and in preparing for this talk and in preparing for a book i'm doing on lincoln and the press, i must say i've been staggered by the numbers that i've been dealing with. as many as 300 separate recorded incidents that included the following -- banning papers from the u.s. mails. interrupting the flow of telegraphic news. arresting and imprisoning editors. and reporters. closing and ransacking newspaper offices. seizing and destroying equipment and suspending publication. many of these occurred where the union was in control and where the court still functioned. as far north as maine. can't get much farther north than main. in areas loyal to the confederacy teetering between southern or northern control or occupied by the union army or supervised by war governors or

military governors, we can add the following to the litany. participating in or failing to prevent mob attacks against newspaper offices. official censorship, the of battlefield reports, the banishment of some, the humiliating punishment of others. if anything, i think historians have not made a full audit. they focused on two or three landmark cases which are often viewed as mistakes later corrected. most scholars have assessed the curtailment of press liberty during the civil war as surprisingly infrequent and usually justified. i'm going to suggest tonight the effort was actually far more widespread than we've understood, though it did remain always supremely disorganized and ad hoc. and you'll decide on the justification yourself. i'm going to propose the

repression was actually supported not only by most of the union public, the loyal union public, although in a constitutional issue, that doesn't matter so much. but also by many newspaper editors as well. i've been surprised by that. finally, i will argue that when lincoln had a chance to apply total press censorship, he didn't. so let me first offer some evidence i guess of the nonlegal variety. because it's important to understand the conditions under which the press and the president operated requires a big leap of historical understanding. you have to imagine yourself in the 19th century when the press culture was totally different than what it is today. in the lincoln era, newspapers did more than report. they openly represented one political view or the other. they were affiliated directly with the republican or democratic party. they publish openly partisan news. they were not newspapers

exactly, they were propaganda sheets. within this culture, violence and suppression against the press became tragically commonplace. in 1837, for example, a mob in the town of alton, illinois, tossed an an ligsist newspaper's printing press into the river, and when the editor, elijah lovejoy tried to save the paper, they killed him. the noise aroused a young politician named abraham lincoln to speak out against what he called mobkratt tick spirit. reverence for the laws should become the political religion of the nation. it didn't. the partisan fighting became the political fighting over the nation, and the fight over slavery and sectionalism only heated up this boiling cauldron. but the 1850s, most american cities had two newspapers, one republican, one democratic. each publishing increasingly

inflammatory warnings about abolitionist plots on one hand, and on the other, southern schemes to separate and divide the union and make slavery perpetual. lincoln was immersed in this world. he was one of many politicians who not only befriended sympathetic editors, he uhung out at office, he had his speeches posted by the local press. he regarded opposition ones as he put it once, as villainous reporter. party malice he said and not public good possesses them entirely. so malice toward none was a long time coming. and lincoln alone -- was not alone in this view. democratic politicians felt the same way about republican editors. now importantly, press loyalties were fueled not only by party discipline, but by expectations of reward. and it wasn't just political advertising which was certainly part of it. once in office, politicians

routinely repaid loyal editors with coveted jobs. even honest abe. he doled out post mast storeships, port commissionerships, and other patronage plums to 30 or 40 of his favorite journalists once he was elected president. the intertwining of press and politics was a tradition, not an exception. even more alien to our modern concept of the press, 19th century politicians not only befriended and rewarded or punished publishers, they often were publishers, and publishers were often politicians. it's extraordinary how much -- how often this intersection occurs. three members of lincoln's first cabinet had been newspaper publishers. the speaker of the house owned a paper in indiana. here in new york, in albany, publisher thoroughly low weed was also the president of the republican party. horace greeley aspired to the senate.

and "the new york times" was founded by the speaker of our state assembly. now think about that for a minute. when i suggested at a recent book party at "the new york times," no less, that this was a bit like shelley silver owning today's "new york times," our host, arthur salzburger jr. shouted out n the back "the party is over." it's alien to our culture today. here is another. the most anti-lincoln most racist paper in new york was the daily news, no relation to today's daily news. if lincoln became president, it warned in one particularly vile article in 1860, we shall find negroes among us swarming everywhere. typical rant of the era. he was the brother of the mayor of new york city. so think about that. that's as if marjorie tiven, who

is mayor bloomberg's sister and serves as the commissioner for protocol instead had beaten out jill abramson for the job of editor of "the new york times." it's totally alien to the intersection, to the relationship between the public and the press today. in fact, when lincoln sought reelection in 1864, his campaign manager was the publisher of "the new york times," henry raymond. and before that sounds unusual, the publisher of the democratic paper, the new york world, was the national chairman for lincoln's opponent for the presidency. press competition and outspokenness only intensified exponentially with succession and war. before his inaugural, lincoln told a group of senators and congressmen freedom of the press was necessary to a free government. but he changed his mind. he changed his mind in 1861, a period of trauma, a challenge to

the very survival of free government when traditional opponents became enemies and criticism was seen by many as sedition. lincoln concluded that he must save the whole constitution, even if it meant temporarily sacrificing specific guarantees. and one of the first institutions to peel the effect was the press. after the battle of bull run, which the union lost in july, the lincoln administration turned particular attention to criticism that he and his cabinet ministers thought had fueled the defeat and now threatened to encourage border states like kentucky, missouri, and maryland to leave the union and join the confederacy. the union banned the use of the mails and commercial export with all of the rebellious states, and assumed control of the nation's telegraph system. the new rules applied to manufacturers and exporters of all sorts of products, including newspapers. one of the first test cases

involved a philadelphia publication called "the christian observer." who had a rather tenuous affiliation with the episcopal church, which basically said we have nothing to do with this paper, and its religious affiliation did nothing to mask its virulently pro succession and pro slavery bias. a month after bull run, the paper ran a story claim to contain an authentic letter from a virginian that charged that union forces on the march there had been guilty of gross brutal 15 andish demonic outrages meant to pillage the houses and burn them, outrage the women and shoot down children for amusement. the paper wasn't about to encourage its home state of pennsylvania to join the confederacy, but it did have readers in maryland, which remained the only route for northern troops to arrive to the defense of washington. and on august 22nd, a month

after bull run, federal forces invaded the office "the christian observer" where they clearly encountered less resistance than they had at bull run and confiscated type and evicted the staff. after appealing to lincoln that he was just an old man who always promoted harmony, the editor fled to richmond and reestablished his paper as an open pro slavery sheet in the capital of the confederacy. the editor had written to lincoln "freedom of the press was i have always believed was one of the great bulwarks of national freedom." tacitly adopted the argument that the national safety required journals like "the christian observer" to be shutdown. around the same time, a federal grand jury in new york's southern district sent a presentiment to the court asking whether certain newspapers here,

and i quote, in the frequent practice of encouraging the rebels now in arms against the federal government had overstepped freedom of the press and now deserved what they called the employment of force to overcome them. the foreman identified the alleged sinners by name, the general commerce, the brooklyn eagle, and the daily news. some of those names may still be familiar to some of us. the daily news had recently editorialized if the national government attempted to subvert the states, every citizen was absolved by his sovereign, and i think by that he did not mean the president, from the obligation to obey. deciding that the federal presentiment had the force of an indictment, the postmaster general banned all five newspapers from the mails. when the daily news tried to subvert the order by sending copies on board a train, the government placed agents on board trains to confiscate them.

this was serious business. its subscribers shut off, the news shut down. and its editor, the aforementioned brother of the mayor, turned to novel writing. facing similar ruin, the brooklyn eagle reformed its editorial policy. and suddenly for obvious commercial reasons, became major supporters of the union. unwilling to do either the editor of the freeman's journal soldiered on and was arrested, this time on the order of the secretary of state and imprisoned for 11 weeks in a prison in the new york harbor. however extreme these actions sound to us today, keep in mind they chilled very few observers at the time. a grand jury in new jersey, thinking this was a swell idea, promptly identified five of their own newspapers to be shut down. mobs attacked pro succession newspapers in such decidedly nonsouthern venues as bridgeport, connecticut, and dayton, ohio. union soldiers torched a paper

in bangor. ugly incidents all, but directed at what people of the day clearly regarded not as loyal opposition, but as fifth column anti-unionism. the war department, a third agency involved, then contributed an order declaring tighter control of the telegraph office because intelligence was being given directly or indirectly to the enemy through the use of this new technology. and keep in mind as we talk about the different press culture, very contentious press culture, there was also this new technology, which had the same threatening impact on people as julian assange had in the 21st century, the idea of publishing anything any time. so the war department placed 154 newspapers on an informal but chilling watch list. as early as april, telegraph wires had fallen completely

under military control. but at the same time, only one or two censors worked the telegraph office. so it was a warning, but it was never completely enforced. and newspapers in the field, journalists in the field always had the option of getting on board a train with a dispatch, or sending a horse back, rider as a runner. correspondents did that and by and large the press did remain remarkably free to cover the war. perhaps more so than they are in iraq and afghanistan. descriptions and depictions of casualties, for example, were never forbidden. only the encouragement to rebell and join the insurrection. if other newspapers felt a bond with their repressed brethren that. >> seldom expressed solidarity. democrats remained completely silent or most, perhaps fearful of objecting out loud.

just weeks after vowing that it would not obsequiously applaud, they found the chamber of commerce guilty of inciting a riot in the streets and apologizing for the mob. no right of the press the times insisted should shield it from the penalty of a crime against society. this is the times speaking. the chicago tribune questioned the very concept of what they called absolute freedom of the press because in society, speech is always limited by prevailing conditions. until the war is over, we must be content to accept whatever the altered conditions of the times and the country may demand as a requisite for national salvation. calling the daily news that most pestlent of succession sheets, even a democratic party said it should be regarded as the act

politicians of treason. and this by and large they were. the times' henry raymond was surprised as he put it that only the administration has for so long foreborn to defend itself against the fanatical and insurrectionary crusade of papers published in loyal states. in states where no such loyalty reigned, lincoln got 53% of the vote in new york, but only 2 or 3% in maryland, the suppression was even more draconian. rejecting what we called extreme tenderness of the citizens' liberty that would relieve he thought more of the guilty than the innocent, lincoln had ordered the military even before bull run to arrest and detain without resort to the ordinary processes and forms of law such individuals as might be deemed dangerous to the public safety. that sounds like chillingly

ambiguous phraseology. the war of the south was a war of the people but the war of the north was a war of the party carried out by political schemers, military authorities shut down the paper and arrested the editor, whose name was francis scott key howard. not by accident. the irony here is he was the grandson of the author of the national anthem. thrown into fort lafayette prison. was he guilty of anything more than expressions opinions? his files showed secret resolutions to support the confederacy. martial law suppressed four others. asked to justify this by congress, lincoln said are all the laws but one to go unexecuted and the government itself go to pieces lest that one be violated? accusing rebels of what he called an insidious debauching of the public mind, a phrase i

think reveals how deeply he felt about harnessing what he called public sentiment. he said that he could but perform this duty or surrender the entire existence of government. i purposely dwelled on these examples of 1861, probably because they're less known than the later incidents, but also because they definitely set precedence for what followed. they inured the country and the press to a greater period of repression. had the country, had the editors risen up to protest, it might have been a slightly different story. now i'm not meaning to ascribe blame if it's warranted to the victims. i do urge everyone, though, to keep the context in mind, to look at this phenomenon through the extraordinary moment of revolution and danger that perhaps mitigated it, not through the dubious lens of hindsight. and at the time, the other branches of government didn't

interfere. when congress came back into session, it basically ratified suspension of the great writ. the supreme court remained silent. in 1862, the house judiciary committee began an inquiry into whether the suppression of the telegraph had been used to restrain what it called wholesome political criticism. they heard from many witnesses, including journalists who testified that some of them testified that they indeed feared using severe language against the administration. but the committee ultimately concluded that legitimate political personal and news if inhibited still free government -- a government free from interference may not always be consistent with the necessities of the government in time of war. and this was ambiguous enough to encourage the house to drop the entire matter. the telegraph censors, as hapless and small in number as they were, were left in charge

under the aegis of the state department or the war department without much furtherover sight. by 1862 that year, the administration had added to the list of forbidden coverage anything meant to discourage volunteering, anything meant to discourage people from allowing themselves to be drafted or allowing the drafts to go forward, as we know they didn't always, including in new york city. then there came a new issue with adherence to the emancipation proclamation. the new york evening express punative damage da repudiated it. we may be locked up for the free speech, but we lend no sanction to any negro equality. this tirade prompted one correspondent to ask the secretary of state how is rebellion to be crushed while such insulting traitorous papers are allowed to be freely

circulated among the people? tens of thousands in new york now stand ready to enter the printing establishment of several such papers and break the heads of the editors, and are only restrained by its unlawfulness and waiting for our weak and puckish government to do the needful to them. no action was taken here, but it's fascinating to read the letters that came into the lincoln administration supporting the notion of further crackdowns. the next year, 1863, the issue came to a head in dayton, ohio, where a union general, ambrose burnside, not the most effective generals in history, arrested a former congressman and newspaper owner, of course, clement vlanding ham for peeking out against the draft and had him tried. he was found guilty, but at lincoln's request was not imprisoned. he confedera confederacy. local newspapers who protested like the columbus, ohio crisis

paid a heavy price. first a mob tried to burn down offices. the editor later proposed nominating this fellow, van landingham as general of ohio. he actually ran for governor as a democrat. was absolutely devastated in the election. but the crisis continued its own campaign for free speech, what it called free speech. this editor too was arrested for conspiracy against the union. he dd a broken man before he could be brought to his trial. he was not the only editor outraged by the vlandingham case. defending his actions against what he branded an effort by insurgents -- he loved that word -- to destroy the union, the constitution and the law altogether, whether on the battlefield or on the newsroom, lincoln rejected the idea of a

government as he put it restrained by the same constitution and law from arresting their progress. their sympathizers said pervaded all departments of the government and nearly all communities of the people under cover of liberty of speech, liberty of the press, and habeas corpus, they hoped to keep on foot a most efficient core of spies, aiders and abettors of their cause in a thousand ways. to lincoln, these disloyal editors were akin to spies and informers. in rerebuttal, albany congressman corning called the doctrine a monstrous heresy, subversive of liberty and law and quite attending to the establishment of despotism. lincoln replied no further. but a few days later when the chicago times, democratic paper rebuked, the general surprised

nearly everybody by ordering troops in chicago to shut down the chicago times and imprison its gun-toting editor wilbur story, who was happy to be arrested because it was good publicity for the repeated expression of disloyalty and incendiary statements. now this act of subpression lincoln may have privately relished. the chicago times had been flaying him for years, and publicly, however, he became convinced that, quote, we should revoke or suspend the order. especially once protesters from both political parties began filling the streets to demonstrate against it. some interference did remain unacceptable to lincoln. by this time, however, censorship and interference were commonplace within military lines. generals suppressed news, restricted access, and banished reporters who talk too much. their argument was if they publish something about troop movements, the enemy will learn

about it and they will impair our ability to surprise them. they will create extra danger for our soldiers. but they also castigated reporters who criticized their generalship. so they had it both ways. some reporters faced courts martial even though they were civilians. one was sentenced to dig trenches for 60 days. another to ride a horse out of camp backwards, which was a sign of humiliation, a sign across his chest and back that read "libeller of the press." lincoln tried revoking one expression to expel a report from grant's headquarters. but unwilling to irritate his most valuable general, he added a caveat. if general grant shall give his express consent. well, general grant didn't want to give his express consent. he wasn't too crazy about reporters either. so he passed the buck to general william sherman, who never met a reporter he didn't hate, absolutely hate. oblivious to the politics

because lincoln hoped to keep the herald's unpredictable editor, james gordon bennet inside the pro war camp, sherman sent the following message. come with a sword oremus sket. prepare to share with us our fate in sunshine or storm, and i will welcome you. but come as a representative of the press, which you yourself say makes no slight difference between truth and falsehood and my answer is never. the ban on mr. knox remained in force. a fellow named william mckee who lincoln called a democrat editor, which is akin to a worse adjective, had better luck. mckee got hold of and published lincoln's official letter promoting a general named john scofield in missouri. scofield was outraged. he demanded that mckee name his source. and when he refused, ordered him arrested. lincoln gently reprimanded the general, not for violating

freedom of the press that would have been too much, for upsetting the political apple cart. he said i fear this lucious the middle position i desired you to occupy in missouri. keep in mind missouri is a state teetering between the south and the north with a lot of bloodshed and a lot of about a bro gags of civil liberties. please spare me the trouble this is likely to bring. scofield's answer was he has to be arrested. he has to be restrained. so lincoln said okay, there is an apparent impropriety. but it's still a case where no evil could result. and i am entirely willing to overlook. finally knox was set free. as lincoln had written scofield in the letter that started the whole business, the one that was published, it's a good thing to have published in a way because they reflect his overall policy on martial law in all the border states. let your military measures be strong enough to repel the invader and keep the peace, but not so strong as to

unnecessarily harass and persecute the people. and this included editors. you will only arrest individuals and suppress newspapers when they be working palpable injury to the military in your charge, and in no other case will you interfere with expression or opinion in any form or allow it to be interfered with violently by others. still wiggle room. the army had incredible maneuvering ability in the areas under their control. but lincoln was changing. he was willing to assume the worst in 1861 when the threat of succession by border states was the highest. now he favored what he called great caution, calmness, and forbearance. but the most famous incident of press suppression was yet to come in. 1864 here in new york, in the one instance in which he took personal possession of a crackdown, he signed a document -- he didn't write it, but he signed it declaring that

the new york world, a democratic paper, had wickedly and traitor ousley printed a false and spurious proclamation of a nature designed to give aid and comfort to the enemies of the united states. the order commanded general john a. dicks here to arrest and impress the editors, pro appropriators and bring them to trial. take possession of the printing establishments and prevent any further publication. tough words indees. why fuss over a bogus proclamation about volunteers? the administration initially believed the democratic press conspired to release a fraudulent presidential order calling for 400,000 new volunteers in the union army in order to send gold prices plummeting following which editors would buy in at low prices and reap huge profits once the proclamation was