The record-union., 1896-05-18
PUBLISHING SCANDAL.
Motive of the Sensational Press for
Its Action.
(From the S. F. Newsletter.)

(F'rom the S. F. Newsletter.)
A citizen Of Sacramento, a man of
wealth, good repute, useful to the COM
munity, and apparently happy in his
domestic relations, made the discovery
the other day that his wife was unfaith-
full He behaved with equal discretion
and mercy. Instead of killing the
woman and her paramour and making a
| great public scandal, he remembered
the feelings and welfare of his children,
some of them daughters and nearly
grown. So he gave the unchaste wife
money and sent her to her people i'm a
distant city, and prepared to depart
with his boys and girls to Europe,
where, he hoped, they would be safe
from learning of their mothers shame
To seek "a divorce was a duty, and he
sought to do it with as little publicity
as possible.
Surely no matter could be more strict
lv personal than this. In no way did
the wreck of the mans home, his private
grief, possess any legitimate interest
for strangers. Yet while the unhappy
husband and careful father was finish
ing his preparations to go away with his
motherless children, the newspapers of
this city blazed out in many columns
topped with shouting headlines, pro-
claiming to all the world what the man
was endeavoring to conceal for the sake
of his boys and girls. If their hearts
have not been broken and their young
souls wounded and poisoned by the
knowledge that their mother is a wan
ton, it is not because the press of San
Francisco has not done it's enterprising
best to force the knowledge upon them.
Custom is the warrant of the news
papers for doing this sort of thing. That
an event has occurred and that the GU
riosity of the multitude would be graft
flied by being told of it-that is the
whole gospel Of the news merchant. He
respects no right of privacy, considers
rot at all the pain that may be caused
or the harm done by publication. The
bleeding pride of men, the reputa ton of
women, the future of children, these
count for nothing The public is ready
to buy news, and the news merchant
therefore triumphs over everything in
order to get it to sell
custom cannot even excuse, let alone
justify this cruel, unmanly intrusion
upon personal griefs, this heartless trad
ing in happenings that should be re-
spected as family secrets. It is custom,
but it is none the less outrage. The
press has no right to deal in such wares.
The fact that it does deal In them habit
ually and that the practice is so we'll
established that it is accepted as in
evitable. proves only that the press has
successfully usurped the privilege of do
ing wrong for gain. The Sacramento
instance is exceptional solely in the ac-
cident Of the conspicuousness of the per-
sons involved. Every day tragedies of
the home with which the public has no
more concern than with any other event
in "a citizens household, are exploited
by the press. No home, conspicuous or
obscure, is safe The press licenses it
self to poke itself in, notebook in hand,
wherever there is strife or sorrow that
arises from sin. And the press is wholly
sordid in the performance of this double
function of Paul Pry and village gos-
sip. Its one motive is nfckels. No won
der the press is neither respected nor
liked by people who are themselves
worthy of being liked and respected.