Major Gen. Ben Butler is reported to have very much
astonished certain New Orleans editors , the other day, by assuring them that
he would like to see anybody who would sustain the proposition that newspapers
had not done more harm than good since their first establishment.
It is very doubtful whether the Major General ever said
anything of the sort, but there are not wanting plenty of smaller military
gentry, whose mouths are constantly filled with just such remarks. Hear Henry Ward Beecher on the other
side. We copy from the New York Post –
Rev. Henry Ward Beecher, in the course of his sermon at the
Plymouth Church last night, made an eloquent plea for newspapers, speaking of
them as one of the most potent elements of our civilization. “There is,” said he, “a common vulgar
objection about newspapers that ‘they lie’ so; they don’t lie any more than you
do. Man is naturally a lying
creature. Truth is a gift from Heaven,
and very few of us possess it before they get there. The newspaper gives both facts and rumors,
and they would be blamed if they did not do so.
It is for the reader to judge of these rumors. The last economy should be in regard to
newspapers. It is better to deprive the
body of some ribbon, or jewel, or garment, than to deprive the mind of its
sustenance.”
– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye,
Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, June 7, 1862, p. 1
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