The Business Values of American Newspapers: The Nineteenth-Century Watershed.

The rejection of the "Great Forces" and "Great Man" theories of newspaper history allows a middle-range view that seeks to discover the uniqueness of the newspaper business and to explain how that uniqueness shaped the business values of the editors and proprietors. An examination of three Chicago, Illinois, newspapers--the "Tribune," the "Times," and the "Daily News'--during the 1877 railroad strike, the 1886 eight-hour day controversy, and the 1894 Pullman strike and boycott reveals that in spite of sharply opposing views on business-labor relations, these papers tended to exhibit similar fundamental business values--a commitment to public interest consumerism, an obsession with commercial order and social control, and a growing faith in organizational/bureaucratic modes of conflict resolution. The unique nature of the newspaper as it evolved in the nineteenth century explains these positions. As public institutions that saw themselves as custodians of the public interest, newspapers abhorred conflict and were committed to peace and order at all costs. Their faith in arbitration reflects journalism's faith in the efficacy of information gathering, application, and analysis. These values were essentially those of the progressive movement and point to the continuing values of contemporary journalism. (JL)