Voices of Revolution: Part 1

When I first bought the book Voices of Revolution: The Dissident Press in America by Roger Streitmatter, I wasn't sure if it was going to be something I would enjoy and willing want to read. However, that feeling changed after I had finished the first reading on the American Labor Press and then the second and third being The Liberator and Women's  Rights. The part that really struck me the most was the depth that each chapter covered. I had of course known about abolitionist movements and pamphlets, as well as women's rights, but the book really went farther into each topic than any history book I had ever read or touched upon in earlier education. What I found most important and striking from each chapter are as follows:

American Labor-- "A law that makes poverty a crime and a poor man a felon, after those very laws have made poverty inevitable, is not only cruel and oppressive, but absurd."-- William Heighton
If it was not for Heighton's Mechanic's Free Press, the push for shorter workdays, reduced child labor, state-supported schools and abolishing imprisonment for debt would not have been acknowledged or changed.

Slavery-- William Lloyd Garrisons' The Liberator, was one of my favorites to read about. I still cannot believe what African Americans had to endure back then and how society's mind actually functioned in such a discriminatory way and for what reason? If I could commend Garrison it would be for his journalistic approaches, particularly his idea to write about Lovejoy's murder and inform the people of their wrongdoing. Without the bravery and commitment of this dissident journalist's writings the Abolitionist Movement would have been severely delayed. If only slavery could have been abolished earlier with what we know now from what we thought we knew then.....if only.

Women's Rights-- Elizabeth Cady Stanton was a pioneer for women's rights along with the numerous others that stood up for what was right at The Seneca Fall Convention. The Revolution, was just that when it came to change for women. Whether it was in the workplace or the civil rights that they should be entitled to, it all stemmed from Stanton's journalistic form.

In my opinion, it it weren't for the dissident journalists and their personal characteristics, the most prominent being devotion, who knows what our history would have been and who knows what our present and future would be like now. I don't know if I could have been as bold and brave of a journalist as they were, each fighting for a great cause, but it is this kind of journalism that is something us newcomers can learn from especially when it comes to dedication on your subject or beat.