The Wilmington morning star., 1944-04-11

and often disagree with them as much as many OF
his readers His articles serve the good purpose OF
making people think.
BY WEsTBROOK PEGLER
NEW YORK-About two years ago, yielding
to the wild impulse of the man who threw an
egg into electric fan, I composed re-
strained and dignifed but daring criticism of
the Negro press for the United States, finding
it low, venal and violent and ethically no
better than the journalism of Charles Coughln
of Detroit, and I should have added, Marshall
Field of New York and Chicago. AS I expect
3D. the retaliation was vigorous, and the guilt
lest of the Negro opportunists in the field of
journalism, profiteers in their peoples per-
plexity and exploiters of ambition and frustra-
ton among their brothers, naturally were the
most violent. Their racket had been recognized
and challenged. In the name of racial anity
and cooperation they had been promoting
race riots and, in contempt of their own pro-
fessed respect for the intelligence and dignity
of their brethren, they were taking dirty money
from swind1ers who advertised voodoo per-
fume, guaranteed to bewitch reticent females,
lodestones to bring luck to clients of the
numbers racket and lucky charms to help
in filling inside straights and in shooting ten
the hard way.
Recently, having received a mild admonition
from even so moist friend as Eleanor Roose-
welt to inspect their sights and alter their
methods, the magnates of the Negro press
celebrated an occasion designated national
Negro newspaper week. l do not know what
exercises went on but, for the record l should
like to quote from an editorial in the Tribune
of Los Angeles, a newspaper published by and
for Negroes.
This" said the Tribune, by decree Of the
Negro publishers Assn, is national Negro
newspaper week and this paper has been en-
couraged to mark the event with editorial
mention. Well we will, but what we have to
say about the Negro press won't be what the
majority of the craft will like to hear. For by
and large we share Westbrook Peglers opinion
of Negro newspapers. For the most part the
Negro press, to a journalist of any training
talent and respect for the profession is nausea
ting That is distinctly our reaction to the
local crop, the national "biggies'' and the
smaller weeklies all over the country, most
of which we read often enought to know that
they are not improving any. We know that
some of the papers have circulations vast in
proportion to the Negroes population But
the Negro newspapers are poWerless while the
white ones really possess that much Wanted
power of the press. Negro newspapers are
poWerless because the men and women be-
hind them and on them have power. They
lack the power of skill, of qualifications for
= ,ir jobs, of knowledge without which ZEAL
of which they have plenty, is just damned
nuisance After a WHILE the job gets too big
for them, too demanding. And they suffer
further handicaps which are ugly Illustrations
of ego and they become corrupt and crooked
editors and publishers make newspapers
And the people who work on newspapers help
make them, the columnists and reporters, the
1,,ho have hot f2x To
fit in their jobs. And you have no Negro
editors in the best sense of the word You
have only politicians and promoters with their
ewes on power, with zeal to lead. to do some
thing. without the tools for the doing.
(Which is why Negro newspapers fall back
on imitation and, in their ignorance the editors
initiate the very worst elements of the White
press. And when it comes to sensational
ism. to vulgarity, to shallowness, to cheapness.
the Negro newspapers go the White press one
better If the white Winchell is vulgar, the
details of rape case in the Hearst papers
are lurid, they're downright elemental in a
Negro paper, And if the white tabloids glorify
cheapness, Negro newspapers go farther in
clarifying vulgarity, even viciousness
''By failing in their duty. which is to be
really beacon, the Negro press, more than
any other single agency, has retarded the pro-
greSs OF the Negro. .What is the solution?
1t lies with small newspapers like the Tribune,
conducted by trained journalists whose zeal is
for the job at hand-not power, not prestige,
but the production of models of journalism;
and that includes everything connected with
the publication of newspaper; service to
the community. financial success and technical
perfection.
Having been reader of the Los Angeles
Tribune for two years, and of other Negro
publications even before, I feel qualified to en-
dorse the contrast which it perceives between
itself and the Pittsburgh Courier, the Chicago
Defender, the Afro-American and other Negro
publications of more renown.
The hope of making the good neighbor pol
icy general throughout the world is perhaps
the most solid basis for believing that we
can arrive at successful world organization
capable of making and maintaining peace
Assistant Secretary of State Adolf A. Berle Jr.