The Saint Paul globe., 1897-08-18
THOSE ASSISTED EDITORS AGAIN.

Save for the snarl of the Dispatch
the Alexandria Post News is the only
paper that has come under our notice
whose editor rises to the necessity OF
the occasion and defends the prostitu-
ton of their editorial columns and the
bald fraud upon their readers by those
Republican editors who accept and use
the ready-made editorial matter pre-
pared by Mr.. HannaS literary bureau
and sent out from Room 1, Glover
Building, Washington, D. c." 1t af-
fects to believe that "the G l o b e is
greatly worried" because of this. If
it really thinks so we beg to assure it
that this mixture of subserviency and
imposition worries the G l OBJ no more
than do the other instances Of fraudu-
lent action which it exposes and COM
ments upon.
The Post News may hold different
ideas of the relations of an editor and
his readers from that held by the
C o b e. 1t evidently regards papers
and advertising columns, mere ducts
for whatever matter the editor thinks
or may be induced to think will inter-
est his readers or serve party purposes
or private ends, into which his own per-
sonality does not enter any more than
it does in his news or advertising col
umns The G o b e, on the other hand,
holds to the old-fashioned idea that,
however open to others may be the
news and advertising portions of his
paper, an editors relations to his read
ers, his duty to them, demand that his
editorial columns be reserved to him
self and made the vehicle for con-
veying to them his best thought, his
ripest judgment, his most accurate in
formation and his deliberate and hon
est convictions. When he subverts
them to any other purpose, when he
surrenders them to others, when he
capitulates this portion to party man
ayers, he prostitutes that which he
should regard as sacred as his home.
1t is not that the G. o b objects to
the use of matter prepared by others,
perhaps more competent because of IT
ter access to information than is the
editor, where the matter is used in such
manner as to delude no reader into be-
lieving that it is the editors own Dur
ing the tariff and currency discussions
valuable assistance was given editors
by various associations that complied
facts for use of papers advocating
either side of the questions; but what is
Objectionable is the preparation of such
matter with the intention that it shall
appear as original editorial matter. We
ncte that some editors compromise with
the Hanna bureau by giving the mat
ter separate position, usually alongside
editorial matter with a heading 'politi-
cal snap Shots or something like, still
leaving the inference a fair one that
they prepared the Shots
The intent of the bureau to deceive
the readers of these assisted papers
"eiS SHoWH III the note that accom-
panied broadside recently devoted to
matter intended to produce the impress
sion that, simultaneously with and be-
cause Of the passage of the Dingley
act, there was a sudden irruption of
prosperity. The note said s'this should
appear as your own matter, with date
blanks filled according to time of pub
lication. 1t should not be used as from
this committee, though it's accuracy is
vouched for" Why "your own mat
ter" if no deception was intended?
Why the filling in of the date line
blanks to accord with the date of the
publication of the paper using it? And
Why, If accurate, should it not be used
"as from this committee?" Why, in
deed, unless the committee knew it
was perpetrating fraud upon the
readers of these servile papers and ex-
pected their editors to become parti
ceps criminis? And, we may ask. whv
does not the Post News use them?
Does the editor think they are not suffi-
GENTLY "apt expressions of the beliefs"
he entertains?
dno1