In refusing to bend the knee, editors are also defending the BBC. To say this may sound absurd given the vindictive and unhinged attacks on the corporation from the right-wing press. So allow me to explain.

State-funded broadcasters could never break a story like the Guardian's revelations about the intelligence agencies or the Telegraph's exposé of MPs' expenses. The government would put insupportable political pressure on the BBC's managers and regulators to stop the broadcasts. As the BBC's funding comes from the state, and as the state has the power to amend the BBC's Royal Charter, the BBC would have to submit.

Few realise the extent of the state's potential power over the corporation because it does not matter now. Who cares if the BBC cannot take the risk of breaking stories about MPs' self-enrichment or state surveillance, when it can follow up the revelations of others? If a minister were to tell them to stop, Chris Patten and Tony Hall would dismiss the demand as ridiculous. The story was out there. Nothing the BBC said or did could change that.

The suppression that could follow the extension of royal charters threatens the old division of labour. I saw how ugly the future may become at the Home Affairs Committee's confrontation with Alan Rusbridger, editor of the  Guardian. Journalists from all over the world wondered what the hell Britain thought it was doing. The Guardian thought it had to prepare a full-scale defence. As it was the "inquisition" was a lame affair. Rusbridger explained in a measured voice how he had not threatened national security. MPs shouted at him but they landed no blows and the tension left the room, as it was always bound to, and we all shrugged our shoulders and left.

What were the politicians going to do? The presumptuous Royal Charter announcing that the Queen  intended to regulate what editors and writers could say had not come into force. Rusbridger remained a free journalist in a free country. If the state wanted to stop him, it could not turn for help to some Leveson quango. It would have to prosecute him under the laws of England. And that it will never do because it knows that there isn't a jury in the land that will convict Rusbridger.

How much longer will freedom last if the celebrities get their way? Not just the freedom of the press, but of the BBC as well? Chris Patten at least senses the danger. He told Lord Justice Leveson that for better and worse the press could do what the BBC could not, and he did not want politicians "getting involved in determining matters of free speech". Perhaps I am reading too much into  his comments, but I suspect Patten at least understands that the BBC could not "stand upright in the winds that would blow" if they did.