The Chief Instrument of Freedom

The National Broadcasting Company in conjunction with the Fund for Adult Education presents Democracy in America by Alexis de Torqueville. In America, the press constitutes a singular power, so strangely composed of mingled good and evil that liberty could not live without it, and public order can hardly be maintained against it.

It causes political life to circulate through all parts of the vast territory. Its eye is constantly open to detect the secret springs of political designs, and to summon the leaders of all parties in turn to the bar of public opinion.

It relays the interests of the community around certain principles, and draws up the creed of every party. In the United States, each separate newspaper exercises but little authority, but the power of the press is second only to that of the people.

The Chief Instrument of Freedom. A Study in the American Press. Item 11 in the series Democracy in America, prepared by the Division of General Education of New York University, under the direction of George Prost, American Historian.

A series designed to bring to life the America of the 1830s, as recorded by Alexis de Tocqueville, and so to illuminate the image of democracy itself. A Study in the American Press. The Chief Instrument of Freedom.

When Bumour and I left America in 1832, the American press was on the verge of a great transition. While we were in America, daily newspapers cost six cents as a rule. This was too much for the working man.

This six penny press, as it was called, was edited in the main by and for business institutions and politicians. number one of the 55 newspapers in New York had more than a circulation of 2,000 copies.