Responsibility Of The Press

Thfi presa everywhere, and very naturally, resents a recent law which it believed to menaoe its freedom. This is instinctive ; for the hand of arbitrary power is first laid upon the press, which is the public tongue. lts freedom is the palla dium of every truly free government, and its utmost abuse is not an evil as great as the constraint of its liberty. But while we shall all probably agree upon this, and while the chief advocates of the law in question deny that they cherish any hostility to the press, nothing is more notorious than the discontent of many publio men with the incessant vituperation and misrepresentation to whioh they are subjected in the newspapers. The point is worth oonsidering whetber the press, which in its comments constantly presents so lofty an ideal of public life, does all it can to make that ideal practicable. Indeed, the impartial reader - namely, the intelligent and discriminating person who is now perusing these linea - must often ask himself, as he rises from his daily feast of the newspaper, whether it does not seom that the great Journal is quite as much bent upon maintaining the consistency of its own expressed opinions upon publio men and measures as upon secnring that lofty conduct which it so strenuously commends. This course, indeed, is natural euough, bocause if its judgment be discredited, its influence is imperilled ; and as the press constantly express the most positire opinions upon the most inadequate or even inaccurate information, an apparentconsistency often requires it to persevere in con8cious error. A journal often wishes, undoubtedly, that it had not taken the position which it has taken, but which, having taken, it must maintain. " I am very sorry," said an editor, in effect, " to have called Mr. Smith a liar, a forger, a thief - very sorry indeed ; but, having done so, of course I mnst s1 and to it." He had a theory not only that a journal should seem infallible, but that he could persnade his readers that it was so. But in the very instance of which he spoke everybody knew that he was wrong, for the disapproving facts had been published, and his refusal to acknowledge the truth, by Bhowing a want oí manly canior, harmed his journal very much inore than his persistence in a slander helped Lts reputation of infallihility. ■ The simple truth is that if an editor acks judgnient he cannot help showing , ; and nothing is a plainer or more ludirous proof of it than the effort to eatabsh infallibility or maintain consi6tency. fet it is this personal and petty feeling which cripples the press in the work of levating the tone of public life. Eaoh ournal has two.or three favoritea, whose nouths, according to its report, never pen but pearls and diamonds drop pro'usely out. They are the greatest statesmen and the most incorruptible of men, while the rest are wretched twaddlers and ettifoggers, imposing themselves upon a ;ood natured community as great men. 'arty organs, of course grind the party une ; but we speak of the press whih' whatever party it favors, means to show y the method and tone of its advocacy üat it does not serve the party, but the ountry by the party. The object of such press certainly should be to co-operate with all good endeavor, and as a power'al means to a loftier and purer politics ;o ui ake public life an attractive oareer br the best men. At the best it has horn8 and repulsions enough. But does