New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1899-12-06
"NOT THE SANE OLD TRIBUNE
so THINKS CORRESPONDENT WITH CON-
slDERABLY MORE CONFIDENCE
THAN REASON
To the Editor of The Tribune

To the Editor Of The Tribune
Sir; Having been pretty constant reader of one
or other issue OF your valuable paper for more than
forty years. am glad 10 declare that in quality 1t
mas seemed to me most admirable and in quantity
much beyond what could have been thought pos
sible; but now take the liberty to suggest that
the paper In the last few months has ceased TO he
Inc Tribune TO which It's readers have become ac-
customed. The tone of its editorials foreign cor
respondence and comments toward England, has
suddenly and radically changed And yet that
country Is the same England which The Tribune
withstood so righteously when she was stretching
her india rubber boundary through Venezuela and
trying to provoke the latter to act
which would excuse a war for gold mines: Il Is the
same England whose colonists more English than
the English, The Tribune exposed so clearly when
they wanted 10 invoke fair arbitration" and
stretch the Alaskan boundary line TO include sea-
ports to which they had no right: IT is the same
England which. since the gold OF the land was
seen 20 be good began to NEEDLE in the Transvaal.
and which. falling In the first Jameson raid 10 get
the mines by force. and later TO get them by
diplomacy. accepted the enlarged franchise. but at
the same time made the ominous threat that there
were other matters 70 be settled which would not
be brought before the Cape Town Convention.
That threat. while British troops were collecting
on the frontier and others being assembled 10 make
the second and governmental Jameson raid. pre-
cpitated the Transvaal "ultimatum," It was
for equal rights" provided they meant British
supremacy, and for representation" provided It
not for Kaffrs. Hndoos, Burmese, Soudanese,
etc And yet The Tribune. in its advanced age,
essays the hopeless task Of wntewashing Britannia
in her old age.
You will perhaps say that you easily do with
out a reader who doesn't like your opinions and
that you know best how TO conduct your paper.
which is quite true. But It is also true that those
OF your readers who don't like your volte face
easily get a paper which will suit them better.
Personally, II Is my fortune 20 read three English
papers. so that l am surfeited with British brag,
argument" and claim to all the cardinal virtues
and gold mines ] would therefore prefer that the
American papers l read (nore than three should
be what they profess TO be-American.
Apart from the possible Establishments Of Lon
don, which made an Englishman of Mr.. Bayard,
beclouded Mr.. Hay, darkened some of Mr.. Lowell :
jokes, and seem 10 have made peryert Of Mr..
Reid. there is no good reason why an American
paper should depart from its TRADITIONAL suspicion
toward John Bull. The Tribune and some other
caught the strain. that we owe England a debt Of
gratitude for her declining to toin European
repaying her debt to us The Tribune has told us
that In her panic, when she was fitting out fleet
against Germany and thought Armageddon had
come at last. England scattered bribes Wholesale
hers to give to France part Of Siam which did
not belong to her: Italy. offer to help her in
the most feared Of all, holding the key OF Eng
LANDS copmssarat intmated to the Government ,s,
known TO diplomacy that the Venezuelan matter
would not be pressed in that crisis. That was the
debt which England repaid last year, and we owe
her nothing but TO watch her old tricks and man.
ners, and TO avoid losing our heads and playing
leopard doesn't change his spots land the British
lion is really ,'1ibbard'D, but The Tribune has
changed it's old line Of reasoning and comment, TO
the Derplexity Of It's admirers and spppeoIrIeTs
Washington d C. Nov q 1899