The Origins of a Free Press in Prerevolutionary ... - Web Publishing

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authority. 54 The newspaper in Virginia had moved from a quasi-governmental
source to one where public opinion and marketplace competition was paramount.
The Stamp Act controversy offers a contrast of the earlier restricted press
with the competitive presses exercising greater freedom. As noted in the prior
chapter, when the British tax enraged the colonists, Royle even failed to print the
Stamp Act Resolves, which were passed just down the street by the Virginia House
of Burgesses. Yet other newspapers across the colonies published this heated
reaction to Parliament. 55 Instead, Royle’s newspaper called on the assembly to help
enforce the tax, and warned of the dangers of disobedience. 56 This was quite
different from reports published in the neighboring colony of Maryland, but also in
sharp contrast to what was printed in both versions of the Virginia Gazette in just
the next year. 57 The original Virginia Gazette, now published by Purdie, contained
an item that referred to the Stamp Act as a flagrant violation of the British
constitution, and called the idea of virtual representation in Parliament a “despicable
subterfuge.” 58 Competitor Rind’s newspaper ran letters from the radical Boston
Gazette, “Letters from a Farmer,” and “The Monitor’s Letters,” a Virginia-based
attack on the Stamp Act. The latter admonished Britain for attempting to enslave
the American colonists, suggesting “that though we are a weak people, yet the
principles of liberty fully infused into us, will render it impossible to enslave us.” 59
54 Virginia Gazette (Rind, July 23, 1767), 1, no longer ran this claim. The March 12 issue still
did. There are no extant issues in between.
55 Morgan, The Stamp Act Crisis, 102.
56 Virginia Gazette (Royle, Oct. 25, 1765), 1.
57 See Chapter 6 for a direct comparison of two issues of the two newspapers.
58 From the Gentleman’s Magazine, quoted in the Virginia Gazette (April 4, 1766), 1.
59 Copeland, Idea of a Free Press, 205, refers to this newspaper as the most radical of this time.
The first of the “Farmer’s Letters” began in the Virginia Gazette (Rind, Dec. 24, 1767), 2. “The
Monitor’s Letters,” credited to Arthur Lee, ran in the Virginia Gazette (Rind, Feb. 25-April 28,
1768), see Schlesinger, Prelude, 125. Quotation from Monitor II, Virginia Gazette (Rind, March 3,
1768), 1.