The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1903-05-15
DEFIANCE TO PENNYPACKER,
NEW LIBEL Law SPCRNED ny
PENNSYLVANIA'S PRESS.
Every Newspaper in the State Is AssailinE
the New Law and. in Addition, ls.
nOrtng Its Provisions-OrsanizstiO ton
Formed to Fight It-I3iS Mass Meeting.

| Formed to Fight N-BiE Mass Meeting
PHILADELPHIA, May A.-Every ne VS..
paper in Pennsylvania is at war to-day
with Gov. Pennypacker, botanist. anti
| quarian, historian, former Common Pleas
Judge and cousin to Senator Matthew
Stanley Quay. With cartoons. verses, edi-
torial and bitter paragraphs the Governor
is being assailed.
Gov Pennypacker on last Tuesday signed
the libel law known as the Grady-Salus
ring as a press mueller. Senators Quay
and Penrose whipped it through the Legis-
lature in two days. and the legislators
voted for it under ironclad orders. This
bill orders every paper to publish the names
Of its responsible heads at the top of its
$500 to $1,000 for each issue.
1t provides compensatory and punitive
damages for negligence upon the part Of
owners and editors in ascetaining facts,
and mental sufferings endured, by the in
come under the ban. There is not one
paper in the State not defying.it It.
Gov. Pennypacker is Pennsylvania
Dutchman whose style Of physical archi-
cartoonists He is an ardent pursuer Of
the quaint and unusual bug, an authority
on Pennsylvania history. an expert on
ancestry. botanist of reputa and an in
tense admirer of Senator Quay. whom he
declared in political speech during his
Gubernatorial campaign to be greater than
either Clay or Webster"
Gov. Pennypacker was cartooned by the
Democratic and "insurgent' Republican
papers. as were Senators Quay and Penrose
This the Governor resented and to 1t he
refers In his apology for signing the bill
1t is this apology which furnished much
Of the material for the present newspaper
war upon him.
al. II this this sRPo9gy among other thing he
'oontorted cat" Legislator Pussy, the
sponsor OF a bill to have all cartoons using
animals, fowls. ETC., rs their basis. declared
lbellous per &c. would one hundred years
ago have been changed and quartered and
his head stuck on a pole"
This "outcast" cartoonist seriously con-
templates suing the Governor for criminal
libel under his own bill and Is being urged
to do SO BY e1rPostmaster- General Smiths
the r,ess x is 1.-The bs s.PSs1 r
nished the greatest surprise to the State
gang II is admitted that the gang is
behind the gag bill and has used the Gov
ernor's wounded vanity as catspaw
to provide measure which seemed to them
would insure immunity from newspaper
attacks,
The Press was considered the admins
tration organ, but its editorial article on
the signing Of the bill was the most satri-
cal and bitter of all, While the warfare
is ifiercest in this city. all over the State
it Ia being waged.
Some of the papers have, printed lists
Of every man in their employ, including
the printers devil az responsible heads.
Others ignore the law utter ". Tho papers
who voted for the bill, and non-partisan
newspaper association has been formed,
with Thomas " Cooper. State representa-
tive from Delaware county, and editor OF the
DeldWdre County American as it's head.
This organization has been formed to fight
the bill and to protect the newspaper IN
terests All the Republican editors Of the
big dailies have practically broken away
from the party.
tonight to about five thousand persons
on the new law and Pennypacker's action.
The question now with every paper defying
him is What is the Governor going to do
about it?
TAMAQuA, Pa, May IA Schuylkill
county attorney, who has since boyhood
been a close friend Of Gov Pennypacker,
said to-day that he felt that he was not
violating "A confidence by saying that it is
the purpose of the Governor. to suppress
newspaper presumably the North American,
il 1t does not discontinue its violent attacks
upon him,
Those who know the Governor best, he
said, will admit that he is sensitive. He
has felt the attacks of ertain newspapers
very keenly. and he believes that he has a
right to exert all the power vested in him
II necessary in order to punish his traducers.
To several close friends he has expressed
the belief that certain newspapers will not
abide by the provisions Of the Salus-Grady
law. even though they are taken into court
and fined In such an exigenoy, he has
intimated 1t would become the duty of the
Chief Executive to suppress such pnblica-