Bismarck weekly tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1884-1943, 1891-07-24

HE large number of editors compos-
ing the National Editorial association
now convened in st. Paul has moved the
Pioneer Press to say: "The great ma
jority of delegates to the National Edi-
torial association, now assembled at st.
Paul, are the editors of the weekly
papers published, in the smaller cities
and villages of the country, or what for
short, are called country editors. The
various state editorial associations which
are represented in the national body are
largely composed of the editors and pub
fishers of country newspapers. These
rural newspaper Offices are the primary
schools of journalism. It is from the
ranks of the country editors that have
sprung nearly all the great lights of me-
%tropolitan journalism. Many of them
are strong and able men, leaders of
thought and molders of opinion, not only
within the local spheres of their circula-
ton, bnt throughout the states where
they reside. Many of them are active
and influential in county and state poll
tics. 1t must not be supposed that rural
newspapers are mere conduits through
which the news and opinonsjof the met
ropolitan press are distributed in the
rural districts. On the contrary, they
are the critics and censors of the great
city dailies. They have more time to
think than the writer's for the latter,
whose often hasty and superficial edi-
torials are frequently of less real value
than the productions of the man who has
a week in which to mature his reflections
upon the topics of his choice. The
country newspapers are in many cases
the sources of much original thought
which finds its way into the city dailies;
the nurseries of ideas which are trans.
planted and developed in the citH hot
house.
Taken together they represent an az.
gregate of intellectual, political and So
cial power which far outweighs that of
the metropolitan press. Of the 1886
periodical publications in the United
States only 1900 are daily newspapers.
There are nearly 1900 weeklies, consist
ing mainly of country newspapers. They
form an army of missionaries whose
work covers every county and township,
every nook and corner of the United
States; a vast array of influences which
reach through every home, down
through all the social strata of that great
commonalty of American yoemen which
forms the controlling power in American
politics and whose will shapes the desti-
MES of the republic. The reign of the
country newspapers thus stretches over
a vast territory which is inaccessible to
the city dailies, o. wen to the city week.
lies. The city papers shed their far
reaching light upon the hilltops; but it
is the rural press which Eliminates the
valley and the plain. Momentous duties
thus rest upon its representatives. The
course of state and national legislation,
the welfare of state and nption depend
largely upon the in which they
discharge those duties. AS a rule they
have discharged them intelligently, con-
scientiously and periodically. And for
this and many reasons they merit not
only the hospitable attentions they are
receiving at the hands of the people of
this city, but to be honored everywhere
as the representatives of the most USE
full branch of a noble profession"