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republican paper, by Hopkins & Heron, and the Spirit of Seventy-six and Patriot, by Timothy B. Crowell; at Newburgh, the Political Index, a republican paper, by Ward M. Gaslay; at Kingston, the Ulster Gazette, a federal paper, by Samuel S. Freer, and the Plebeian, a republican journal, by Jesse Buel; at Poughkeepsie, the Political Barometer, republican, by Joseph Nelson, and the Poughkeepsie Journal, federal, by Paraclete Potter; at Hudson, the Northern Whig, federal, by Francis Stebbins, and the Bee, republican, by H. Holland; at Catskill, the American Eagle, federal, by M. Elliot & Co., and the Catskill Recorder, republican, by Macky Croswell; at Lansingburgh, the Lansingburgh Gazette, by Tracy & Bliss; at Troy, the Troy Gazette, a federal paper, by Eldad Lewis, also the Farmers' Register, a republican paper, by Francis Adancourt, and the Northern Budget, neutral, by Oliver Lyon; at Salem, the Northern Post, federal, by Dodd & Rumsey, and the Washington Register, republican, by John P. Reynolds; at Plattsburgh, the American Monitor, republican, by George W. Nichols; at Waterford, the Waterford Gazette, by Horace II. Wadsworth; at Ballston, the Advertiser, republican, by Samuel R. Brown, and the Independent American, federal, by William Childs; at Schenectady, the Mohawk Advertiser, federal, by Ryer Schermerhorn, and the Schenectady Cabinet, republican, by Isaac Riggs; at Johnstown, the Montgomery Republican, federal, by Asahel Child, and the Montgomery Monitor, republican, by Daniel C. Miller; at Herkimer, the Bunkerhill, republican, by George Gordon Phinney, and the American, federal, by J. H. & H. Prentiss ; at Utica, the Utica Patriot, federal, by Ira Merrell, and the Columbia Gazette, republican, by Thomas Walker; at Oxford, the Chenango Patriot; at Cazenovia, the Pilot, republican, by Baker & Newton; at Peterborough, the Freeholder, federal, by Jonathan Bunce & Co.; at Manlius, the Manlius Times, federal, by Leonard Kellogg; at Canandaigua, the Ontario Repository, federal, by James D. Bemis, and the Genesee Messenger, republican, by John A. Stevens; at Batavia, the Cornucopia, republican, by Peck & Blodget; at Geneva, the Geneva Gazette, federal, by James Bogart; at Cooperstown, the Otsego Herald, republican, by Elihu Phinney, and the Cooperstown Federalist, federal, by J. H. & H. Prentiss; at Owego, the American Farmer, neutral, by Stephen Mack; at Schoharie, the True American, federal, by

Thomas M. Tilden, and the American Herald, republican, by Derrick Van Veghten; at Sherburne, the Republican Messenger, republican, by Pettit & Percival.* Papers published at Troy, which is nearly equi-distant from the northern and southern boundaries of the state, were then organs of the north; and there were four newspapers printed in the region west of Onondaga, where now more are published than in 1810 supplied the whole

state.

The number of newspapers now published within this state is upward of three hundred, being a hundred times more than were printed in the state at the close of the Revolution, and eight times the number printed in the United States at that period.† The more important publications are, in the city of New York, the Courier and Enquirer, by James Watson Webb; the Journal of Commerce, by Hale & Hallock; the New York Express, by Brooks and Townsend; the Standard, by John I. Mumford; and the New Era, by Jared W. Bell-morning papers; the Commercial Advertiser, by William L. Stone; the Evening Post, by William C. Bryant; and the American, by Charles King-evening papers, published upon the old system for regular subscribers: the New York Tribune, by Horace Greeley; the Sun, by Moses Y. Beach; and the Plebeian, by Levi D. Slamm, published upon the new plan of selling indiscriminately for cash. In the city of Albany, the Albany Daily Advertiser, formerly the Albany Gazette ; the Albany Argus, by Edwin Croswell; and the Albany Evening Journal, by Thurlow Weed. In the city of Troy, the Troy Daily Whig and Troy Budget. In the city of Utica, the Oneida Observer and the Oneida Whig. In the city of Rochester, the Rochester Democrat and Rochester Daily Advertiser: and in the city of Buffalo, the Buffalo Commercial Advertiser and the Mercantile Courier.

There is scarcely more resemblance between the press as it now exists, and that institution as it was at the close of the Revolution, than between the present aspect of our inland regions and the forest garb they wore while inhabited only by the Iroquois. Then the art, employed chiefly in printing the colonial statutes, almanacs, occasional sermons, and volumes of devotional psalmody, and publishing a semi-weekly record of events, was only auxiliary,

*Thomas' History of Printing.

+ The number of newspapers published in the state in 1850 was 403.— Ed

in the hands of its managers, to the more important objects of selling books, pamphlets, stationery, and sometimes other merchandise. Now, labor-saving machines, with mechanical and brutepower, are substituted for the arm of the pressman, and, with the aid of stereotype-foundries, the press has departments distinctly separated, and as numerous as the divisions and subdivisions, classes, combinations, interests, occupations, studies, and tastes of society. The book-press seizes with avidity all new publications, whether designed to instruct or only to amuse, whether foreign or domestic, and prints and reprints and scatters them over the continent with inconceivable rapidity. Works of fiction most adapted to the popular taste are now printed and sold at prices less than, fifty years ago, were charged to subscribers for the perusal of such volumes by circulating libraries. The commercial press, morning and evening, records with accuracy every occurrence and every indication which affects trade; and the advertising columns are indispensable auxiliaries in every operation of commerce or finance. The political press, divided between contending parties, and again subdivided with nice adaptation to the tempers and the tastes, the passions and the prejudices of the community, conducts party warfare with energy, zeal, and, it must be admitted, with unsparing severity; and the combatants, faithful throughout all changes, abide the trials and share the fortunes of their respective parties. The religious press furnishes to Jew and Christian, Protestant and Catholic, and to each of the sects and denominations of those grand divisions of the church, a devoted organ more effective than an army of missionaries. The moral, the scientific, the literary, the legal, the medical, the agricultural, the military, the abolition, the temperance, the colonization, and the association newspapers, each represent a portion of society desirous to inculcate peculiar views of truth, and promote reforms which it deems essential to the general welfare. The emigrants from every foreign country communicate with each other through organs furnished by the press, and preserve mutual sympathies and endearing recollections of their father-lands. The press was dependent on European facts, sentiments, opinions, tastes, and customs: now, it is in all things. independent, and purely American. It was metropolitan: now, it is universal. The newspaper in each important town conveys intelligence of all interesting incidents which occur within its

vicinity, to the central press, and receives in return and diffuses information gathered from all portions of the world.

The press studies carefully the condition of all classes, and yields its reports with such a nice adaptation of prices as to leave no portion of the community without information concerning all that can engage their curiosity or concern their welfare. It no longer fears the odious information, or the frowns of power; but dictates with boldness to the government, and combines and not unfrequently forms the public opinion which controls everything. Yet the press is not despotic. Its divisions. distract its conduct, and prevent a concentration of its powers upon any one object. That the newspaper press is capricious and often licentious, will scarcely be denied; yet if it assails, it arms the party assaulted with equal weapons of defence, and yields redress for the injuries it inflicts. The ability, learning, and spirit, with which the press is now conducted, strikingly contrast with the dullness and superficial learning of its earlier period. Its editors, no longer regarded as mere chroniclers of events or pains-taking mechanics, hold rank as a liberal profession, and exert a just influence upon the multifarious interests of society. Nor are the sweeping allegations of indecorum, venality, and violence, brought against the press in any sense just. That it sometimes offends propriety, decency, and candor, is unhappily too true, but it reflects in all things the character of the country; and while the ignorant, the prejudiced, the malevolent, and the vulgar, can not be deprived of its weapons, it never generally, nor long, withholds its resistless influence from truth, wisdom, justice, and virtue. Every improvement of the public morals, and every advance of the people in knowledge, is marked by a corresponding elevation of the moral and intellectual standard of the press; and it is at once the chief agent of intellectual improvement and the palladium of civil and religious liberty.*

There were in New York, in 1762, two Dutch Reformed churches, and religious worship was celebrated therein in the language of the Netherlands. These and all other associations of that denomination acknowledged subordination to the classis

*Notes on the History of the Press until the close of the Revolution were received from Edwin Croswell, Esq.

of Amsterdam, which some times permitted, and other times refused powers of ordination. The expenses attending the journeys of candidates for ordination to Holland, and the reference of disputes concerning doctrine and discipline, to foreign judicatories, induced a portion of the clergy, even at that day, to seek a domestic organization. There were also two Protestant Episcopal churches which were more independent; but still the bishop was obliged to go to England for orders, before he could exercise his ecclesiastical functions; and rectors were required to be instituted and inducted, agreeably to the king's instructions to the governor, and the canonical rights of the bishop of London. The presbyterians had one church, and aimed at ecclesiastical independence, but all such efforts were defeated by the opposition of the episcopalians; and to save their little edifice and grounds, the former conveyed the glebe, in 1730, to the moderator of the general assembly of the church of Scotland and others, as a committee of that body, and received from it a declaration that "the property was held on condition that it should be free and lawful for the presbyterians in the city of New York and its vicinity to convene in the edifice for the worship of God in all the parts thereof, and for the dispensation of all the gospel ordinances." Besides these churches, there were a small French church, two German Lutheran societies, a Friends', a Moravian, and Anabaptist meeting-houses, and an obscure synagogue. But the dependence of the church had one advantage. Many of the clergy had received a transatlantic education, while this country was destitute of proper seminaries, and the reproach of ignorance did not attach to the theological profession.*

One of the most serious obstacles in the way of the revolutionary cause, was found in the apprehensions indulged by persons connected with the English established church, that religion, here deprived of the sustaining support of the mother-country, must languish, and infidelity and vice disappoint the hopes of those who had the disseminated principles of civil liberty. Experience has shown that this was a capital error, and that independence has been even more beneficial to the necessary diffusion of religious instruction throughout the continent, than to the political progress of society. We need only refer to the condi

American Gazetteer, 1762.

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