Not So Honest Abe

President Abraham Lincoln used the Media to get what he wanted and climb the political ladder. In a world without facebook, twitter, or television , Lincoln knew how to manipulate the one form of media that was used to get into the heads the people: The Newspaper.

In the article by Wills, on how “Lincoln Played The Press”, the reader can clearly see just how Abraham Lincoln manipulated the press and was a self publicist in order to rise on the political rankings. There were five main stages in Lincolns career and mission to control the press. The first one was infiltration. Abe used the power of infiltration by writing articles for the Whig party. He used his fiancé to write articles posing as “Rebecca” in order to critizise the opposing candidate of the democratic party, James shields.Even though Lincolns position rose, Abe never really stopped contributing anonymous articles. Through co-opting,the second point, Lincoln was able to actually be a part of a newspaper and not just contribute anonymous articles. He helped finance a german newspaper when he noticed that many votes were coming from a German community. The article also states how Lincoln would create debates with his opposing party in order to receive more advertisement. Lincoln created many favors in return for positive press by buying off which is Wills third idea in “How lincoln Played The Press”.Repression of News to be printed was what Will’s mentions as the fourth tactic of Playing the Press. Lincoln created and “leaked”…

oops!

letters and held public speaches in order to have those be printed in the press and distributed. With this method, he cut out the intermediary, Will’s last point in the article.

According to the commentary on “Lincoln’s War With the Press”, written by Fredd Hiatt, politicians in the time of the civil War created tension by subjecting their oponents in order to attract coverage. Lincoln knew that public sentiment was everything and acted upon this idea by creating his own anonymous articles and “drama” to be reported on by the newspapers in which he funded or showered with favours. “With his dramatic letters of 1862 and 1863 . . . Lincoln in some ways wrote the big three New York editors out of the equation when it came to molding public opinion,” Holzer writes

Prior to the civil war, journalists found it difficult to find and secure a job.Journalists also faced shockingly low wages, just another reason for accepting bribes. The article “ How The Civil War Gave Birth to Journalism in the Nation’s Captial” written by Paul Fahri, explains how all of the drama and excitemenet created by the war, gave young journalists something to write about. War was exciting and reporting it made journalists feel important. The journalists who acted as correspondents during the war, even chose to remain in the nation after the war.

News at the time seemed like it should have been on ABC’s show Desperate Housewives,a television series filled with lies and gossip. The article written by Fahri shows one how some of the information printed by news papers wasn’t the most honest of news . “They printed almost every rumor you can imagine,” says Mark J. Stegmaier, a historian at Cameron University in Oklahoma.

What was interesting at the time, and would be seen as very innapropriate in today’s press was the relationship that political figures had with the news… the people in charge , that would eventually be writing stories about these figures. “They courted and wrote flattering accounts of political players”

People working in the press were continuously bribed and offered stake holidings in the government as well as better jobs. Its only obvious that the newspapers then had to write favourable accounts of their leaders. Afterall, you can’t bite the hand that feeds you now can you.

What also did not help in keeping news “true” and unbiased, was the fact that news was censored through telegraphs operated by war censors. These war censors would make sure that the news favored the North even causing journalists writing for democratic newspapers to give up home seeing as their articles probably would have landed in the trash bin.

I do think that the relationship between political figures and the Press has changed in comparison to when Abraham Lincoln was in the White house.A good thing.

The media is not as biased as it once once. There are too many different forms of media and different sources for it to be so. The newspaper, the sole form of “mass communication” was easy to control since it was only one form of media. Anyone is allowed to have an opinion nowadays. Just imagine having to control facebook, television, radio, print, etc. That would be like living in North Korea.. and we see how well that has played out. There are also many more rules that have been set especially by the Associated Press that have instilled morals into journalism. Gifts over 25 euro cannot be accepted according to the rules and guidelines of the Associated press ( so Abe’s tactic of inviting journalists over for tea and offering jobs to poorly paid Journalists would NOT have worked) and most importantly, anyone working in a campaighn or running for a political figure cannot work as a journalist.

The reporters, naturally, repaid their sponsors with favorable coverage, leading one senator, James Doolittle of Wisconsin, to complain that “great men and heroes are manufactured here” by blatant press bribery. What Gill stated in his article that “Editors ran their own candidates—in fact they ran for office themselves, and often continued in their post at the paper while holding office” would never have occurred in today’s day and age. Journalists for leading newspapers are meant to report the news that is happening without putting their own personal opinion in the article and they are not meant to praise or bad mouth a certain political figure.

Truth and trust in Journalism is the most important thing. Newspapers around the time of the Civil War seemed like a bible for exaggerations and gossip. Nowadays, a Journalist cannot just sit back and lie to media consumers. This is apparent with what is happening with Nbc’s Brian Williams. One cannot fluff up one’s feathers and fake journalistic war accounts only to sit back and enjoy the ride.

Poor, Poor Brian.

What was very similar with today and back then is the power of the Media. Certain things shown on media such as the interview with George W. H Bush which was shown on national TV can either make or break someones political career.

How many times to people say things with a specific purpose? A lot.

Another aspect that was similar to today is that Lincoln created certain scenarious for the press… as they say all publicity is good publicity, political figures now and then created certain stunts just so that the gossip would be spread. This is evident through lincoln’s creation of the “scrapbook” published by the Chicago times and Chicago Tribune.

There are many things that can be said that are similar between how the press was run during the Civil War and how the press runs today. For the most part,we can say and be thankful that there are enough laws to make sure that the press stays unbiased and honest.But… As in the case of everything, there are exceptions.