Page:History of Journalism in the United States.djvu/233

Rh found that Jefferson was indifferent to the machinations of Aaron Burr, who, after killing Hamilton, had wandered west. Daveiss twice presented Burr for treason to the grand jury, and twice the grand jury declared in Burr's favor. The leading Democrats of Kentucky were Burr's friends, while Henry Clay acted as his counsel, Daveiss, however, through the advent of two new settlers, was able to have a newspaper which exposed the treason of Burr and aroused the public.

It was in the summer of 1805 that there arrived in Frankfort, Kentucky, two pedestrians from far-off Virginia. John Wood had been a writer on the New York papers and had been connected with Aaron Burr; later he had gone to Virginia, where he had interested a young man named Joseph Montford Street and to him proposed starting a newspaper either in Kentucky or at New Orleans. Because of political enemies in New York, Wood's part, it was explained, must necessarily be a secret one. With the assistance of William Hunter, the editor of the Palladium, who allowed them to print their paper on his press, and with materials obtained from the editor of a paper published at Lexington, the first number of the Western World appeared on July 5, 1806. The paper was itmocent-looking enough from a modern standpoint. The first article was entitled the "Spanish Conspiracy"; it aroused great excitement. Street was kept busy receiving challenges to duels, and finally notified the public that he would file all challenges in the order received and "from time to time give a list of them in the Western World for the information of the public at large." Not all of his opponents, however, gave him an opportunity to defend himself, for one legislator endeavored to assassinate him.

Street's next sensation was to further the prosecution