[CIVIL WAR] [PRESS FREEDOM] THE CRISIS NEWSPAPER

Columbus, Ohio, 1863. 20.5"x13.5"x1.75" brown cloth binding of one full year of weekly editions of The Crisis, a political newspaper published during the Civil War in Columbus, Ohio. Each issue is 4 pages front and back, printed in 5 columns. Issue 2 is repeated. Title written on front and spine in black marker. Light wear, loose leaves, some discoloration. Last leaf - index to V.2 - has loss affecting some text. Good+~~Samuel Medary, a controversial journalist and political activist known as a Peace Democrat or Copperhead, published The Crisis from 1861-1864. Believers in States Rights, Copperheads like Medary vilified Lincoln, despised abolitionists, and disparaged non-white Americans. The Crisis espoused tradition over change and couched Medary's unpopular political opinions in a desire for peace with the South. His views opposing the Union war effort and encouraging resistance to Lincoln's policies angered many in the North. The newspaper officers were ransacked and Medary was charged with conspiracy, but the paper was never shut down by he or the government. ~~Of note is Medary's January 7, 1863 response to the Emancipation Proclamation being enacted on the first of the year, in which he declares Lincoln to be a "dictator" and "usurper". The language in this and other articles is reminiscent of the pervasive modern political hate-speech. While his politics have gotten no less controversial with time, his tenacious and oppositional publication contributed to ideas about American freedom of the press that remain valuable.~~~.