Jefferson’s words inspire NZ journalists

No New Zealand city has had two daily newspapers since 2002, when Wellington’s morning Dominion merged with the Evening Post to form The Dominion Post. With a circulation of just under 90,000, the Dom Post (as it’s commonly known) is the country’s second-largest daily.

The paper’s modern building has a comfortable café just off the lobby called The Front Page. On the wall, I was surprised to see this quotation from Thomas Jefferson: "Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter."

When I became editor of the Argonaut (the University of Idaho’s student newspaper), I placed this quote on the masthead – a jab at the student government. A few years later, I discovered that Jefferson’s enthusiasm for newspapers waned, particularly after he became president in 1800 and was the target of some nasty barbs from Federalist writers. He wrote to a friend: “The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.” And in retirement, he remarked, “ I do not take a single newspaper, nor read one a month, and I feel myself infinitely the happier for it.”

Even so, Mr. Jefferson’s first quote seems especially fitting for the paper published in New Zealand’s capital, just a short walk from Prime Minister John Key’s office and the Parliament building. It’s a long way from Monticello to Boulcott Street in Wellington, but I suspect that Mr. Jefferson would be pleased to see his comment receive such prominence.