Arizona republican., 1898-06-03
GATHERING NEWS.
Product of Work Exclusively-It is
Not a Commodity.

At the banquet of the Associated
Press in Chicago last week, Mr.. Fred
erick Lehman responding to toast.
said, among other good things:
I'VE are the victims of a mistaken
Technology. We speak Of news as a
commodity in the same sense in which
we characterize coal as a commodity.
But moments reflection viii show
that it is of an essentially different
character. What is the report of the
Associated Press-that is, all that it
has to offer to its members; that is
all that it could have to offer to any
one-is it commodity? Is it some
thing tangible? The blowing up of the
Maine-was that news? No; the re-
port of that event was news. The
property of the Associated Press was
not the event itself, nor even the infor-
nation Of the event, but simply that
particular narration of the event
which one of its own agents, becom-
ing the possessor of the information
undertook to convey to his employer
that and nothing more.
You have men upon Cuban soil
who venture upon the very verge Of
enemy's lines, who have emperiled
their lives. and are today possibly sub
ject to be shot as spies if they are cap
tured. What do they bring into the con
duct of their business? Courage. enter
prise and intelligence. And these
high qualities are their own and what
they achieve through them is their
own and no law consistent with free
institutions can compel them to share
the fruits of their perilous industry
with the coward and the sluggard who
lags behind. Can it be possible that
while one man is willing to go for
ward and to venture the perils of
news gathering service in a time like
this, another may sit comfortably in
the rear and undertake to determine
the value in money of the differential
between cowardice and courage, be-
tween enterprise and Incidence? Col
Fred Burnaby undertook to report the
war in Egypt. He reported it not from
afar, but from place in the ranks OF
battle, and he went down in the front
rank of battle with the thrust of a
savage spear through his throat, re-
GREETING, perhaps, that he was not able
to report his own death.
Events occur. They may be with
in the knowledge of a thousand peo-
pie. One man may have the quality of
mind that enables him to perceive in
a given event something of human in
terest. He is able to give to the re-
port of that event a form--a literary
fornl-which makes it attractive. That
report is his property, to dispose of alb
solutely as he will, and upon whatso-
ever conditions or limitations he
chooses to impose. And there never
was an enactment of the United States
that put any limitation upon his right
thus to dispose of his own personal ef-
forts.
''Now, what do your reporters
what do your newsgatherers carry in
to their work? No privilege conferred
by any law, no franchise granted by
any state, no opportunity that is not
open to any one of their fellow citi-
zens Their report is thing of brain
and Drawn. and in it is to be found
nothing but that labor which responds
to the primal law of God-'In the
sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread
all the days of thy life
s'The property which you have in
your news, for purposes of Immediate
publication, is simply that property.
Is it exclusive? Yes; so is all owner
ship The owner of a horse has a mo-
nopoly of his use. That kind of mo-
nopoly is of the very essence of prop
erty of all kinds-exclusive in the par
ticular thing which has either been
produced by the labor of the owner or
has been bought by him when pro-
duced by the labor of some one else.
That property is always defensible."