Bellows Falls times. [volume] (Bellows Falls, Vt.) 1856-1965, 1868-07-03
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BELLOWS FALLS, JULY 3, 1868.
Editors Convention.

of Hon. G. w. WILLARD of the Montpe-
lier Freeman, and Poem of Mr.. CAIN of
the Rutland Courier omitted last week:
HON. CHARLES W. wILLARD's REMARKS.
MIR. Willard expressed his regret that
he had neglected to prepare an essay to
be read at this time before the associa-
tion, but if the chairman and gentlemen
would indulge him he would, in desul-
tory way, submit few observations upon
the duty of the press to the public.
Any person, he said, can establish a
newspaper. No preparation is deemed
necessary as a preliminary to entering
the editorial professional least none is
required by the craft or demanded by the
public in Vermont. In other professions,
those who already hold credentials de-
mand of all new comers preliminary
course of study, to be evidenced by a
careful and thorough examination. The
physician, the lawyer, the teacher, the
clergyman, must submit their qualifca-
tions to appointed examiners; before
they are recognized as regularly author
lied to engage in their work. Yet, i'm
portant as may be the office of teacher
or clergyman, the influence of a newspa-
per is far greater. The clergyman ad-
dresses his audience of few hundred
once a week, the editor addresses his
thousands every week. Mr.. Beecher's
sermons, borne on the wings of the press,
are brought home to millions who never
heard and never will hear his voice. Yet
how many persons without experience,
and with little thought respecting the
mighty engine which they are setting in
motion, assume the responsibilities of
publishing newspaper.
The result might have been foreseen.
The press is upon too low level. We
all consider how we can make a paying
newspaper, rather than how we can make
the best newspaper. We do not so much
try to instruct our readers, and make the
world better, as we do to fill our own
pockets. We pander too much to viii
ated and depraved tastes, if our papers
will thereby sell. We keep back the
truth, or turn it into lie, through fear
of disafecting some of our subscribers.
None of us are SO perfect that there is
no room for improvement in these re-
spects.
Mr.. Willard said that an editor and
publisher should make ne1rs-paper.
This should be the first and highest con-
sideration. Our State papers would find
it profitable and would improve their pa
pers, by giving full State and local news
They cannot compete with city papers in
general news, or editorial discr ssions, and
must soon be crowded from the field, un-
less they give the news which can be got
nowhere else but in their columns. There
should be editorial ability, and well Sc
lected or original discussions in all de-
partments of knowledge; and politics
should be fearlessly and independently
dealt with. The editors object should
be to instruct, lead, guide, direct and
control the minds of his readers, and not
merely cater to tastes, good or bad, as
the case may be; not merely reflect pub
lie opinion, nor go with the popular cur
rent.
Mr.. Willard spoke, in this connection,
of the great good which might be accom-
plished by editors so far bursting party
trammels to declare the honest convic-
ton of their own judgments in respect
to the platform and candidates of their
parties, and not praise their party friends
and party acts with partisan partiality,
nor condemn their political adversaries
with partisan unfairness. He believed
politics would be purified of its most cor
rupt elements, and the country be put in
the hands of wiser and more honest leg
islatures and executives, if party and its
success were reckoned of less account,
and truth and righteousness, and justice,
and honesty in party friends as we'll as
party foes, were demanded with the SOL
emn emphasis Of an outspoken, unselfish,
untrammeled, home press.
Mr.. Willard also touched, briefly, up
on what he characterized as the eulogis-
tic, and often overdone, praise of officials,
and of almost everybody of whom our
newspapers have any occasion to make
pleasant mention and he hoped to seen
diminution, both in degree and quantity,
of the complimentary adjectives in per-
sonal paragraphs, lest by their frequent
use, applied to all sorts of persons, they
should lose their power in places where
really deserved.
He also condemned the too common
habit of putting everybody who adver-
tises, or gets job of work done, or dis