II. The ‘London Evening Post’, 1727–1744: A Study in the Development of the Political Press

Extract

One of the most significant of the anti-ministerial newspapers of the early eighteenth century was the London Evening Post. Its importance has been overshadowed by such great newspapers as the Craftsman, which has come to be regarded as the main propaganda weapon of the Opposition to Walpole. But it seems probable that the London Evening Post reached a wider public, and that its influence was more sustained and more immediately effective. The Craftsman was published only once a week, and devoted the greater part of its space to its political essay. These essays were undoubtedly immensely influential, and in times of unusual excitement the paper' circulation could reach quite remarkable figures. But the regular circulation of such a paper was bound to be limited. Outside the capital, London newspapers were not cheap: and few readers would be so politically minded as to be prepared to subscribe regularly to a purely political paper. Most country readers wanted news as well as views: and perhaps no eighteenth-century paper set out to satisfy both demands more effectively than did the London Evening Post. Its reputation was increasingly to be based upon its political content: but its various printers never lost sight of the fundamental fact that their product was first and foremost a newspaper, and even in the most hectic political campaigns the news always received priority. On the political side, instead of relying, as did most political papers of this period, upon lengthy and often tedious essays, the Post preferred to make its point by brief but exceedingly pungent comment upon the news and by the savagely humorous verses for which it was to become notorious. In this way, it made politics both interesting and amusing. The result was that the Post very rapidly became established as one of the main sources of London and foreign news throughout the countryside. By the 1740', there were few country papers indeed which did not draw heavily upon the Post: and these papers reproduced not only the Post's news items but also its politics. In fact, its political influence became so pronounced that on two occasions, in 1733 and 1754, the Whig ministry paid it the supreme compliment of endeavouring to prevent its transmission through the Post Office.