Evening star., 1942-08-29

year 1900, or three times the cur
rent assessment If that Is higher.
Cost Might Exceed S1,00O,000
Depending on the size of the city,
this tribute might exceed $1,000 900
"a million dollar refund to news
for AZ years past, a bonus on past
monopoly. The beauty of the pro-
vision is that, besides presenting a
financial bar to membership, it
forces the penalized applicant to
strengthen his competitor and
weaken himself by the same bonus
payment as the price of getting
started.
Even without the money tribute,
however the election provision is
mere window dressing. Let it be
absolute veto, right of protest. a
four-flfths vote or simple majority,
the fact remains that no newspaper
will be elected to the A P. over the
| objection of competitor.
The reason is simple. The average
A. P. member is bound to think: IF
vote to give this member a COM
petitor he will vote some day to
give me one So he votes no. He
VIII always vote no. Four times in
IL years, between 1929 and l941. at
tempts were made to obtain A. P.
franchises by election. over the OBJ
lection of competitors. Every at
tempt failed.
In the pioneer days of American
Journalism, when there was no Or
ganlzed method of gathering news,
an association which banded to-
gether to collect and distribute news
might perhaps claim to be a gen.
ulne cooperative, and might assert
that its inVentiveness and initiative
gave 1t the right to limit it's mem
| bership to those who did the Or
ganizlng work. If So the rightness
OF that claim ended years ago, Just
as the limited monopoly granted to
inventors under patent laws comes
to an end as matter of public
policy.
Most of the pioneers who organ
| lied the A. P. are dead Hnanimate
corporations have succeeded them
and devote their energies to keeping
| the worlds news in their own hands.
News gathering has become a huge,
worldwide concern, too vitally con-
nected with human welfare to be
subjected to monopolistic control.
A free press is too important to
have 1t placed in the shackles of
monopoly at the fountainhead of
| news.
No Control by Government.
| If, as result OF the Governments
suit, the monopoly clauses of the
Associated Press bylaws are held
to be unlawful, no member of that
association will suffer in his lust
rights. News will be collected and
distributed as before, to all news
papers that wish to share in the cost
and labor. The cost to present
members, therefore, will be cut
down. The Government will exer-
else no control whatever over the
news. Every newspaper will be left
IN absolute freedom The press as
whole will be set free from a mo-
nopoly which now throttles its free
dom and hampers its expansion.
When the Government moves to
put an end to this monopoly, it does
what the Illinois Supreme Court
undertook to do in 1900, at which
tlme the predecessor Associated
Press was organized under the laws
OF the State of Illinois. Our Su-
preme Court held in that year that
news was of such public concern
that an agency like the A. P. must
serve all newspapers without dis
elimination. The old Associated
Press thereupon fled from the State
OF Illinois and reorganized as a
membership corporation in the State
of New York. under a law governing
the formation of private clubs,
churches, etc.
The idea expressed in 1900 by the
Illinois Supreme Court was SO es-
sentially right that it could not
perish. The A. P. fled from the
command of the State of Illinois,
but it could not flee from the idea.
1t is proper and fitting that, follow
ing the complaint Of an Illinois
newspaper. the Federal Government
should tell the Associated Press now
what the courts of Illinois told it AZ
years ago. This is the admonition of
Government dedicated to freedom
of the press and equality of oppor-
tunity, the Federal Governments
| admonition to the Associated Press.
Live up to your name. Be in
truth and in fact an Associated
Press, an association of the American
press, dedicated to furnishing all
the news to all the people, through
whatever newspaper the people
prefer to buy.