cuss and condemn the war policy of the government is identical with the freedom of the people to do the same thing, and continued to express its disapproval of the war. The attack upon the paper caused it to gain rather than lose in the popular estimation.[1]
A study of the various instances of governmental repression in the case of newspapers will reveal not so much that the penalties were excessive in view of the offense committed as that the means were ill adapted to the end desired. Popular pressure, rather than governmental repression was, after all, the most effective method by which the journals could be kept within bounds. The press of the country is in any case but the reflection of sentiment, and where the sentiment was hostile to the administration any interference with its written expression could have no other effect than to intensify resentment and bring popular sympathy to bear upon persecuted editors. It is the old story of the absolute inability of government to force or supplant sentiment.
There were many in the North, however, who waxed indignant at the thought that while their sons were fighting for the cause of the Union, editors should be unmolested in furnishing to the enemy by their pens a form of aid and comfort which was more effective than guns and ammunition. This popular resentment found expression in numerous attacks upon such papers as were tainted with disloyalty. Editors were worried, threatened, banished, or subjected to personal outrage; newspaper offices were frequently attacked by mobs so that guards were needed to protect property; in some instances papers were destroyed, and other forms of opposition were resorted to.[2] Officers of the government received numerous petitions directed against disaffected journalists, and such expressions of loyal indignation more than outnumbered remonstrances against interference with journalistic freedom. It may be said that the government did far less than the enthusiastic Union men of the time would have wished in the way of controlling the press. Zealously loyal men had to be disappointed while policy was so trimmed as to avoid offending conservative sentiment.
Viewing the whole period of the war, and taking account of all parts of the country, it appears that the actual governmental inter-
- ↑ Baltimore Exchange, editorial, September 13, 1861. Other Baltimore papers were summarily dealt with. The South was suppressed on February 17, 1862, and the Maryland News Sheet on August 14. The Gazette (the News Sheet under a new name) was suspended from September 28 to October 7, 1863, and the Daily Baltimore Republican was suppressed on September 11, 1863. Check List of American Newspapers, Library of Congress, pp. 81 ff.
- ↑ An interesting summary of incidents showing popular violence against newspapers and editors is to be found in the Annual Cyclopedia, 1864, p. 393.
