, 1864-05-06
THE WASHINGTON STATESMAN
FRIDAY EVENING. MAY 9th, 1864.


INDEPENDENT" AND NEUTRAL
To the minds ola great many persons these
terms, when applied to newspapers, are sy-
nonymous. A reference to any dictionary
will show such persons their error. An in
dependent newspaper is by no means a neu-
trail one, and neutral one is far from being
independent. To be neutral, an an editor
is supposed to favor neither side of politics
in fact, to have no opinions, or at least to be
in a position where the right to express an
opinion upon questions dividing parties is
denied him. An Independent journalist,
as Artemus Ward would say, may take the
liberty of Cutting and slashing" where he
pleases in politics; being in no manner sub
ject to the control of others, nor to the re-
straints Of The position in which an avowed
neutral is placed. There is another class of
persons who seem to think that because an
independent journalists expressed opinions
pTeponderate to the side Of particular par
ty he must, to be consistent with himself,
support all nominations of such party, and
if he has once done this he has lost his in
dependence and must forever after surround
himself with the entangling alliances of par
ty, no matter how times may change, or
whether new party leaders may advocate
the doctrines for which he contended or not
A truce for all such reasoning These per-
sons are as much in error as the neutral
independents This much by way of pre-
lude to answering question that has too
frequently been put to us lately as to what
our course would be in the event that party
nominations were made in the county We
are just vain enough, however, to regard it
as matter of little consequence, and inde-
pendent enough to answer the question as
much for own qualification as for that of
those who might have saved themselves the
trouble of asking had they availed them
selves of the opportunities they have had of
reading the paper. In our salutatory in the
first number we issued we stated that the
paper would be Independent upon all sub
jects and neutral upon none, and in the be-
ginning of each volume since that time the
same statement has been made. Claiming
to be "men of our word' and arrogating to
ourselves the credit of never speaking un-
less we know what We are going to say, and,
that having said we act accordingly, further
explanation upon this point might be deemed
superfuous; but to prevent misconstruction
we will be more explicit At times we have
seen fit to discuss questions of public policy,
aud have endeavored to take such decided
grounds that there could be no mistaking
our positions but some have misunderstood
us, and construed our position into a parti-
zan one. Such is not the case. We have
never intended that the STATESMAN should
be regarded as partizan' paper, and it is
not now our intention to make itsuch. But
we claim that it is not inconsistent with the
duties of Independent journalists to advo-
cate the claims of honest and competent
men for position in preference to dishonest
and incompetent ones; but to favor the pre-
tensions of individuals, or to advocate their
claims for position, simply because they be-
long to a particular party or have been NOM
mated by party caucus is only within the
province of of a partizan Journalists
task we do not crave, and one that we shall
not impose upon ourselves.
Ifpoliticians ofany party-impressed with
their growing importance, on account of
their desire to obtain office or the fact that
they have been nominated for one,-want to
see their names in conspicuous places, we
will give them place, if they will pay us
for it, in our advertising columns; or, it be-
ing in our legitimate line of business, we
will print them campaign paper, upon the
same terms