Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1898-11-05
aelisecllaneous 8tading.
GOOD PAPERS WORTH PAYING FOR.
An Exposition of the Weakness OF the
Cheapening Policy.


The New York Times, which has
heretofore been sold at three cents
a copy and which is looked upon
as one of the high-class papers OF
New York city, recently decided to
reduce the price per copy to one cent.
The Philadelphia Public Ledger, one
of the most careful, conservative and
respectable newspapers in America,
comments upon the experiment OF
The Times as follows:
The criticism advanced by the op-
moments of the one-cent idea is that
there is a certain price below which it
is impossible, on sound business prin-
ciples, to publish newspaper, and
one cent is below that price. The cost
of publishing newspaper is enormous.
The great plant to be maintained, the
corps of men trained in the craft, the
large body of skilled workmen, the
army of news gatherers, the various
fixed charges, the interest on the cap
ital, and especially the white paper
consumed daily, make total which is
so huge that, if high quality in all be
maintained, the completed paper, if
sold at one cent, is sold without profit,
or at an actual loss. This is the shrewd
criticism, based on many experiments,
made against the lower price. 1t is
wholly immaterial how many copies
are sold, because the cost of white
paper of good quality is so great
that, with the other expenses added,
the cost of each finished paper leaves
no margin at one cent.
1t is evident, then, that any prospect
of profit for the publisher rests wholly
in the increased advertising patronage,
which he hopes will follow. This is
not business. 1t is the abandonment
of the only safe, sound business ground,
that of fair profit, to embark in the
realm of the fortuitous. 1t is change
from a sound, safe, business basis to a
precarious and doubtful one, and,
therefore, we should say that in plac-
ing a paper in a hazardous position,
jeopardizing its independence, there is
a tendency to weaken its independence
and impair its tone.
The editor of The Times assumes
that there is vast number of educa-
ted, refined and intelligent people in
New York who would prefer to read
clean newspaper, ''not given over to
vulgarity and mad.house methods, "
and that these people, who are now
deferred from reading a decent news
paper because of its higher price, will
abandon the vulgar papers and read
wholesome ones, if the price be low
cred. Here are two false assumptions.
We do not believe that refined people
read the "mad-house" sheets, and we
do not assent to the proposition that
intelligent, healtby-minded people are
deferred from habitually reading de-
cent papers because of the difference
of one or two cents in the price.
That were a pitiful estimate to put
upon the quality of the country's re-
inement and intelligence. 1t is, we
are sure, mistake to assume that only
the well-to do buy the high-class news
papers. We do not think it is 80 much
matter of means as of taste and
character, and the intelligent and re-
fined, whether rich or poor, will be
found, we think, to be the patrons OF
clean, honest newspapers.
The Times, we believe, has made a
mistake. The people who now read
the "mad- d-house" sheets read them be-
cause they are loud and vulgar. They
are the morbid, who, as the French
say, constantly crave "new shiver." ."
They are seeking new sensation, and
the paper that peppers the highest is
sure to please" 1t is clientage as
unstable as water, and when once got
is of uncertain duration. The temp.
tation to hold it by catering to it will
be ll.nigh irresistible. No orator is
uninfuenced by his audience, and
every newspaper is bound to be infiu-
enced, it may be sensibly, but none the
less apprecably, by the character of
its readers. To make sacrifice of quail
ity for mere popularity is to throw
away for one thing essential for gen
uine success, and to get what is OF
questionable value.
People who believe that the day OF
the one. cent newspapers is inevitable,
are, we think. wide of the mark. The
very opposite we deem to be the exact
truth. The cheap yellow journalism
has been overdone. The people are
tired of it, and the reaction is coming.
To suppose that the vogue of the hid
eous mass of ridiculous, inane, vulgar,
meudacious stuff that masquerades
under the name of news in the fam
boyant cheap journals is anything but
passing craze, is to wholly misjudge
the sanity and basic common sense OF
the people. They are disgusted with
it, and we have the best reasons, based
on the most irrefragable testimony,
that there never was time when the
people were more willing to pay fair
price for a good newspaper than they
are today.
RIIRJED SIX HI1SBANDS.