The Bottineau courant. (Bottineau, Bottineau County, N.D.) 1895-1929, 1920-08-12
FARGO FORUM
Gets CAUGHT
IN CRUDE LIE
"Fake Factory BIunders When
II Tries to Connect Frazier
With |. W. ".

Running true to form, the Fargo
"Fakum" (Forum), organ of the Twin
City Milling and Flour Dukes who
are endeavOring to fasten their long,
bony, 'tigerish claws upon the govern
ment of North Dakota at the coming
election, is at its old trick Of taking
up news and trying to undermine
Governor Frazier among farmers by
falsely connecting him with the /. w.
w. So many palpable and b%are-faced
lies have been circulated in recent
years by this organ of the Minneapolis
Chamber of Commerce that it would
be difficult to say which n first en-
titled it to charter membership in the
Flickertail Liars club; however, eit
would appear the "Governor Frazier
I. w. w. lie' is the biggest one in
newspaper history, making the Fakum
(Forum) fake factory" a laughing
stock throughout the state.
The Fakum (Forum) came out with
Il l~Opg-winded, pipe dream last week
to the effect that Governor Frazier
had issued al order protecting the l.
w. w. from arrest and that word to
Of Police Dahlgren of Fargo, the
sheriff of Cass county and the city
attorney of Fargo within recent weeks.
Both the sheriff and Chief Dahlgren
deny ever receiving any orders of this
kind from the governor. Their repu-
diation of the Forum story leaves it
in the position of a deliberate liar.
The Courier-News of Fargo has inves-
tigated the story, finding it utterly
unfounded." Following is a copy Of
the Courier-News editorial comment
upon the crude output of ~falsehOOds
from the Forum fake factory:
MALICIOUS NEWSPAPER TAXING
deliberate, malicious and inten-
tional Justification of facts in a news
story published in and ent cit from
Fargo in reference to Governor Frazier
and the l. w. w. has been proven by
Investigation by the Courier-News.
"The charge was made that Cover
nor Frazier had issued an order pro-
tecting' members of the l. w. W. from
arrest and that the orders Of the chief
executive had been received by Chief
of Police Dahlgren OF Fargo, the sher-
if of Cass county and the city attor-
ney within the last two weeks.
"The chief of police and the sheriff
yesterday stated positively that NO
SUCH ORDER had been received and
furthermore that they had not re-
ecived any order relating to the 1. w.
w. from Governor Frazier.
I'm other words, those officials say
there was ABSOLUTELY NO FOUN-
DATION for the statement made con-
Meeting Governor Frazier with the l..
W. w.
"The motive of the lie is plain. It
was an u%nprincipled attempt to injure
Governor Frazier with the farmers Of
the state by trying to make them be-
lieve that the governor was support
ing the members of the I. w. w. in
what was said to be their effort to
force the farmers of North Dakota to
pay 81 a day for harvest workers.
"Rarely has such a deliberate false
hood been printed about a man in
public life.
1T was a lie manufactured for the
direct purpose of trying to discredit
Governor Frazier and was WITHOUT
EVEN THE SLIGHTEST FOUNDA-
TION in fact.
"The chief of police Of Fargo, the
sheriff or the county attorney of Cass
county did not tell any newspaper
man they had received such an order
from the governor and if they had
been asked they would have said they
did not receive any such order. just
as they stated to the Courier-News.
"The falsehOod would have been
more serious perhaps if it had not
been so pitifully clumsy. It was a lie
so easily REPUTABLE that it is hard to
imagine that any newspaper or cores
pondent with any ordinary common
sense would have deliberately "faked'
a statement of the kind.
However, it is merely a sample Of
the sort Of campaign tactics that the
enemies of Governor Frazier will fol-
low as long as a newspaper can be
found that has sunk so low in the
scale of decent journalism us to fill it's
columns with deliberately faxed
falsehoods about the chief executive
of the state" .~