Mr Rusbridger held firm in an hour-long session in front of the MPs of the Home Affairs Select Committee, and denied that he was in charge of a "rogue newspaper".
Indeed, it emerged that much less than 1% of the material from Mr Snowden had been printed so far, and that the paper had "made very selective judgements" about what to include. Additionally, no security officials' names have been revealed.
"We have published, I think, 26 documents so far out of the 58,000 we've seen," said Mr Rusbridger.
Meanwhile, in a slightly bizarre exchange, the editor was asked by Keith Vaz if he "loved this country", prompting an unsurprisingly forthright response.
"Yes, we [at the Guardian] are patriots," said the Harry Potter-lookalike. "One of the things we are patriotic about is the nature of democracy, the nature of a free press and the fact that one can in this country discuss and report these things.
"One of the things I love about this country is that we have that freedom to write, and report, and to think and we have some privacy, and those are the concerns which need to be balanced against national security, which no one is underestimating.
"I can speak for the entire Guardian staff who live in this country that they want to be secure too."
Interestingly, the question from Mr Vaz immediately recalled to my mind the recent story in the Daily Mail about Ralph Miliband, the late father of the Labour leader, Ed.
The Mail claimed in October that, because Marxist academic, Ralph, was against a market economy and rejected some of Britain's institutions such as the Royal family, he actually "hated Britain".
But what the Mail did not realise is that there are many different way to love your country, and not all - or indeed many - of which will subscribe to the right wing rag's one-eyed view.
Back to the Committee today, anyway - and a slightly more valid query came from Conservative MP Mark Reckless who pondered whether the Guardian had committed a criminal offence.
Again, though, Mr Rusbridger remained unmoved. "I think it depends on your view of a free press," he replied.
Instead, the Guardian chief reeled off a ream of examples of how his newspaper had been intimidated into spiking these huge public interest articles.
Mr Rusbridger said: "They include prior restraint, they include a senior Whitehall official coming to see me to say, 'There has been enough debate now'.
"They include asking for the destruction of our disks. They include MPs calling for the police to prosecute the editor... things that are inconceivable in the US."
"I feel that some of this activity has been designed to intimidate the Guardian."
The Guardian, though, is thankfully not alone. There is some safety in numbers as stories from the files taken by Mr Snowden have also appeared in Der Spiegel in Germany, and the New York Times and Washington Post in the United States.
Of course, the Post is still most famous for uncovering the Watergate scandal in which it was found aides close to President Richard Nixon had broken into the Democratic party headquarters.
The reporters of Watergate, Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward, have subsequently gone down in journalism folklore for their brave, investigatory work.
And so, it was rather apt, then, that Mr Bernstein took the time to write an open letter to Mr Rusbridger, praising him for standing up to government intimidation and summing up the debate quite presciently.
Indeed, Mr Bernstein hit the nail on the head when he wrote: "Generally speaking, the record of journalists, in handling genuine national security information since World War II... is far more responsible than the over-classification, disingenuousness, and (sometimes) outright lying by a series of governments, prime ministers and presidents. Especially in recent years."
Trust, effectively, is the crux of the debate. Mr Rusbridger today promised that the Guardian "would not be put off by intimidation, but nor are we going to behave recklessly".
On this matter, it would be bizarre if he were lying and, to be honest, the MPs on the Select Committee would be better saving their questions for elsewhere.
In fairness to the politicians, that does, in fact, seem now to be happening with head of MI5, Andrew Parker, summoned to appear next week to justify the somewhat specious claim that the leaks endangered national security.
No doubt, Mr Rusbridger and many others will watch on with a keen interest, confident that morality, at least would appear to be on their side.
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