The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1901-07-23
PERSONAL JOURNALISM.

v
PERSONAL JOURNALISM.
Personal journalism is common to all
newspapers of whatever degree and is
inseparable from the debate of public
questions which have to do, as is the
case with most such questions, with the
ambitions activities, and schemes of
men. We know of no journal of the
day which does not deal in the spirit
of sharp criticism with any person who
represents bad measures or evil designs.
The religious press for years attacked
Robert G. IngersoH and various ex-
clergymen VINO stood for what it calls
heresy; and today it is not .sparing in
it's assaults upon any man VINO, as it
thinks, seeks to undermine the faith.
We recall mention of Brigham Young
in terms that were scarcely gracious;
of late there have been invidious re-
jah Dowie and dozen others; and
when the religious press gets into poll
tics it carves Boss Croker and the Phil
adelphia ringsters in terms which lose
nothing in the severity of their stroke
by the polish of their metal.
Passing into the atmosphere of what
nalism, represented by Harper's Week
ly, the New York Evening Post, the
New York Times, etc, and we find that
personal attacks are not only common
in their pages but have been the means
of their most signal services to good
government. Who can forget the cam
paign which Harper's Weekly made
against Tweed in the early seventies.
ing editor and Thomas Mast the accus-
ing artist. Mr.. Curtis wasted little time
upon the discussion of the abstract
principles of honesty and dishonesty in
public afffoe,i but he aartaigned the man,
every other high-minded journal in
America. Mr.. Mast drew pictures of
Tweed with his hands in the till; of
Tweed in the opulence of stolen wealth;
or Tweed in felon,s garp. Nor was the
areh-robber the only one attacked.
There were Sweeney and Connolly and
Genet and Oakley Hall. 1t was person
al journalism in it's last analysis which
broke the power of Tammany in 1871
and the same tremendous weapon, bat
terfng again at the door of Tammany,
will yet break it down and let the arm
VI tIC ldW ISdCU III 1OI -CIOhcI. DOuUl-
less Croker, like his predecessor, Tweed,
has high views about personal journal
ism, and one could hardly blame him.
Did the great literary papers. the Or
gans of the scholars and the UNIVERSE
ties, go into the antiBlaine campaign
with eye single to principles rather than
persens9sg Far from it, They invented
the tattooed man. Then and since the
Evening Post and it's weekly issue, The
Nation, have revelled in personal jour-
nalism, making targets not of causes
alone, but of the men who represented
causes, and doing it with immense eff
feet wherever they happened to be
right in their antagonisms. They need
ed the weapon they used; they could not
have been effective without it. Realiz-
ing that, when the commander falls the
army is half beaten, they directed their
fire at him: and the route of their on
ward march is gn-boarded with the
graves of successive commanders of
evil causes whom they have annihilat-
ed with the causes themselves.
The masters of American daily Jour
nalism in the nineteenth century were
James Gordon Bennett, senior and
Junior; Horace Greeley, Charles A
Dana, Whitelaw Reid, Joseph Storey,
Joseph Pulitzer and VIM. r. Hearst,
and we venture to say that no single
Issue of their papers ever went to press
without attacks upon some public man
Sometimes the editors went wrong and
said too much; but as a rule they work.
ed out the problem Of better govern
ment. In San Francisco personal jour-
nalism destroyed the power of Boss
Buckley and sent him hurrying to Can
ada; it sidetracked Kelly and Crimmins
and Rainey; it made O'DonnelI an inn
possibility for Mayor and gave Reform
er Phelan his chance. We venture to
say that the destruction of personal
power must precede every victory for
good government in American politics
whether in the case of Quay or Ad-
dicks or Platt or Buckley or Bathhouse
John or of any schemer for spoils In
Honolulu.
A public journal which strikes no
blows at persons does but half its duty
to the people: and the people soon count
1t weak and temporizing. The man can
not be separated from his works and IL
it is desirable to put an end to the
works the man must be brought down
first. What good would 1t have done in
the recent month of May In Honolulu to
indulge in abstract homilies about the
use Of the courts to satisfy private
spleen? Such articles would have left
no mark. Not only must the conspir-
acy be exposed but the conspirator
must be pilloried; and the result will,
show a triumph for personal journalism
which could not have been won in any
other way. The general local illustra-
tions are by no means confined to
the most recent ones. They go back as
z-eH to Moreno, the Ashfords, Julian
Ere, Mick" Weaver and BILLY"
Ilu.