North Carolina standard. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1850-1852, 1851-12-31
THE KossuTH BANQUET.

York Editors.
az address you, gentlemen, the more with Joy,
ao,n,,oo tbrouIh YOU have the invaluable benefit
70 address the whole university of the great, gio-
ions and free people of the United States. Tins
is a great word, gentlemen, and yet 1t IS heefaty
true While, eighty years ago Immortal ffanki!n
own press was almost the only one in the colonies
now there are over three Thousand newspapers in
the United States having circulation OF hve mil
lions of copies, and amounting in their yearly CIR
culation to the prodiSious number OF nearly 1ouf
and a half hundred millions every grown man IN
the Union reads, on the average, two newspapers a
week and one hundred and five copies year near
ly eighteen copies fall in the proportion 10 every
human being in the Union-man, woman and
child.
am told that the journals of New York State
alone exceed in number those of all the rest OF the
world beyond your great Union, ana the clrcuis
ton of the newspapers OF this city aone neaY
exceeds those of the whole empire OF Great britain
But there is yet one particularly remarkable 1acE
which cannot forbear to mention, gentlemen;
boldly declare that beyond the United States, there
exists scarcely practical freedom of the press
at least in Europe-not except, perhaps, Norway
of whose condition. in that respect, am not quite
aware. You know, gentlemen, how the press is
fettered throughout the European continent, even
for the present in France ITSELF whose great nation
by a strange fate, sees, under nomnaily repuoiI-
fruts of their great and victorious revolution vast
inc between the blasting fingers of centralized, adj
ministrative and legislative competence
You know how the independent press of France
is murdered by imprisonment OF their editors, and
bv fees you know how the present government OF
France feels unable to bear the force OF public oPn-
ion-so much that in the French republic the very
legitimate shout of " ViUe la Repu6lique :" has
almost become crime. This very circumstance IS
sufficient to prove that in that glorious land where
the warm and noble heart of the French nation
tbrobs with selfconfdence and noble pride, new
revolution is an unavoidable necessity. Iii mourn
full view which the great French nation now pres
ents but it is also an efficient warning against the
propensities of contradiction inconsistent with free
dom, because inconsistent with selfgovernment !;
and it is also source of hope for the European
continent because we know that things in France
cannot endure thus as they are we know that to
become a true republic is necessity for France,
and thus we know also that whoever be the man,
who, in the approaching crisis, will be honored by
the confidence of the French nation, he will, he
must be faithful to that grand principle of frater-
nity towards the other nations, which, being an
nounced by the French constitution to the world,
raised such encouraging, but bitterly disappointed
expectations through EuroPes oppressed continent.
But it is chiefly, almost only; Great Britain in
Europe which boasts to have free press, and to be
sure, during my brief stay in England Joyfully
an unlimited one, so far that l saw printed adver-
tisements spread at every corner, and signed by
the publishers, stating that Queen Victoria Is no
lawful Queen-that she ought to be sent to the
Tower, and all those who rule ought to be hanged.
Men laughed and nobody cared about their foolish
extravagancy. And yet dare say, and hope the
generous people of Great Britain will not feel of
Tended at my stating the fact that there no prac-
teal freedom of the press. The freedom of the
press, to be practical one, must be common ben
eft to a-else it is no freedom, but privilege. 1t
is wanting two ngredients-freedom of printing
and freedom of reading Now, there is no freedom
of reading there because there is possibility for
the people at large to do So Because the circula-
ton of newspapers the indispensable moral food of
human intellect, is, by heavy taxation, checked.
The press is source of public revenue, and by
the incumbrance of stamp and paper Duties made
almost inaccessible to the poor. Hence it is that
the newspapers in the United States are only one
TENTH and in some one-twentieth the price of
English or French papers; and hence, again, is the
immense difference in their circulaton-in the U nj
ted States several of the daily papers every morn
inc reaching from thirty to forty thousand readers
whereas the London Times is considered to be a
monster power because it has circulation of TWEEN
ty-ive or thirty thousand copies, of which l WAS
told, during my stay in England, that the good,
generous sense of the people has abated some six
thousand copies in consequenceof its foul hostility
to the just and sacred cause of Hungary. Such
being the condition of your press, gentlemen, it
must of course be high source of joyful gratifca-
ton to me, to have the honor to address you gen.
tlemen because in addressing you really address
the whole people of the United States-not only
whole people, but whole intelligent people, gen
tlemen. That is the highest praise that can upon
people be bestowed; and yet is no praise-it is
the acknowledgment of real fact.
The very immensely of the circulation of your
Journals proves it to be so-because this immense
circulation is not only due to that constitutions
right of yours to speak and print freely your opn
ions !; it is not only due to the cheap price which
makes your press a common benefit to all, and moi
privilege to the rich-but it is chiefly due to the
universally of public instruction which enables ev
cry citizen to read. 1t is glorious thing to know
that in this fourishing young city alone, where
streets of splendid building proudly stand where
few years ago the river spread its waves the
plough titled, nearly one hundred thousand chill
dren receive public education annually. Do yol
know, gentlemen, what I consider the most glo
rious monuments of your country? If it be so, a.
have read it once-it is that act, that when in thu
steps of your wandering squatters, bur engineer
90 on to draw geometrical lines, even in the ter
ritores where the soundof human step never We
has mixed with the murmurs by which virginia. ma
ture is adjoining the land in every place marked
to become a township. on every sixteenth squar
you place modest pole, with the glorious mark
popular Education Stock" This is your proud
est monument.
Gentlemen, it is proud recollection of my life
that commenced my public career in the humble
eapacitV of Journalist. And in that resnect may