Page:History of Journalism in the United States.djvu/202

CHAPTER XIII

ADAMS AND THE ALIEN AND SEDITION LAWS

Attitude of the new President—The control of the press—Oppressive laws—Severity of penalties provided for violation — The President's responsibility—Trial of Duane—Dr. Thomas Cooper—His Defense—Duane's later history—The Boston Chronicle indicted—Laws defended by Oliver Wolcott.

Having followed the career of John Adams in the pre-Revolutionary days, when, with Sam Adams, he made the Boston Gazette the official organ of the patriots, the student of journalism might well expect that his administration of the office of President of the United States would be marked with a distinctive course in the matter of the Fourth Estate. And so it was, for in the second year of his term there were passed laws, intended to shackle the press and oppress the editors, that aroused a spirit of indignation that contributed not only to his own downfall but to the extinction of his party.

To understand the character of Adams, we must recall that, even at the time when the Massachusetts Spy and the Boston Gazette were vigorously fighting in the cause of the Revolutionists, he was not the exponent of an entirely unshackled press. In one of his interesting and most illuminating letters, written at that time to his wife, he declared that it was a pity that the papers were not more guided and controlled. Even then he overlooked the fact that the fight for independence was a fight against that very guidance and control, the absence of