The Test of Freedom

Moscow's Pravda did some boasting last week in honor of Press Day, marking its 36th birthday. In 30 years, said Pravda, the Russian press has grown from 884 to 7,163 papers with 31,100,000 circulation. Pravda alone claimed 2,200,000, which made it Russia's biggest and the world's fourth biggest daily.* Pioneer Pravda, for young Communists, was second with 1,000,000, and Izvestia third with 800,000.

This growth was the "clearest index of true freedom of the press." How was this freedom defined? Said Pravda: "Every line in our newspapers and journals must be devoted to Bolshevik propaganda."

*The first three: London Daily Express, 3,856,589; London Daily Mirror, 3,850,000; the New York Daily News, 2,375,000.

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