CATHOLIC WORLD.

VOL. XXIII., No. 135.—JUNE, 1876.

GERMAN JOURNALISM.[97]

The universal hymn of journalistic praise, sung throughout the civilized world with hardly a discordant note, is of itself no mean evidence of the power of the press. “Great is journalism,” says Carlyle. “Is not every able editor a ruler of the world, being a persuader of it?” From France M. Thiers declares that the liberty of the press is theoretically and practically the most necessary of all; and was it not our own Jefferson who solemnly affirmed that he would rather live in a country with newspapers and without a government than in a country with a government but without newspapers? Did not the great Napoleon himself stand in greater awe of a newspaper than of a hundred thousand bayonets? “Give me but the liberty of the press,” cried Sheridan, “and I will give to the minister a venal House of Peers; I will give him a corrupt and servile House of Commons; I will give him the full sway of the patronage of office; I will give him the whole host of ministerial influence; I will give him all the power that place can confer upon him to purchase up submission and overcome resistance; and yet, armed with the liberty of the press, I will go forth to meet him undismayed; I will attack the mighty fabric he has reared with that mightier engine; I will shake down from its height corruption and bury it amidst the ruins of the abuses it was meant to shelter.”

But we do not propose to treat our readers to a dissertation written in the style of him who declared that, were the starry heavens deficient of one constellation, the vacuum could not be better supplied than by the introduction of a printing-press. We fully recognize, however, the very great power of the press which controls public opinion, and indeed often makes it. Nothing is unimportant which throws light upon the constitution and workings of this “Fourth Estate,”

into whose hands the destinies of modern nations and civilization seem to have been delivered; and it is for this reason that we take pleasure in bringing to the notice of the readers of The Catholic World the work of Professor Wuttke on German Journalism and the Origin of Public Opinion.

It would be difficult to find a more curious or instructive book. For years connected with the press himself, a leader of the “great German party,” and the author of several valuable historical and philosophical works, Herr Wuttke has brought to his present task the thoroughgoing and painstaking conscientiousness of a German professor. He is wholly in earnest; neither smiles nor laughs; does not even stop to give smoothness and polish to his phrase, but without remorse or fear invades the editorial sanctum, and pours upon its most hidden mysteries the profane light; holds them up before vulgar eyes, and leaves not the suspicion of a doubt but that he is resolved to tell all he knows. His courage no one can deny. The enterprise to which he has devoted himself was full of perils, none of which were hidden from him.

German newspapers before the revolution of 1848 were chiefly of a literary character. Their columns were filled with criticisms of books, philosophical and theological discussions, æsthetic treatises, accounts of travel, entertaining stories, and theatrical notices. Scarcely any attention was paid to events of the day, and least of all to those of a political character. The explanation of this anomaly is simple. The governments of Germany exercised a rigorous censorship over the press, and allowed nothing to be published which might

set people to thinking about what their rulers were doing. But the storm of 1848 blew the pen from the hand of the official censor, and opened the columns of the newspaper to all kinds of political theories and discussions. The governments were at sea, borne helpless by the popular wave which had broken them loose from their ancient moorings and was carrying them they knew not whither. Their official organs, with unlimited financial support from the state, were powerless, because people refused to read them whilst independent journals were within their reach. The revolutionary outburst was soon followed by a reaction, partly brought on by its own excesses; and with the aid of the military the former governments were restored. Restrictions were again placed upon the liberty of the press; but so universal had the political agitation been that to think of carrying through a policy of rigorous repression was manifestly out of the question. It became necessary, therefore, to devise some expedient by which the press might be controlled without being muzzled.

With this view Von Manteuffel, the Prussian minister, established in Berlin a “Central Bureau of the Press,” which stood in intimate relations with the government and received from the “Secret Fund” a yearly support of from forty to fifty thousand thalers. With this money the pens of a crowd of needy scribes were bought, who for twenty or thirty thalers a month agreed to write articles in support of the views which the director of the Bureau should inspire. The next step was to make an opening for these articles in the columns of journals in different parts of the kingdom. This was not difficult,

as the contributions were well written, by persons evidently thoroughly informed, and were offered at a nominal price, or even without pay. On the 9th of March, 1851, the director of the Bureau sent a circular to “those editors and publishers of the conservative party with whom he has not at present the honor of holding personal relations,” in which he promised, with special reference to his connection with the Ministry of State, to send them from time to time communications concerning the real condition of political affairs, in order to furnish them indispensable materials for the successful prosecution of their labors. This assistance was to be given free of cost, and many editors were eager to avail themselves of it without inquiring with much care into its special significance. In this way the “Central Press-Bureau” wove a network of lines of communication over the whole kingdom, which, however, was carefully hidden from public view. It also kept up constant intercourse with the representatives of Prussia at the various European courts, which enabled it to give tone to public opinion on foreign affairs as well as on matters at home. Through the influence of the government, and by spending money, the Bureau gradually succeeded in introducing its agents into the offices of many newspapers, and occasionally in getting entire control of this or that journal. By this cunning policy the Prussian government was able to lead the unsuspecting public by the nose.

Whilst confiding readers throughout the land were receiving the views of their favorite journals as the honest expression of public opinion, these newspapers were in fact only the whispering-galleries

of the Berlin ministry. The editors themselves were often ignorant of the fact that the pens of their co-laborers had been bought and sold. Even foreign journals, in England and France, did not escape the meshes of the “Press-Bureau,” but were entrapped and made to do service for Prussia.

Another contrivance for working up public opinion was the “Lithographic Correspondence-Bureau,” which is a French invention. This is an agency for the manufacture of correspondence from all parts of the world, at home and abroad, which is lithographed and sent to journals that are willing to pay for it; and nearly all of them find this the cheapest and easiest method of keeping abreast of the times.

As the men who found these Bureaus are chiefly intent upon making money, and live, moreover, in salutary awe of the government, they generally find it advisable to place themselves at its disposition. The correspondence-agency of Havas-Büllier in Paris was Orleanistic under Louis Philippe, and Napoleonic under the Empire. In return it obtained the monopoly of “lithographic correspondence”; so that, during the reign of Louis Napoleon, France received its knowledge of the foreign world through the single channel of this Bureau, which was carefully supervised by the government. This was too excellent a device not to find ready acceptance in Berlin, and in the most natural way in the world the “Lithographic Correspondence-Bureau” was placed alongside the “Press-Bureau”; the journals which had already fallen under the influence of the latter yielded without resistance to the seductions of the new ally, and thus became to a still greater extent the tools of the government.

In this way the “eunuchs of the court and press” were in position deliberately and with malice to falsify and pervert public opinion, which soon came to mean the utterances of the herd of venal scribes in Berlin who had sold themselves, body and soul, to the “Press-Bureau.” One of the five sins which, according to Confucius, is unpardonable, is from under the mantle of truth to scatter broadcast lies which are hurtful to the people; and this is the charge which Professor Wuttke brings against the crowd of German newspaper-writers.

Telegraphy, which was first introduced into Germany in 1849, led to further improvements in the art of manipulating the press. The “Correspondence-Bureau” of Havas-Büllier became a telegraphic agency and furnished despatches free of charge to the Parisian journals, in order to prevent the starting of a rival business; and when, notwithstanding, the Agence Continentale was organized, it was suppressed by Persigny, the Minister of State, who by this means was enabled to control the publication of telegrams in all the leading journals of France. In Italy the Stefani Agency, at Turin, rendered similar services to the government of Victor Emanuel; sending out the most shameless falsehoods to the four corners of the earth, and carefully suppressing whatever the authorities wished to conceal from the public. These despatches were printed in the leading journals of Europe and America as coming from unsuspected sources, when they were in fact the “cooked” telegrams of the secret agents of Cavour and the Revolution.

In 1850 Reuter established his telegraphic Agency in Aix-la-Chapelle,

but removed it in the following year to Berlin; and a few months later, when the cable between Calais and Dover was laid, he made London the central point of his operations. In Berlin a similar business was opened by Dr. Wolf, a Jew. In 1855 he sold out to a number of capitalists, who organized the Continentale Telegrafenkompagnie, and then entered into a combination with Reuter and Havas, through which they controlled the telegraphic despatches furnished to the press of all Europe. To have the latest news was a journalistic necessity; and yet to maintain special agents in the great centres, and to pay the high rates for sending special telegrams, would have been too heavy a burden. Nothing remained, therefore, but to take the despatches of the Agencies which were now in league with one another.

In Prussia nearly all the telegraphic lines, most of which were put up during the reaction after the revolution of 1848, were in the hands of the government; and this, of itself, was sufficient to place the Agencies at its disposal. And in point of fact, it is no secret that in Prussia there exists a censorship of the telegraph, and that the government decides as to the despatches which the newspapers shall receive. Whoever will take the trouble to weigh this matter will see what a terrible instrument for the perversion of public opinion is thus placed in the hands of the state. A despatch has always in its favor the force of first impressions. When, after days or weeks, explanations follow, they are passed over, new events having already preoccupied public attention. All the world reads the telegram; comparatively few pay any attention to the later-coming

corrections of inaccurate or false statements.

Prussia, then, through her “Central Press-Bureau,” her “Correspondence-Bureau,” and her “Telegram-Bureau,” succeeded in getting control of the leading German journals, which, while keeping up the appearance of independence and honesty, were either in her pay or under the influence of her agents. Public opinion in Germany was at her mercy; so that, after she had made the most thorough preparations for the war of 1866, she found no difficulty in having it proclaimed throughout the fatherland that Austria had been arming and was ready to fall upon her in order to rob her of Silesia. The newspapers even lent themselves, when the war had begun, to the publication of a spurious address to the army by Benedek, the Austrian leader, in which there was not one word of truth, but in which he was made to speak in a way that could not fail to arouse the indignation of the Prussian soldiers. This forged document was circulated by the press and read by the captains to their men as soon as they had entered Bohemia.

The creation of the new empire has not improved German journalism. The “Press-Bureau” has enlarged the circle of its activity, while the government has invented other means not less effective for controlling the newspapers. “We care not for public opinion,” said a high official in Berlin some months ago; “for the entire press belongs to us.” Prussia has German public opinion, in so far as it is allowed to find expression, in her keeping. After the war with Austria the annual secret fund of the “Press-Bureau” was increased to 70,000 thalers; but

this is in reality a very inconsiderable portion of the money at its disposition. The incorporation of Hanover and Hesse with Prussia threw into the hands of the government very large resources. From George of Hanover King William exacted 19,000,000 thalers, and from the Prince Elector of Hesse property with an annual rental of 400,000 thalers. Both these sums were placed at the disposal of Bismarck by the Landtag, that he might use them to defeat the “intrigues” of the enemies of Prussia. It was on the occasion of this grant that Bismarck used the words which have given to the “Press-Bureau” fund a name which it can never lose. “I follow,” he said, “malignant reptiles into their very holes, in order to watch their doings.” The money which he received to carry on this dark underground business was appropriately designated by the Berlin wits the “Reptile-fund” (Reptilienfond). A vocabulary of slang has been invented to designate the hired scribes of the Bureau and their operations. Bismarck calls them “my swine-herds” (meine Sauhirten). To write for the “Press-Bureau” is to take mud-baths (Schlammbäder nehmen); and the writers themselves, who are classified as “officious,” “high-officious,” “half-officious,” and “over-officious,” are called “mud-bathers” (Schlammbäder), and they devour the “Reptile-fund.” The instructions issued by the directors for the preparation of articles for the different journals are styled “wash-tickets” (Waschzettel). The directors who are not immediately connected with the Bureau are known by the name of “Piper” (Pfeifer), which, in the jargon of Berlin, has a peculiar and by no means flattering signification.

As the buzzards fly to the carcass, so gathered the hungry German scribes around the “Reptile-fund”; but their pens were cheap and the “Press-Bureau” was able to feed a whole army of them, and yet have abundant means to devote to other methods for influencing public opinion. Its machinations are, of course, conducted with the greatest secrecy. All manner of blinds are used. Its agents assume in their articles a style of great independence, deal largely in loud and captious epithets, occasionally even criticise this or that measure of the government, and ape the ways of honest and patriotic men. The “Central Press-Bureau” itself is pushed as far out of sight as possible; stalking horses and scarecrows are put forward; and the institution is made to appear as only a myth. But the Cave of Æolus is in Berlin, and the winds which are let loose there blow to and fro, hither and yon, through all Germany, starting currents in other parts of the world. In this cave the old snake-worship of so many ages and peoples still exists, and the god is the “Reptile-fund.” Out of this cavern are blown the double-leaded leaders which fall thick all over the land, and always, as if by magic, just in the right place. False reports eddy through the air; stubborn facts are pulled and bent and beaten until they get into the proper shape. The light which is permitted to fall upon them is managed as skilfully as in an art-gallery or a lady’s drawing-room. With the aid of the “Reptile-fund” the “Press-Bureau” found little difficulty in extending its business of buying up journals, paying sometimes as high as a hundred thousand thalers for a single newspaper; and where this could not be done money was freely

spent to start an opposition sheet. Whenever a journal was found to be growing weak, aid was proffered on condition that it should open its columns to the “Press-Bureau”; sometimes with the understanding that one of its agents should be placed in the editorial chair. So thoroughly has this system of bribery taken possession of Prussian journalism that the court decided (October, 1873), in a suit against the Germania newspaper, that to accuse an editor of being in the pay of the “Press-Bureau” is not a criminal offence, since it does not in the public estimation tend to lower his character.

Occasionally, in spite of the greatest care, the secrets of the Bureau are betrayed. Thus in February, 1874, a circular was sent to various journals, and amongst others to the Neue Wormser-Zeitung, with the offer to furnish from the capital, first, a tri-weekly original article on the political situation; second, original political and diplomatic advice from all the departments of the government, also three times a week; third, a short but exhaustive parliamentary report; fourth, special correspondence from other capitals (written in Berlin); fifth, original accounts of foreign affairs, drawn from the special sources of the Bureau; and, sixth, a short daily, as well as a more lengthy weekly, exhibit of the Berlin Bourse. For these services nothing was demanded; but, that the thing might not appear too bald, it was stated that the editor should fix his own price. Now, it so happened that when this circular was received by the Neue Wormser-Zeitung that paper was in the hands of Herr Westerburg, a Social Democrat, who straightway took the public into his confidence.

The newly-acquired provinces of Prussia were a favorite field for the operations of the Berlin Bureau. General Manteuffel, in 1866, suppressed the Schleswig-Holsteinische Zeitung, and handed the country over to the reptile-press. In Alsace and Lorraine also journals were suppressed, and others established, by the government. In these provinces the independent press has wholly disappeared, with the exception of two tame and unimportant sheets. In fact, if we except the Catholic and a few Social Democratic newspapers, there is hardly a journal of any weight in the German Empire in which the press-reptile is not found. “I know,” wrote to Professor Wuttke an author well acquainted with the circumstances—“I know few German newspapers in which there is not a mud-bather.” For even passing services the Bureau is ready to pay cash. Chaplain Miarka, the editor of the Katholik, has declared publicly that he was offered 7,500 thalers on condition of consenting to write in a milder manner during the elections.

The working up of public opinion through the press extends far beyond the boundaries of the German Empire. The proceedings of the court in the trial of Von Arnim in 1874 developed the fact that he, whilst representing Prussia at the Tuileries, had entered into relations with various journals of Paris, Vienna, and Brussels; and it is generally understood that 50,000 thalers were placed at the disposition of Herr Rudolf Lindau for the purpose of manipulating the Parisian press. Through these and similar means an opening for the articles of the “Press-Bureau” was made in English, French, and Belgian newspapers; and these articles, which

had been first written in German, were translated back into German and published by the reptile-press as the expression of public opinion in foreign countries on Prussian affairs. “I could give the names,” says Professor Wuttke, “of the press-reptiles who write for the Indépendance Belge, of those who take care of the Hour, and of others whose duty it is to furnish articles to the Italian and Scandinavian newspapers.”[98] To hold the English in leading strings, Berlin had, in 1869, a North Germany Correspondence, and then, under the supervision of Aegidi, the director of the “Press-Bureau,” a Norddeutsche Correspondenz, which is still the chief source from which both English and American journals draw their information on German affairs. The attempt made from Berlin to buy Katkoff’s Journal of Moscow was defeated by the incorruptibility of the proprietor.

The reptile-press, of course, ignores and strives to hush whatever may throw light upon the dark workings and intrigues of the “Press Bureau”; and no better instance of its power in this respect can be given than the history of Professor Wuttke’s book on German journalism. Its existence was not recognized by the press-reptiles; its startling revelations were ignored or received in profound silence; and so successful was this policy that a year after the publication of the work only three hundred copies had been sold; and it is chiefly through the efforts of a Catholic newspaper—the Germania—and of Windthorst, a leader of the party of the Centrum, that it has finally been brought to public notice and has now reached a third edition. In the German

Parliament, on the 18th of December, 1874, Windthorst took Professor Wuttke’s book with him to the speaker’s stand, and, in a powerful address against any further grant of the “Secret Fund” (Reptilien-fond), made special reference to this work, which he characterized as “conscientious” and full of startling revelations which leave room to suspect even worse things. A year before (December 3, 1873) the same speaker declared in the Prussian Landtag that in Germany the government had nearly succeeded in getting entire control of the press; that the influence of the “Reptile-fund” was already noticeable in foreign countries, particularly in the newspapers of Vienna; and that the attempt had been made to establish a “Reptile-Bureau” in connection with the London embassy; and when this was found not to work well, a “Press-Bureau” for England, France, and Italy was organized in Berlin. These charges, made in public parliamentary debate, were allowed to pass without contradiction, although Aegidi, the director of the Central Bureau, was a member of the Assembly and present during the discussion.

Eugen Richter, the member for Hagen, brought forward other accusations of like import on the 20th of January, 1874. We have already given an example of the uses to which the Prussian government puts the reptile-press, in the instance of the forged army address attributed to Benedek, and published throughout Germany at the outbreak of the war with Austria in 1866.[99] Similar services were rendered by the “mud-bathers” at the time of the crisis with

France in 1870. A false telegram, purporting to come from Ems, dated July 13, 1870, in which the French minister, Count Benedetti, was said to have grossly insulted King William, was eagerly taken up by the venal press and commented upon in a way which excited the greatest indignation in the minds of the Germans against Napoleon, who, they firmly believed, was bent upon humiliating Prussia. In this way public feeling in both countries was fanned into a heat which could be cooled only by blood. The account of the interview at Ems was a fabrication, as Benedetti has since clearly shown; but Bismarck’s “swineherds” had faithfully done their unholy work.[100]

When, just at the beginning of the war, the French army made an attack on Saarbrücken, the reptile-press spread the report that they had reduced the city to ashes; and this infamous falsehood made a deep impression throughout Germany. A similar lie had been propagated at the commencement of the Austrian war. On the 27th of June, 1866, the Prussians were driven from Trautenau by General Gablenz, and forthwith the reptile-press raised the cry that the citizens of Trautenau had poured from their houses hot water and boiling oil on the retreating soldiers; and the government lent itself to the spreading of this detestable calumny by dragging off the mayor of Trautenau, Dr. Roth, to prison, where he was detained in close confinement nearly three months.[101]

There is no subject on which the organs of the “Press-Bureau” are more united or more eloquent than the necessity of keeping up the full

strength of the standing army; nay, they have gone so far as to demand that the Reichstag shall consent to take from the representatives of the people the right to legislate on military affairs during the next seven years. But before taking this step, hitherto unheard of in the history of constitutional government, it was necessary to manipulate public opinion, so that the members of parliament might seem to be compelled to this decision by the will of the people themselves. With this view packed meetings were gotten up in various parts of the empire which the telegraph lyingly announced to the world as very numerously attended and unanimous in demanding the seven-year enactment; but the popular gatherings which were held to protest against this violation of constitutional rights were passed over in dead silence, and their action, consequently, did not become known outside of their own immediate neighborhood. The reptile-press acted in full harmony with the “Telegraph-Bureau.” The Spener’sche Zeitung, in Berlin, went so far as to declare that no protests had been heard, whereupon the Provinzial-korrespondenz exclaimed that the movement, which had proceeded from the depths of the nation’s heart with unexpected power, should force the Reichstag to yield to the demand of the government.

As a part of the same programme, the “Press-Bureau” just a year ago raised the cry that France was buying horses, and that in less than three months she would declare war on Germany. On the same day and at the same hour this startling announcement was made in Frankfort, in Leipzig, in Stuttgart, and other cities. The following day hundreds of newspapers

throughout the fatherland took up the chorus and began to shout that the empire was threatened. Now, all the world knows that France at that time was as little thinking of making war on Germany as of tunnelling the Atlantic Ocean; but this piece of journalistic legerdemain roused the Teutonic mind to the necessity of strengthening the army and increasing the military resources of a country which was already a camp of soldiers.

No figure of rhetoric is more forcible than repetition, and we may calculate with mathematical precision just how many leading articles, all saying the same thing in fifty different localities, are required in order to fabricate a public opinion on a given subject.

Another trick of the reptile-press is employed to prevent the people from getting a knowledge of the speeches of the opposition in parliament. The arguments of these orators are either excluded from its columns or caricatured so as to appear childish or ridiculous. When, for instance, Sonnemann, the member for Frankfort, made an appeal in behalf of the Alsacians, who had themselves been reduced to dead silence, and showed from authentic documents the pitiable condition to which that province had been brought, the organs of the “Press-Bureau” declared that “to answer such utterances would be beneath the dignity of a chancellor of the empire; such want of political honor had no claim to pass as the honest views of an individual”; and when Mallinckrodt placed his hand on Lamarmora’s book to prove his charges against Bismarck, the Spener’sche Zeitung announced that “the national parties were filled with deepest disgust at the conduct of the Centrum’s faction,

and were not able to conceal their regret that Prince Bismarck should deign to answer these Ultramontane brawlers, since, by consenting to notice the tricks of Windthorst, Mallinckrodt, and Schorlemer, he was giving prominence to what ought to be completely ignored”; and then closed with the phrase of Frederick the Great, “Shall we play at fisticuffs with the rabble?” The Norddeutsche Allgemeine and National Zeitung indulged in similar strains, and these articles were then republished by nearly the entire German press. When an opponent is especially troublesome the press-reptiles raise the cry that he has been bought up by foreign gold; and in this they are probably sincere, since it must be difficult for them to understand how any man could refuse to sell himself for a proper consideration.

For five years now Bismarck’s venal press has poured the full tide of its wrath upon the bishops and priests of Germany. Here was a subject upon which the reptiles could distil their venom to their hearts’ content. What magnificent opportunities were here offered to the “mud-bathers” to hunt through the sewers of the centuries and to wallow in the mire of the ages; to revive Luther’s vocabulary and refurbish the rusty weapons that for hundreds of years had lain idle and hurtless! What an open field was here in which to ventilate historical calumnies, to produce startling effects by the dramatic grouping of striking figures; to bring out the light of the golden present by causing it to fall upon the dark and bloody background of the past! And what divine occasions for indignation, wrath, horror, word-painting to cause the hair to stand on end and the eyes to start! Here

was place for withering scorn, patriotic thunder, lurid lightning to sear the Jesuitic head bent upon the ruin of the new empire. And with what demoniac delight the hired crew ring the changes on each popular catch-word—progress, liberty, culture, free thought; and how they foam and rage when a bishop or a priest has the “boundless impudence” to speak in defence of the church! “It has come to this,” says the Dresdener Volksbote (April 17, 1873): “Minorities must keep silence.”

“Gone,” exclaims a former German Minister of State,—“gone is the reign of noble ideas; the power of the love of country and of freedom; the worth and honor of the national character! Money alone is loved, and all means by which it is acquired seem natural and praiseworthy.” The very foundations of the moral order are attacked by this vile press. The events of 1866 and 1870 are now spoken of as “an historical phenomenon, which cannot be judged by the current notions of morality, but in accordance with which these moral principles themselves must be widened and corrected.” This is the low and degrading philosophy to which the idolatry of success fatally leads.

But, for the honor of journalism, a portion of the German press has remained closed against the insidious power of the “Reptile-fund.” No Catholic newspaper has lent itself even covertly to this conspiracy against truth and liberty; and it must be admitted, too, that the socialistic journals have refused the government bribes; their circulation, however, which is not large, is confined almost exclusively to the laboring classes, and their influence is but little felt. The

power of the Catholic press in Germany is of recent growth. In the early part of the present century the only periodical of any weight devoted to the defence of the interests of the church in Germany was the Theologische Quartalschrift, founded in 1819 as the organ of the Tübingen professors. Twenty years later Joseph Görres established in Munich the Historisch-politischen Blätter, which soon caused the influence of his powerful mind to be felt throughout the fatherland, and which, under the editorial management of the historian Jörg, is still to-day one of the ablest reviews in Germany. The censorship of the press which, prior to the revolution of 1848, was maintained in all the German governments, was exercised in a way that rendered Catholic journalism impossible. No sooner, however, had the Parliament of Frankfort proclaimed the liberty of the press than the Catholics hastened to take advantage of it by creating newspapers to advocate their religious interests. The bishops and priests, in obedience to the earnest exhortations of Pius IX., threw themselves into the work with a will; the people followed their example; press-unions were formed and a large number of Catholic newspapers sprang into life. Bismarck’s persecution of the church gave yet greater force to this movement and increased both the number and the circulation of Catholic journals. In the new German Empire there are to-day two hundred and thirty newspapers devoted to the interests of the church. The Augsburger Wochenblatt has a subscription list of thirty-two thousand; the Mainzer Volksblatt, one of thirty thousand. Twelve thousand copies of the Germania (in Berlin) are

sold daily, and many other Catholic journals have a circulation of from five to ten thousand copies. As this powerful Catholic press could not be bought, nothing remained to be done but to silence it.

At the close of the year 1872 all Prussian journals were warned, under pain of confiscation, not to publish the Christmas Allocution of Pope Pius IX. Mallinckrodt, the vigilant Catholic leader, raised his voice in protest against this attempt upon the liberty of the press; but the Reichstag was silent, and the newspapers which had not heeded the warning were seized. The Mainzer Journal was brought into court for having presumed to print an open letter to the emperor, in which was found the following sentence: “The emperor is bound by the laws of the moral order just like the least of his subjects.” The government procurator (Schön, in Mainz, on the 19th of December, 1873) declared that the emperor is a “sanctified” person, whose majesty is “above the laws of the state,” and the bare address “to the emperor” is a punishable offence. For republishing this open letter the editors of the Kölner Volkszeitung and the Mühlheimer Anzeiger were condemned to prison for two months. Siegbert, the managing editor of the Deutscher Reichszeitung (Catholic), was called upon to give the name of the writer of a certain article which he had published; and upon his declaration that this would be a breach of honor he was thrown into prison.

On the 1st of July, 1874, a new law came into force, by which still further restrictions were placed upon the liberty of the press; and on the 15th of the same month the Minister of Justice enjoined upon the government officials to keep sharp

watch upon the newspapers. Within six months from this date the Germania newspaper in Berlin had been condemned thirty-nine times; and there were besides twenty-four untried charges against it in court. In January, February, March, and April, 1875—four months—one hundred and thirty-six editors were condemned either to prison or to pay a fine. The most of these were Catholics, though some of them belonged to the democratic and socialistic press. It is not necessary to say that the “press-reptiles” were not represented among them. These editors were thrust into the cells of common criminals, were refused books and writing material, and were forced to live upon “prison fare,” which many found so unpalatable that they could eat nothing but rye-bread.

The reptile-press alone is tolerated. If a man wishes to be honest, and has, notwithstanding, no desire to go to jail, the most unwise thing which he could do would be to become a journalist in the new German Empire. To refuse to eat of the “Reptile-fund” is to condemn one’s self to Bismarck’s “prison fare” of beans and cold water.

To poison the wells is not held to be lawful, even in war; but to taint the fountain-sources of knowledge, and to corrupt the channels through which alone the public receives its general information, is not thought to be unworthy of a great hero, if we may judge from the Prussian chancellor’s popularity with Englishmen and Americans, which is not diminished even by his determined efforts to crush all who refuse to sell their souls or renounce their manhood.

“The only man,” said Carlyle of Bismarck—“the only man appointed by God to be his vicegerent here

on earth in these days, and knowing he was so appointed, and bent with his whole soul on doing and able to do God’s work.” And our great centennial celebration of the reign of popular government is to be desecrated by a colossal statue of the man who is its deadliest enemy.

We have not, in this country, wholly escaped the evil effects of the vast European conspiracy against truth and honor which is carried on through the agency of “Press-Bureaus,” “Telegram-Bureaus,” “Correspondence-Bureaus,” and “Reptile-funds.” One may, for instance, readily detect the “trail of the serpent” in many of the cable despatches to the Associated Press, and not less evidently in the European correspondence of some of our leading journals. Is it not worthy of remark that so few of our great newspapers should have taken up the defence of the persecuted and imprisoned German editors? The American press, which can, upon such slight compulsion, be blatant and loud-mouthed, has been most reserved in its treatment of Bismarck; has, indeed, hardly attempted to veil its sympathy with his despotic and arbitrary measures. If this approval of tyranny went merely the length of applauding his persecution of the Catholic Church, it might be explained by the desire to pander to popular Protestant prejudice. But how shall we account for it when there is question of the degradation and enslavement of the press itself; of the violation of every principle of liberty; and of the systematic consolidation of the most complete military despotism which the world has ever seen? Might it not be possible, even, to trace to the Reptilien-fond the recent attempts to

rekindle in the United States the flame of religious hate and fanaticism? However this may be, it is unfortunately true that money is the controlling power in American as in German journalism. Its influence is as discernible in the columns of our own “independent” press as in a genuine Berlin “mud-bather’s” double-leaded leader.

“How can we help it?” said a well-known editor of Vienna. “A newspaper office is a shop where publicity is bought and sold.” “I will be frank,” said another journalist. “I am like a woman of the town (Ich bin die Hure von Berlin): if you wish to have this and that written, pay your money.” Praise and blame, approval and condemnation, are the articles of merchandise of the press, and they are offered to the highest bidder.

“When the proprietor of a journal,” says Sacher-Mosach, a widely-known and conscientious writer, who was for some time connected with the Vienna newspaper, the Presse, and afterwards with the Neue Freie Presse—“when the proprietor of a journal has entered into lucrative relations with a bank, he is not content with placing his sheet at its disposition in whatever relates to financial matters; but if the director of the bank, as sometimes happens, is a man of fancy who patronizes an actress who has beauty but not talent, he will order his theatrical critic to praise this lady without stint; and the critic will reserve all his squibs for some

old comédienne who is not protected by a bank director or by any one else. If a great publisher has all the works which appear in his house advertised in the journal, the proprietor will direct his book critic to find them all admirably written, profound, and full of the freshest and most delightful thoughts; and the author is just as certain to be praised in this sheet as he is to be torn to pieces by the newspapers in which his book has not been advertised. The first principle of journalistic industry and of the criticism at its command is to recognize merit only when and so far as it is financially profitable to do so.”[102]

It is far from our thought to wish to deny the vast power for good exercised by the press; but this is its own constant theme, and we have deemed it a more worthy, even though a less pleasant, task to point out at least some of the ways in which its power may be turned against the highest interests of truth and the dearest liberties of the people. A thoughtful and fearless work on the influence of journalism on our American civilization would be a fitting contribution to the centennial literature, and at the same time a most instructive chapter in the history of the country. The only attempt of this kind which so far has been made does not rise above the dignity of a compilation, and is without value as a philosophical discussion of the subject.

[97] Die deutsche Zeitschriften und die Entstehung der öffentlichen Meinung. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Zeitungswesens. Von Heinrich Wuttke.—The German newspapers and the origin of public opinion: a contribution to the history of journalism. Leipzig: 1875.

[98] Die deutsche Zeitschriften, p. 309.

[99] This spurious document has got into many books; e.g., into Hahn’s Geschichte des preussischen Vaterlandes.

[100] See Ma Mission en Prusse, by Benedetti, Paris, 1871, p. 372 et seq.

[101] Roth, Achtzig Tage in preussischen Gefangenschaft, p. 13.

[102] Sacher-Mosach, Ueber den Werth der Kritik, Leipzig, 1873, p. 55.