Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1875-06-17
sORpID IOURNALIsM IN GERMANY.


A pappy, indiscreet book Just pub
lished by Professor Heinrich Wdttke,
of the University of Leipzig, makes
some very surprising disclosures IN re-
gard to the machinery by means Of
which public opinion IN Germany is
created, manipulated and propelled, as
well as IN regard to the general eondi-
ton of the public press in that happy
country, where Suabian innocence and
FrancOnian honesty are generally sup
posed to have successfully resisted so
far the corrupt Establishments of
Prussian fnesse. Professor Wuttke
makes it exceedingly plain that there
is another army In Germany besides
that which wars with needle guns and
Krupp's batteries. The general staff
of this army has its headquarters
IN Berlin, and is known as
the Central Bureau of the
press. This was first established when
ManteUffel was Minister, but
its functions have been vastly enlarged
since 1866, and it has now grown to be
a huge workshop for the manufacture
of opinions for use at home and abroad.
1t is an endowed institution, having re-
ceived for its uses the confscated prop
erty Of the King of Hanover and the
ElectOr of Hcsse. This endowment
the witty Berlinese frankly denOmiuate
the RePtilienfoHd, a title given, accord
ing to some, because 1t is used to ex-
terminate the reptiles who conspire
against the safety of the State, but,
according to others, because it is used
for the nOurishment of reptiles, whose
services the state does mot disdain to
hire. In connection with this the Ber-
lnese say Of those journalists who are
IL the habit Of going to he Central
Bureau to be informed what opinions
1t Is proper for them to hold, that they
go to take their SchlGmnsbadeT, liter
ally their slime-baths. Mud baths are
notably good Tor some sorts Of consti-
/ tutlons, and the Berlin establishment
Is said to have performed some wonder
full cures.
"Al that 1 DESIRE" Prince Bis
marck IS reported to have said, is that
political journals viii reserve a certain
space for the communications | send
them from Berlin, they may fill the
rest OF their columns Just as they
please" The extent TO which this Off
cial control and officia. subvention of
the press IS carried in Germany is real
ly startling. The bureau has been
charged in open Parliament with paying
hundred thousand thalers down for the
purchase of one journal; of establish
ing new administration journal out Of
hand In another place, and that place
not even IN Prussia. Herr Windthorst
said IN the German Parliament that
the industry Of the press
had become a Government monOpO-
", and that many papers Published
throughout Germany were actually
edited at the Bureau in Berlin, naming
as among these the augsburg Gazette
and the Cologne Gazette. Wuttke
quotes a "well-informed publicist" as
saying: II do not know any German
paper with the editing of which some
amateur of the Schlammbader is not
connected" They 90 50 far as to say
that they can infallibly recognize the
hand Of these mud-dabblers, not only
by their opinions, their tendencies,
their blind zeal for the holy cause, but
even By their style, which betrays itself
inevitably by the lofty disdain and su-
perb chauvinism with which the Ber-
lneI cOudescends to lay down the law
to the baser multitude.