PRESS AND PUBLIC
" I am in favour of a free Press, and if I live to the age of Methuselah that belief will never go " (said Mr Ramsay Macdonald at a recent meeting of the Newspaper Society). "A free Press is a condition of a free democracy, and a free democracy is a condition of a free Press. It is very curious—and I hope you will not miss the significance of this—that as sooh as a Dictatorship is established the first thing that goes is a free Press. A Dictatorship cannot stand expression of public opinion. The newspaper is going to intake or mar the foundation of our democracy. If, week after week, or day after da)y, some trivial thing is advertised, or some casual thing is blazoned as an amazing 'incident, what sort of mental foundation is that going to lay for our race ? If, day after day, news is mixed up with views to' such an extent that the views steadily encroach on the news, and the news is relegated to some obscure corner in the column, while the views are turned up 'into a two-column headline—there you discover one of the modern mysteries which beset the people who Want to get the news—in the end no democracy can survive."
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/WAIPO19340811.2.18
Bibliographic details
Waipa Post, Volume 49, Issue 3504, 11 August 1934, Page 3
Word Count
212PRESS AND PUBLIC Waipa Post, Volume 49, Issue 3504, 11 August 1934, Page 3
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