The weekly Columbian., 1857-02-14
Plain Facts for Plain People.

The Marysville Inquirer of the 18th,
says the Sierra Citizen, has most excel
lent article on the business of newspapers
in San Francisco, all of which we transfer
below, and heartily endorse the whole.
Friend Mantz is good practical printer,
and one of the best editors in the State.
His sheet is always spicy and original,
and If there is news to be had, he is bound
to have it. But to the article:
Those unacquainted with the news
paper business, and who happen OCCASION
ally to gel hold of certain San Francisco
sheets, would be led to suppose that print
ing material cost nothing, that office rent
was "thrown in,' that journeyman print
ers lived on air, and that editors, report !
ers, clerks, and other delicate assistants,
merely labored for glory. This is a very
great mistake, and one which, even at so
late day, it might be we'll to correct.
The publishing of daily newspapers is
most expensive business while the labor,
as a whole, performed on them, is hard,
incessant and perplexing. The weekly
erpenses of some daily papers in Califor-
MIA, if presented in this connection, would
astonish our readers, and when arrayed
side by side with the amount and kind of
labor performed each day, would appear
incredible. 1t is owing to the great ex-
pense attending the daily newspaper b,l.
siness that we find SO many proprietors
struggling along year after year, running
in debtor all the while losing money
in the vain attempt to establish the news
papers on a paying basis. 1t is owing to
the numerous avenues of expense neces-
sarily opened by daily newspaper, that
we find SO few Of them making money,
and so many barely living.
Yet in the face of such facts, and with
an experience which should have taught
them better, we find certain San Fran
cisco Journals filling their columns day
af;er day, with city and county advertise
ments free Of charge! More than this
| We perceive that while one paper exults
over the fact of its being selected to do
the printing for nothing, another growls
because at did not have an equal chance
for the job at the same price! 1t was
never asked, nor expected that such work
would be performed for nothing, and
though such offers, on the part of news
paper proprietors, may to some ears sound
like liberality, it is in reality species of
competition most ruinous TO the establish
ment that enters into it, disgraceful to the
printing business, and stab at working
classes generally. For we have already
seen-and it is the natural result of all
such movements-that one Of the proprie-
tors who, in his frantic grasp for gs0ry
entered into heavy bonds to fulfil his con-
tract to several thousand dollars worth of
printing for less than that many grains of
sand, has called for a reduction of the
printers wages, even though he knew
that at the present prices the workman
barely lived Thus it will be seen, that
if the paper thrives, the journeyman prin-
ter must also work for comparatively
nothing.
AS we proceed, this subject grows, and
we only wish that we had the time to
dwell on it. Striking as it does at the
very link which connect the mechanical
department-and indeed the entire work
ing classes-to the rest of society,-it is
to us deeply interesting, and worthy of
all attention. If newspaper proprietors
agree to work for almost nothing and sue
ceed in lessening the result of their folly
by grinding their journeymen to the
ground, we see no reason why the car
penter, builder, shipwright, blacksmith,
halter, shoemaker, as well as every other
branch of business, might not do the same
thing. If contractor, in order to get
big job. builds house for two thousand
dollars less than cost, must he take the
| loaf of bread from his workman's table
to save himself! If the halter feels dis
posed to cover some official head with
twenty dollar hat for nothing, is it right
that he should draw his pay from the wa
ges of his workmen? This is the case
fairly presented. There is no necessity
of printing for cities and counties free of
charge, and the newspaper proprietors
who do SO should expect to open their
own private purses,-not to make up or
lessen their loss by fleeing their work
men.
EMIGRATION TO GADsDEN PURCHASE.
The San Diego Herald says that We
ry large emigration has crossed the Colo
RADIO, at Fort Yuma, for the Gadsden
| Purchase.
The discoverers of the new copper
mine, twenty miles above Fort Yuma, on
the Gila, are very sanguine Of success
late researches having resulted in the dis
covery of a vein of great extent and ex-
ceeding richness.
Reports from the Arizona Mining Com
pany are of the most hattering kind.
| Their vein of ore increases in extent and