The prison mirror. [volume] (Stillwater, Minn.) 1887-1894, 1891-10-08
ENOUGH SAID.
Our New York Correspondent Squares
Himself, and Gives the Press a

Our New York Correspondent Squares
Himself, and Gives the Press a
Boost.
Editor of THE PRISON MIRROR: It is not
my desire to open discussion of opinion rel
alive to your conceptions of Jed Jukes VS..
Jed Jukes. find. after carefully consider
ing them. that your sight Is pretty clear, so
far as you have seen things Jukesian; yet.
as you appear to have seen them as through
a glass. darkly, crave your favor to allow
me to address your readers in more
of September 7th permitted. Your
structures on my matter are just a little Sc
we're, and I ask you to note what now
present to your readers:
MY DEAR READERS: You are. l pre-
sumo, acquainted with the slight conten-
tiOns that have passed between the editor
of THE PRISON MIRROR and myself.
These narrow down to the questions: 1st.
Has Jed Jukes been mercenary? 2nd. Has
he deepened public prejudice against you?
IL am addressing you as my fellow prison.
ers) and 3rd. Has he changed his opinions?
1st. AS to my being mercenary. Your
editor has not directly charged me with be-
ing venal; but he has directly charged me
with the same Offense for which l purpose
i?) "disciplining the press"-gOld greed.
His comparison of my case with the news
paper man is very unfair one. and very
.Odous one. While. for the time being
admit l ''prOstituted my wisdom to my
physical necessities" it was very unfair to
,educe an equivalent case in a newspaper
man. The newspaper man has neither
wisdom to prostitute, nor physical necessi-
ties to subordinate to his morality; and the
comparison was very odious in that never
confessed to any OffenSe in relation to the
press, nor have l ever had, nor shall l ever
have purpose of disciplining the press for
its mercenariness. l detest with my whole
being the mock morality of the newspaper
press; l am disgusted with its sOphstry,
and platitudes, and platitudinal sophistries,
whereby it can trip up the credulOus bald
brain into the gutter of "a universal truth, !"
etc. l feel benign contempt for news
paper mans mOduS vivendi: but as for his
dollar craving capacity l feel a most philO-
sOphical risibility shaking me whenever it is
mentioned. THE press" as a whole. is
educational, industrial. Indispensable The
fault in its make up is not its mercenari-
ness SO much as its vulgarly named ''big-
headedness." 1t Graves for the dollar. not
for the dollar alone, but for what it can do
in the equation of fame" Its egotism.
or we gotism. is more potent in its own
eyes than are its pockets. and it only relies
on these things in order to make the former
one more potent. My references in The
Greed of Liberty editorial to ''business"
prompting, ''private interests" and the like
had bearing on. not the mercenary charac-
terstic, but the big headed one-talk. talk.
talk, In order to pose as a philanthroplst, a
patriot. philosopher. or parrot. l am
referring to the we'll established newspaper.
and the one that is ''looked up to- by the pO-
litical canaille or the innocent rustic. How
it became well-established is another mat
ter. Probably every brick. or every inch of
stone in a newspaper structure-those
marks of individual enterprise-represent a
poor newsboy's dinner; but of that have
rnOthing but suggestion. The fact to which