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The War Of The Union And Confederate Side During The Civil War

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One of the few newspapers to act like Switzerland received a huge amount of backlash for doing so. The Republican paper did not succumb to the Union or confederate side and instead advocated for both sides, since the two editors of the paper had different views, but the public was not pleased with this decision. “The general public deemed it weakness and ‘a sign of duplicity’ to publish articles advocating both sides of the issue and dubbed the paper ‘the swill tub’ (Sachsman, 2014, p. 53). A Virginia paper tried this tactic as well, to no avail. “The attempt, however, on the part of any opposition paper to be simultaneously a Union journal and a Southern journal was becoming illogical if not well neigh impossible” (Cappon, 1936, p.14). This explains why the majority took a side during the civil war, as no newspaper wanted to loose the core of their audience due to not taking sides. It is important to note that not all of the papers in this era were propagandist. The Enquirer was able to omit their opinions and write objectively about the war. “Wise and his successors objectively reported the news rather than venting their dissatisfaction with Confederate’s conduct of the war” (Davis & Robertson, 2009, p. 37). This should have been how all the papers of this era reported the war yet a backlash amongst the public contributed to a public outcry, which can be detrimental to a newspapers survival. The U.S. government and Confederates were susceptible to using propaganda to sway

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