Weed and his associates in the Whig party leadership saw in this change of public feeling hope of electing a Whig Governor in New York in 1838, as well as a Whig President in 1840, and they looked on a cheap weekly newspaper, which would vigorously espouse their cause and keep the voters informed and stirred up, as a necessary part of their campaign equipment.
“In looking about for an editor,” says Weed in his autobiography, “it occurred to me that there was some person connected with the New Yorker possessing the qualities needed for our new enterprise. In reading the New Yorker attentively, as I had done, I felt sure that its editor was a strong tariff man, and probably an equally strong Whig. I repaired to the office in Ann Street where the New Yorker was published, and inquired for its editor. A young man with light hair and blond complexion, with coat off and sleeves rolled up, standing at the case, ‘ stick’ in hand, replied that he was the editor, and this youth was Horace Greeley.”
Greeley accompanied Weed and a member of the Whig State Committee, who was with him, to their hotel, where, after the necessary
