.Ed 1357].

It must also be remembered that appellant in this proceeding seeks to restrain respondents from further utterance of their sentiments on claimed excessive jury verdicts or to oust them from carrying on their corporate business in the State of California. Manifestly, this is an attempt at prior restraint upon publication and in essence amounts to censorship, denounced by the state and federal Constitutions in their protection of freedom of speech and press. The courts have held that a statute authorizing such proceedings in restraint on publication is not consistent with the conception of the liberty of the press as historically conceived and guaranteed. While, as heretofore pointed out, the right of free speech is not unlimited, no one’s mouth may be closed in advance, as sought herein, for the purpose of preventing an utterance of his sentiments, however mischievous the prospective results of such utterance. The right of free speech was his, but at all times he was responsible to the law for an abuse of that right (Near v. Minnesota ex rel. Olson, supra; Dailey v. Superior Court, 112 Cal. 94, 97, 99 [ 44 P. 458 , 53 Am.St.Rep. 160 , 32 L.R.A. 273 ]; Empire Theatre Co. v. Cloke, 53 Mont. 183 [ 163 P. 107 , L.R.A. 1917E 383 ] ; Northwestern Pac. R. Co. v. Lumber & Sawmill Workers’ Union, 31 Cal.2d 441, 448, 449, 450 [ 189 P.2d 277 ].) The principle underlying the rules enunciated in the cited eases is the inability to conceive how anyone can possess the right to publish what he pleases, subject only to penalty for abuse, and at the same time be prevented by any court from doing so. We are persuaded that the quo warranto statutes in this state deal with forfeiture and suppression of corporate rights, and not with publications per se, and their use is not permitted to effect restraint upon publication—which is the essence of censorship.

The advertisements here in question amount to a generalized discussion of a particular topic—the claimed excessive awards in negligence cases. There is no effort made to influence a particular decision. As pointed out by respondents, “The gist of the four advertisements attached to the amended petition is that verdicts should be rendered 1 “according to the Law and the Evidence.” ’ They protest excessive verdicts rendered on the assumption that 1 “The insurance company can afford to pay.” ’ They point out that when jurors do not base their verdicts on the law and the evidence, but, in violation of their oath, upon an impulse to be ‘overly generous with an insurance company’s money’— the jurors, in violating their oath, hurt not just the insurance company but themselves and the public generally. To allege by way of a conclusion that a protest on behalf of the whole insurance industry and, according to the beliefs of many, on behalf of the public at large, is ‘presently dangerous of prejudicing and corrupting’ jurors, is to reject every reasonable hypothesis from the facts pleaded.”

Appellant relies heavily upon the case of People v. Connors, 70 Cal.App. 315 [ 233 P. 362 ], in which a conviction under Penal Code, section 95, was reversed because of an erroneous instruction. Upon a retrial defendant was again convicted resulting in an affirmance of the judgment ( 77 Cal.App. 438 [ 246 P. 1072 ]). In the cited ease, Connors caused copies of a multigraphed letter to be circulated promiscuously in Sacramento County during the pendency of a series of criminal syndicalism cases and during the actual trial of one. The letter strongly criticized the law under which the cases were prosecuted, attacked the prosecution witnesses as “a trio of degenerates” and defended the accused. The court said that the defendant would be subject to punishment if the letters were sent in the hope and expectation of thereby reaching many jurors and with the intent of corruptly influencing them. However, the Connors case is unlike the one now engaging our attention in that it did not involve the form of prior restraint sought here. There was no attempt to restrain future utterances. The publication in the Connors case related to particular and specific pending eases. And in neither appeal was the constitutional question presented. However, in the Connors case the court carefully distinguishes publications “for the sole purpose of creating public opinion” from publications corruptly attempting to influence jurors in specific pending cases, thereby anticipating the holding in Pennekamp v. Florida, supra, that only the extraneous influence “specifically directed to a concrete case” can be barred.

The reasoning in the cases cited by us is conclusive in the ease at bar. The language used in the questioned advertisements herein was not nearly so intemperate or unfair as that charged in the Pennekamp and Craig cases, supra. When appellant’s petition is read in the light of the cases cited, it seems to us the conclusion is inescapable that there is no sufficient showing therein of a “clear and present danger” to the orderly administration of justice, nor that any such danger was “serious” and “imminent.” On the basis of the facts alleged in the amended petition, the maintenance of quo warranto proceedings against respondent must be held, under the authorities herein cited, to amount to an infringement upon rights guaranteed respondents by the federal and state Constitutions. Respondents’ demurrer was therefore properly sustained.

The foregoing conclusion at which we have arrived renders it unnecessary to discuss or decide other points raised on this appeal.

The judgment is affirmed.

Doran, J., and Drapeau, J., concurred.

A petition for a rehearing was denied May 9, 1955, and appellant’s petition for a hearing by the Supreme Court was denied June 16, 1955. Carter, J., was of the opinion that the petition should be granted.