The Portland daily press., 1883-04-04

An Indictment of Dishonest Jour-
nalisp1.

The Hon. B. w. Harris Of Massachusetts,
has retired from Congress, having earned
the reputation due to faithful public SER
want. His constituents gave him warm
welcome home, ard in responding te the
welcome he said things that will bear wide
quotation. Among them are caustic com
ments upon some Washington correspond
ents and other representatives of the So
called metropolitan journals-commeu
that, we regret to say, are as truthful as Sc
we're. In the course of his speech Mr.. Har-
rls made use of the following words:
The dangers attending life in Congress
are many. The purest motives may be mis-
understood, and grossly misrepresented; The
bravest act and the most unselfish and pairi-
otto vote may be made to appear to be die
tated by cowardic- or corruption. The pub
lie ear is constantly filled with rumors about
the corrupt lobby which fnfest the capitol
and control Congress. / am of opinion that
fewer members of Congress are corrupted
by the lobby than we are accustomed to be-
lieve. The lobby works its will by far diff
ferent methods than by open bribery of
members. Public opinion, or what FOR the
time seems to be public opinion, often con-
trolls the action of men, even against their
better judgments. To Manufacture public
opinion in the interest of speculation ami
jobs is the modern Office Of the lobby to a
large extent. II not unfrequentiy happens,
l think that the men who control -reat and
influential n, wspapers are the men who
become recipients of the b0unties of the
lobby. So popular has this method of
shaping public thought become that the
most gigantic swindlers become the
owners or controlling spirits of great public
journals. venture to express the opinion
that no corrupt lobby was ever organized
which did not contain its fair share of active
and influential aud INSCRIPTIONS members
of the press. The member of Congress who
honestly and 5ravely resists these influences
10 very likely to fall beneath the lash of the
organs of the lobby. Some hired agent of
the lobby who sits in the reporters gallery
as representative of the press may stab the
character of any man too honest to yield to
the demands of the corruptionists. It may
not unfrequehtly be heard as the boasts of
merest stripings of the press that by their
art they make and mar at will the fortunes
of Congressman. Il will be well, therefore,
for the people, if they win receive with eau
ton, and even something of distrust. the
nlppant newspaper criticisms of public SER
wants. No public man with decent self-re-
spect can reply to or publicly refute the
pregnant innuendoes and half-attired slam
ders of the sensational press of the country
To notice them at all is but to invite fresh
attack.
Commenting upon these utteranees which,
however truthful they are, require courage
to voice, an exchange speaks thus: The
evil to which Mr.. Harris refers is grave
enough to awaken the alarm of every
thoughtful citizen, irrespective of partisan
predictions. The lobby understands that
it can make its way with much less difficult
ty through the completely of the newspaper,
than through the yenality of the Congress
man. The Tweed ring carried on its cru
SADIE of wild peculation in New York for
years, by buying the silence of the press
When only one newspaper did at last refuse
its largesses, it was speedily overthrow
The people are all the time in danger of be-
ing grossly deceived in respect Of the char
acter. of public men, through the wilful mis-
representations of the penny-a-liners who
swarm in the Capital. They defame good
men and extol bad ones, precisely as the or
der they are called upon to fill specifies The
consequence is, that some very poor speci-
mems of humanity pass for paragons of per-
lection, and others, who are without blem-
ish, are pictured as veritable monsters Of in
EQUITY. These modest gentlemen Of the
quill insist upon running the Government;
if they are permitted to do so, everything is
shown up in rosy light; if they are thwart-
ed, they take the same sort of revenge the
Philadelphia fish women are supposed to
who bespatter those who look at their fish
and won't buy. When they have their way,
jobbery runs riot al d nothing is said about
it. When they are sighed and snubbed,
there is nothing like as much crook. dness,
because it cannot flourish unless they are In
il; but there is vast deal more clamor,
for they are ferocious when they ''get left"
If we could have an honest press, this would
be the best-governed country in the world
In all other particulars, it is infinitely supe-
rior to any in the universe. The bosom of
reform will begin grand and necessary
work when it is directed, as it inevitably
must be, sooner or later, to the elevation and
publication of our newspaper literature