Louis Jennings MP, editor of the New York Times and Tory Democrat - David Morphet

Louis Jennings was a campaigning journalist, author and politician who made a strong mark in Britain and the States, not least in his battle with the Tweed Ring. This book throws a sharp light on the life of a journalist during the second half of the 19th-century.;As Editor-in-Chief of the "New York Times" from 1870, Louis Jennings' editorials played a key role in the downfall of the Tweed Ring which was cheating the City of vast sums. When he left New York in 1876, many prominent citizens, including the future President Chester Arthur, signed a testimonial to his "courage and sustained energy" in leading the fight to bring down "Boss" Tweed. Back in England, as MP for Stockport in Cheshire, he threw in his lot with the mercurial Lord Randolph Churchill in promoting the cause of Tory Democracy - the Conservative bid for the hearts and minds of newly enfranchised working class voters. In the words of Lord Randolph's son Winston Churchill, Louis Jennings looked on Tory Democracy as a "living political creed".;This book tells the story of his alliance with Lord Randolph Churchill and how it came to a dramatic end on the floor of the House of Commons during a highly charged debate on the forged "Parnell letter". Earlier, Louis Jennings had served as a foreign correspondent of "The Times" - first in India, where his first-hand report on self-immolation under the wheels of the Juggernaut led to a public outcry. Later, as "Times" correspondent in America from 1865-67, his reports restored the London paper's credit in Washington following its support for the South during the Civil War. He reported first-hand on the state of the post-bellum South, and on the Congressional debates on Southern reconstruction, and was one of the first British journalists to describe the growth of Fenian Irish republican activities in the States, warning of an armed incursion into Canada.;He married a leading lady of the New York stage. In the course of a hectic journalistic career he wrote nearly forty political articles for the Quarterly Review, launched his own weekly paper, and published eight books. Towards the end of his life he renewed his United States connections, accepting the invitation of James Gordon Bennett Jr. to edit a London edition of the "New York Herald".