Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1880-11-06
From the New York Tribune.
What the Press has Done.

In giving honor to whom honor is due for
the magnificent victory of Tuesday, no CRATE
full republican-and the whole land is filed
with grateful republicans to- day-will forget
the noble work Of the republican newspapers.
There has never been a campaign in which
the power of an intelligent and conscientious
press showed itself so great as in this. There
has never been campaign in which the re-
publican newspapers, and particularly those
of the interior, were so far in advance of
public opinion, and none in which they have
! had a more electric success in arousing the
gers of democratic Administration. When
General Hancock was nominated hardly a
democrat could be found who did not sincere
" believe that his candidate was foreordained
to be President, and many republicans feared
it. His nomination made temporary truce
| in this State. His personal character was
above reproach. His military record was
brilliant, and it had not been proved that in
civil affairs he would be incompetent There
was a time when General Hancock's election
seemed not Impossible.
But the republican press. knowing the dan
ger that lay in the path, went to work with a
grand energy. undismayed by the 13s electo-
raj votes which the South had massed togeth-
er to be voted in a lump. We venture to
say that there has never been a campaign in
which the republican newspapers, from
Maine to California showed such fighting
ability and such fighting spirit as this. From
the day the canvass opened they put the dem
ocratic party where it belonged-on the de-
fensive.
They forced the democratic record, in all
its hundred phases, on the attention of the
country. and kept the democratic orators and
organs busy protesting that the party would
not do in the future what it had never failed
to do in the past. The candor of the
republican papers was as great as their cour
age. Every issue that has arisen has been
discussed fearlesslv and skillfully. The abil-
| ity and the zeal with which the business
mems issue and the tariff question were
urged upon the country, are cases in point
They made a clean campaign also. General
Hancock was treated with the respect which
his private character and public services
demanded. At the same time. there has not
been Islander upon Gen. Garfield put for
ward by the democratic press, which the re-
publican papers, by reason of having much
the greater supply of brains, as well as the
truth. on their side, have not made to recoil
upon the head of its inventors. The demo-
cratic gem of vituperatiOn, 329, and the
democratic masterpiece in campaign fiction,
the forged letter. were made good for thous-
ands and thousands of republican votes by
the traukness with which the republican
papers took them up, and the wit and skill
with which they turned them back upon their
authors. The democratic cry of ga change"
was caught up in the same way. and used
with telling effect But it would take = good
part of President Garfeld's term to enumer-
ate the achievements of the republican press
of the interior in this campaign. This splen-
did engine of enlightenment and progress
| has battered the walls of the democracy-
blow upon blow. week after week. month
after month-until they fell, and great was
the fall thereof.
| 1t would not be Just to omit tribute to the
most efficient ally the republican press has
had-viz: the democratic press. Has there
ever been time when the low tone and in
fcrior ability of the average democratic news
paper were so conspicuous? 1t has not had
the decency to tell the truth when it helped
the other side, nor the skill to tell it when it
might help its own side. democratic
statesmen said dolefully not long ago ''If
sever do make a point for my party. there
''isn't democratic paper in the country that
has the brains to see it.