VOA慢速英语 网络是在拯救, 还是在扼杀报纸?

　　VOICE TWO:

　　Some newspapers in colonial America supported British rule. But historians say the criticisms of other newspapers helped lead to the American Revolution. After the war, newspapers supported different political parties and felt free to express opposition to the government.

　　Yet the government of the new nation did not always accept freedom of the press. The Sedition Act of Seventeen Ninety-eight made it a crime to criticize the government with the aim to damage it in the eyes of the public.

　　Three years later Thomas Jefferson became president. He permitted the act to end. Jefferson spoke about the importance of a free press. He said "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."

　　VOICE ONE:

　　Newspapers in the early eighteen hundreds cost about six cents -- too much for many immigrants and working people. Then in the eighteen thirties came the "penny press." These newspapers cost just one cent, a penny. Also, they published a lot of crime and court stories to get more attention than other papers.

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