Traveling throughout the United States in the early 1830s, French social scientist Alexis de Tocqueville saw something unique about American life that separated it from what he had witnessed among Europe’s monarchies:
“In aristocratic countries, you group readily around one man,” he wrote, “and in democratic countries around a newspaper, and it is in this sense that you can say that newspapers there [in America] take the place of great lords.”
The unsettling moments we Americans witnessed on Wednesday as a mob inspired by President Trump stormed the U.S. Capitol Building and interrupted the democratic process, underscore the need to sustain and restore journalism, especially at the local level.
Free expression and the open debate of ideas – rather than violence and the taking up of arms – underpins our democracy. It reminds us of who are as a people. It’s literally the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, guaranteeing our rights to religion, assembly, redress of grievances, free speech and, yes, the press. Read more…
Andrew Conte 