St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1894-02-12
THE PASSING OH THE EDITOR.

those who VIII go TO near his lecture on
Money aud Morals" this evening,
brings forcibly to the minds of the
workers on the press especially. to the
older readers OF papers also, the rapid
process of evolution which. in this last
half of the century. in this country, has
reversed the relative positions of the
editor and the paper. Because Mr..
Watterson is one of the few men who
have survived this process, and remains
unsubmerged by the paper which he
created and makes famous and poten-
! tial; because he is the only one now in
harness of the men who shaped ana
directed public opinion in the ffties
| and sixties. and whose papers were
known merely as the tools with which
they forged and threw their bolts. but
makes more prominent the great change
which has come over the press of the
country.
Thirty, forty years ago the paper was
but the background bringing into
strong Keller the personality OF the ed
itOr Back of Sam BowleS was the
Republican: it was Greeley. not the
Tribune, who spoke; Bryant, not the
Post. 1t was Storey who Numbered,
lot the Times; and so on through a
long and notable list of strong men who
made themselves, through their papers,
active forces in molding popular opin-
ion, before which statesmen and politi-
clans bent and bowed. There is more
than the designer had in his thought
when he devised the groups of repre-
sentative apers in the country with a
fac-simile of the paper for back
ground and the portrait of the editor
photographed on its front page. though
it is truer representation of what was
than of what is.
1t was the good fortune of these men
10 be at The ''fortuitous juncture of cir
cumStance" when the development of
the railroad and the telegraph made
possible the development of the modern
metropolitan newspaper. They had
founded their papers. and, utilizing the
opportunities which these two factors
of gathering and disseminating news
and opinion gave them, they were borne
out OF circle of local into one of ma
tional reputation and influence. They
saw their opportunities, they utilized
them and were equal to them. But it
was not this alone that enabled these
men to imprint themselves on the
thought of their day. Something more
was needed than ability to see and seize
and use opportunities as they came
The elder Bennett was the superior of
all these men in this respect. and estab-
lished great newspaper, which con-
tlnues to run and prosper by mere in
ertia, but which never was and never
has been the power that the others
were.
Nor was it merely the great mental
ability of the editors which made them
selves and their papers famous and
powerful; they have had their equals.
possibly their superiors, in fertility of
thought and deXterity of expression. 1t
was their strength of conviction, their
tenacity of purpose. their manifest and
answering honesty, and their fearless
ness in maintaining what they saw was
right, regardless of consequences, finan-
cial or other, that made these men and
their papers the trusted leaders of the
public thought of their day. They i'm
pressed their personality and these quail
tiles on their papers; they infused their
spirit into their assistants so that, insen-
sibly, they thought as their chiefs did.
The opportunity which came to these
men has passed forever. To establish a
paper now requires much more than
editorial ability. The mere gathering
6f of hn
OF an Office for printing it, demand the
immediate command of capital and
its prolonged investment before a paper
can be put on its feet" and it may be
said that the man who has both the
ability and the means is not among us
today. 1t is possibility that some time
In the future there may be born to
fathers who have given their lives to
the accumulation of great fortunes, sons
endowed with the qualities which made
these men of generation now passing
away great editors, who will use the
wealth they inherit to maintain and
establish papers which will be but ex-
panslonS of their own indiyidualltieS:
but now the capital needed can only be
had by combining the investments Of
the money of many men who are too
apt to regard their investment as one
which must be made to yield returns
either in dividends or the accomplish
ment of Interior aud personal objects,
and who make the paper subservient to
these ends. Such use Of paper cannot
be long hidden from its readers, and
such use of it destroys its influence ell
tirely. 1t may disseminate news, but it
does not mold opinion.
1t is the survival of Watterson, the
personal journalist, among the crowd of
impersonal journals, that, aside from
| qualities that would command attention
| if divorced from the newspaper, makes
| him striking figure among the prom
| inent men Of today. He is the last of a
| class of men whom the conditions of our
times doom to extinction. In a few
years the editor will have passed into
| eclipse behind the paper on which he
| tolls, whose reputation and standing
and prosperity he creates or enhances,
but who remains unknown save to the
narrow circle in which he lives. Men
no longer say Greeley says" but say
1.-THE Tribune says" and, sometime
may the years be many before it comes
men will cease to say "Watterson
says' what they read in his paper, and
will say only 'the Courier-Journal
says" We of today are witnessing
the passing of the editor.
THE SUGAR BOUNTY.
Can the government with iustice tav