Editing Profumo affair (section)

===Government and press===
In the early 1960s, the British news media were dominated by several high-profile spying stories: the breaking of the [[Portland spy ring]] in 1961, the capture and sentencing of [[George Blake]] in the same year and, in 1962, the case of [[John Vassall]], a homosexual [[Admiralty (United Kingdom)|Admiralty]] clerk who had been [[blackmail]]ed into spying by the [[Soviet Union]].<ref>Pincher, p. 65</ref> Vassall was subsequently sentenced to eighteen years in prison. After suggestions in the press that Vassall had been shielded by his political masters, the responsible minister, [[Tam Galbraith|Thomas Galbraith]], resigned from the government pending inquiries. Galbraith was later exonerated by the [[Vassall Tribunal]], after which judge [[Cyril Radcliffe, 1st Viscount Radcliffe|Lord Radcliffe]] sent two newspaper journalists to prison for refusing to reveal their sources for [[sensationalism|sensational]] and uncorroborated stories about Vassall's private life.<ref>Levin, pp. 59–60</ref> The imprisonment severely damaged relations between the press and the [[Conservative government, 1957–1964|Conservative government]] of Prime Minister [[Harold Macmillan]];<ref>Levin, p. 62</ref> columnist [[Paul Johnson (writer)|Paul Johnson]] of the ''[[New Statesman]]'' warned, "any [[Conservative Party (UK)|Tory]] minister or MP&nbsp;... who gets involved in a scandal during the next year or so must expect—I regret to say—the full treatment".<ref>Davenport-Hines, p. 241, quoting Paul Johnson in the ''New Statesman'', 22 March 1963</ref>{{#tag:ref|The two imprisoned reporters, Brendan Mulholland and Reg Foster, were initially hailed as martyrs and heroes, defending the high moral principle of press freedom. Davenport-Hines states "they did not want to admit they were liars who had invented their stories".<ref>Davenport-Hines, p. 240</ref> |group= n}}