New Ulm review. (New Ulm, Brown County, Minn.) 1892-1961, 1909-11-17
The Myth Of a Free Press
Bv William Marion Reedy.

ldf1Ol h66uy
wealth, and we find the anarchistic
page grown suddenly conserv ative,,
and barking back to the old cry that
property must be protected, and that
the only cure for the evils is individ-
ual honesty and restraint. There is a
great cutlery always against wealth
and corruption in the abstract, or a
thousand miles away, but when it is
brought down to the concrete, at its
own door, the average newspaper sud-
denly draws in its horns, and is found
apologizing with more or less speci-
BUSINESS for the institutions and for
the system and for the individuals
that rob the community. It is no
wonder, therefore, that the public has
lost faith in the editorial. It is cause
for qualification that the public is now
awakening to the fact that it cannot
any longer believe in the news.
But the case is not hopeless. Some
thing can be done. My opinion is
that the county editor can help, and
help greatly. Let him study the daily
paper in the light of such instances of
revelative character asI have de-
.scribed here, and of many others
which he can find out for himself by a
little inquiry, and then, let him cease
to follow the lead of the papers of the
cities on public issues. Let him think
for himself, and write his own opin-
ions in a way to make his readers
think. If he will but pause to look at
things for little while, he will find
that, in nearly every important matter
upon which the editor is called upon
to express himself, he is burdened
chiefly with advice and suggestions
from people in his own community
whose personal interests are most at
stake in relation to this issue. He
will find that the people in every COM
munity who are in close touch with
the men who run and draw results
from the great corporations in the
larger cities, are always the men who
are ready to point out the beauties of
conservatism. He will find them elo-
quent on the theory that what is good
for them is good for the whole COM
munity.
He will find them presenting to him
arguments which are exploited, more
or less directly, in the great dailies, in
opposition to new men and new ideas.
He will find that the politician, as
rule, takes his cue finally from these
great conservatives. He will find that
all the machinery for the making of
public opinion is, in the hands of
people whose interest it is that public
opinion shall in no way interfere with
their graft. He will find his every
mail burdened with printed slips from
various publicity bureaus, which he
can use free, and in every case he will
find that the purpose and purport of
this slip matter is to bolster up some
great private interest built upon pub
lie rights and property, or to discre-
dit some man or movement, proposing
to put a check to the ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
of such wealth by the restoration to
the community of the rights which
have been flched away from it, through
the connivance of corrupt representa-
tives. The sort OF big corrupt journal
to which have called attention,
fourishes because the people do not
think. It distorts and perverts its
news in order to lead the occasional
thinking reader to wrong conclusions,
for a man is certain to reach wrong
conclusion if his reasoning is neces-
sarily based upon false premises for
thinking.