Scandal And Civility: Journalism And The Birth Of American Democracy

scandal & civility This page intentionally left blank Scandal & Civility Journalism and the Birth of American Democracy marcus daniel 3 2009 3 Oxford University Press Oxford University Press, Inc., publishes works that further Oxford University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education. Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offices in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Copyright © 2009 by Oxford University Press, Inc. Published by Oxford University Press, Inc. 198 Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10016 www.oup.com Oxford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of Oxford University Press. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Daniel, Marcus Leonard, 1962– Scandal & civility : journalism and the birth of American democracy / Marcus Daniel. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-19-517212-6 1. Journalism—United States—History—18th century. 2. Press and politics—United States—History—18th century. 3. Journalism—Political aspects—United States—History—18th century. 4. Newspaper editors—United States—Biography. I. Title. II. Title: Scandal and civility. PN4861.D36 2008 071'309033—dc22 2008023724 135798642 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper For my parents, John Turner Daniel and Judith Ann Daniel, who helped teach me how much words matter and how much more some things matter than words. This page intentionally left blank Acknowledgments Like most first-time authors, I have a long list of people to thank for their witting and unwitting contributions to this book. Teachers first, for they really are the source of everything that follows. At Plymouth College of Further Education in Devon, England, Elizabeth Patel nurtured my enthusiasm for history and biography with her lectures on Disraeli and Gladstone, Bismarck and Garibaldi, and even more amazingly taught me to love the intricacies of diplomatic history when this still meant one damn treaty after another. Allan Insall (a student and staunch follower of the literary critic F. R. Leavis) taught me to wring meaning out of everything I read, from Alexander Pope to the daily press. As an undergraduate at Pembroke College, Cambridge, I was lucky enough to be taught by three remarkably dedicated teachers and scholars: Jay Winter, always exuberant and ready to talk; the late Mark Kaplanoff, who guided my first essays on American history in his own tartly conservative manner; and the late Clive Trebilcock, a fellow Plymouthian who tried hard to deter me from the life of an academic, but without success. At Oxford, John Rowett did the best he could with a difficult student at a difficult stage of his career, and when I wavered encouraged me to set out for the New World. For this I thank him. At Princeton University, I encountered the most remarkable group of students and teachers I have ever known. And whatever the day-to-day drawbacks of graduate life in Princeton, they ensured it would be intellectually lively. Among the faculty (past and present) I’d especially like to thank Stephen Aron, Kathleen Brown, Gerry Geison, Gary Gerstle, Peter Mandler, Reid Mitchell, John Murrin, Dan Rodgers, Christine Stansell, and Sean Wilentz. My thesis committee at Princeton—Sean Wilentz, John Murrin, and Lawrence Stone—all left a deep imprint o