The Daily state journal. [volume] (Alexandria, Va.) 1868-1874, 1871-03-02
THE IMPERsONALtTY OF THE
PRESS,

A great deal has been written recensy
about the impersonality of the press
most of which is mere twaddle. In
despotic government we can conceive of an
impersonal press but we see no good to
result from it under our free institutions,
where the liberty of the press is guaranteed,
aud where the public have right to know
upon whom to fix the responsibility OF
published opinions. We suspect that most
of this talk about an impersonal press,
which simply means the suppression OF
the names of the real editors, has. been
gotten up by publishers and self-styled
editors that they may be enabled the more
surely to steal the brains of writers and
appropriate them to their own use.
1t is d well-known fact that nine-tenths
Of the papers in this country are edited by
men with whose names the public are
wholly unacquainted. They never hear
them nor see them in print These drudges
of the press and public go on from boy
hood to old age, writing day after day and
week after week wasting their mental, and
physical faculties alike, and receiving in
return about half as much for their ser
vices as the commenest book-keeper in
wholesale business house. They are de-
MED even the qualification of being known
to the public as the writers of "those arti-
cles which took SO well, and so pleased
everybody"
This is the kind of impersonality you
will always find certain editors and pub
fishers SO anxious to establish. We are
opposed to this kind or any other kind of
impersonality. Make the press strictly
personal, and then you will raise the
standard Of journalistic ability. More
editors would study purity of style, and
all writers, if they knew the public would
hold them accountable for not only the
opinions expressed, but for the style of
their articles, would be more careful in
their composition, and pay strcter atten-
tion to the rules of elegance. Hold every
one that is connected with paper respon-
sible by name for his department in the
paper, and you will at once compel him
to pay due regard to the taste he under
takes to cater to.
If this were done everywhere, it would
not be long before charatans and pretend
ers, and all who live and thrive and fatten
on the brains Of others, would be driven
from the profession, and all who could
maintain foothold in it would have to
do SO through merit alone. The public
would be the critic and the Judge, from
whose decision there would be no appeal
and sham would be forced to retire from
the stage covered with Kisses and scorn.
In speaking of this matter the Norfolk
Journal, whose best writers have never
been known to the public, says:
Public journals discussing public matters
should speak, not as individuals, but as some
unseen and unknown agency uttering views
for the people to consider without reference to
the man or the mind by which they are sub,
mitted to the world. II is in this way alone
that the opinions of the press can be received
on their merits, unattended by prejudice or
prediction; and it is proper that this should
be SO, if the public mind is to be influenced by
what is said rather than by him who says it.
Now, that is all wrong. The public
ought to know whose opinions and utter
auces they are receiving--for everything
depends upon the man. Why you might
as well veil the pulpit, and force the
preacher to address his audience through
a screen-gve his oracles as of old-or
build wall around the forum, aud hide
your orators from the world suppress the
names of all writers of history,--of all
poets, and all romancsts. No, the
public should not only judge the matter,
but the man. This is a fruitful theme,
and we should like to dwell upon it,
But one thing we know from experience;
no writer will prepare articles with that
care or weigh opinions with that calm
Judgment when he knows that his author
ship is to be kept secret, that he will exer
else in both cases. when he is aware that
the public will hold him personally respon-
sible not only for what he says bat for the
manner in which he expresses it, For in
stance, in these few remarks, we know
the real writer will not be known to
the public, and, therefore, we have hastily
sketched them off, carelessly, loosely, and
without regard to rules of composition or
graces of style.
In respect to the other definition Of i'm
personality in the press, which means per-
sonal abuse and vituperation, we fully
agree with our contemporary above quoted,
when it says: B3
There is another phase of impersonality,
too, which we are pleased to see has been
adopted by an editorial convention in Ohio.
We refer to abstinence from individual dispar-
agement or reproach in journalistic discus
sions. Arguments may be combatted, opinions
controyerted, and statements denied-as is
done every day in private circles, among
friends = without producing i'll feeling
or at all disturbing the amicabie re:
lations between parties editorially associated
with the newspapers engaged in the contfo-
versy. Editors should always be as guarded
in the language of the journals they control
as in that they employ in their social inter-
course with each other. An interchange of
oAfa,s;ra a,ithato end eharn innisiva words