Alternative Press, Alternative Powers

We wish to plead our own cause. Too long have others spoken for us. Too long has the public been deceived by misrepresentation of things which concern us dearly. It shall ever be our daily duty to vindicate our brethren, when oppressed, and to lay the cause before the public... From the press and the pulpit we have suffered much by being incorrectly represented. Men... have not hesitated to represent us disadvantageously, without becoming personally acquainted with the true state of things.
- Freedom's Journal, 1827

In a broad sense, the history of the dissident press is often also the history of the social ideas that changed America. Many of the proposals it broached eventually became acceptable mainstream positions, even if. others remained on the fringes. The fundamental changes in the nation's economic system advocated by the socialist press have never been accepted, but abolition, women's suffrage, child labor laws and the success of some of this century's antiwar movements are only a few examples of ideas that worked their way from dissident pages to the courts and the statute books.

Although often harassed for their advocacy in spite of the First Amendment, these David-like papers accepted the challenge of disseminating opinions, beliefs and information against the Goliath of the established power structure. The minority press, in addition, presented radical ideas on behalf of its group and helped to persuade readers that they were worth working toward. Abolition, civil rights, reparations for World War II internment, reimbursement for appropriation of Native American lands — all became believable, and thus possible, when they were printed in the black-and-white of their representative newspapers.