The better sort of American newspaper is neither a party publication nor yet merely a news-sheet, but the conscious exponent of public opinion. Its columns contain a tiresome amount of party information, it is true; but a part of this is directly in the interests of an intelligent public opinion, since every citizen needs to be instructed in all the phases of party life, of political and congressional doings, and in regard to the candidates who are up for office. It is to be admitted, moreover, that some of the better newspapers, although not the very best, are unreservedly committed to the leaders of some party—in short, are party organs. In the same way several newspapers are under the domination of certain industrial interests and cater to the wishes of a group of capitalists. But any such policy has to be managed with the utmost discretion, for the American newspaper reader is far too experienced to buy a sheet day after day which he sees to be falsified; and he has enough others to resort to, since the competition is always keen, and even middle-sized cities have three or four large daily papers.
It is perhaps fortunate that any such extreme one-sidedness is not to the commercial advantage of the newspapers, for in America they are preëminently business enterprises. Their financial success depends in the first place on advertisements, and only secondarily on their sales in the streets. The advertising firm does not care whether the editorials and news items are Republican or Democratic, but it cares very much about the number of copies which are circulated; and this depends on the meritorious features which the paper has over competing sheets. Newspapers like the German, which count on only a small circle of readers, and these assured, at least for the time being, by subscriptions, can far more readily treat their readers cavalierly and constrain their attention for a while to a certain party point of view. In an American city the daily sales are much greater than the subscriptions, and the sheets which get the most trade are those which habitually treat matters from all sides, and voice opinions which fall in with every point of view. Of course, this circumstance cannot prevent every paper from having its special political friends and foes, its special hobbies, its own style, and, above all, its peculiar material interests. But, on the whole, the American newspaper is extraordinarily non-partisan on public questions, notwithstanding the statements in many German books to the contrary; and the ordinary reader might peruse a given paper for weeks, except just on the eve of an election, without really knowing whether it was Republican or Democratic. Now one party and now the other is brought up for criticism, and even when the sheet is distinctly in favour of a certain side, it will print extracts from the leading articles of opposing journals, and so well depict the entire situation that the reader can form an opinion for himself.