They saw the press as a sort of fourth branch of government, one that would keep the "checks and balances" of the other three branches honest.
Somebody got a cite for that? I think this is "fake history." What the founders didn't want was government controlled press. I doubt they saw the press as having any sort of quasi-governmental function. Keeping the government in check falls to the people. The press isn't anything special now, and wasn't then.
ping
Somebody got a cite for that? I think this is "fake history." What the founders didn't want was government controlled press. I doubt they saw the press as having any sort of quasi-governmental function. Keeping the government in check falls to the people. The press isn't anything special now, and wasn't then.When writing the 1st Amendment to the Constitution, one area of speech the Founders were specifically interested in protecting was that of a free press. They saw the press as a sort of fourth branch of government, one that would keep the “checks and balances” of the other three branches honest.
The printing press was, at the writing/ratification of 1A, the technical means of promoting facts, ideas, and opinions - about subjects mundane and controversial. Before it promulgates “the freedom of the press," 1A mentions religion, and after that, it mentions politics - the two things one politely refrains from bringing up at a dinner table (other than among the like-minded).Since the Constitution specifically encourages "the progress of science and useful arts” - and since the Ninth Amendment makes plain that the Bill of Rights is to be understood only as a floor under our rights, and in no sense a ceiling on them - nothing in the Constitution justifies government control over printing or any other technical means of promoting political opinions.
There can be no question of “printer” being a title of nobility, the grant of which is expressly forbidden to the Federal and, separately, to the State governments. And without an established religion, there is no question of journalists being a priesthood which you or I are obligated to respect. Talk about “the press” as “the fourth Estate” is fatuous, considering that the term comes from France, and the other “Estates” included “the nobility” and “the priesthood.” That is, “the freedom of the press” is a right of the people. The right of the people to spend their own money (in unlimited amounts) to buy or rent technical means of promoting their own ideas.
So yes, in a way it is true that it falls to “the press” to check the government, but
The members of the elected branches are controlled at the ballot box. The wire services homogenize “the press” into a single entity which amplifies the perceived interests of journalism as a business (a “special interest,” if you will). The interest of journalism is to be influential. Journalists hold that nothing actually matters except PR - and they control PR. The implication of that is that journalism is cynical about society (“the people”) and naive about government. Government, in that view, has great power to do good (under the tutelage of journalism), and the only limit to how much good government actually does is the intentions of those in office.
- the press is of and by the people, and
- ”the press” is not legitimately a single entity but a cacophony of voices from which the elected branches of government are to extract what intelligence they may.
Conservatives agree with Thomas Paine that, to the contrary, government is at best a necessary evil and that society, even at worst, is a blessing.
Thanks for the ping, PG.