[Speech of Slason Thompson at the seventy-fourth dinner and fourth
"Ladies' Night" of the Sunset Club, Chicago, Ill., April 26, 1894.
The Secretary, Alexander A. McCormick, presided. Mr. Thompson spoke
on the general topic of the evening's discussion, "The Ethics of
the Press."]
MR. PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN:--It would be interesting, I think,
for the gentlemen of the press who are here to-night if they could find
out from what newspaper in Chicago the last speaker [Howard L. Smith]
derives his idea of the press of Chicago. I stand here to say that there
is no such paper printed in this city. There may be one that, perhaps,
comes close down to his ideas of the press of Chicago, but there is only
one--a weekly--and I believe it is printed in New York. The reverend
gentleman who began the discussion to-night started into this subject
very much like a coon, and as we listened, as he went on, we perceived
he came out a porcupine. He was scientific in everything he said in
favor of the press; unscientific in everything against it. He spoke to
you in favor of the suppression of news, which means, I take it, the
dissemination of crime. He spoke to you in favor of the suppression of
sewer-gas. Chicago to-day owes its good health to the fact that we do
discuss sewer-gas. A reverend gentleman once discussing the province of
the press, spoke of its province as the suppression of news. If some
gentlemen knew the facts that come to us, they would wonder at our
lenience to their faults. The question of an anonymous press has been
brought up. If you will glance over the files of the newspapers
throughout the world, you will find in that country where the articles
are signed the press is most corrupt, weakest, most venal, and has the
least influence of any press in the world. To tell me that a reporter
who writes an article is of more consequence than the editor, is to tell
me a thing I believe you do not believe.
When Charles A. Dana was asked what was the first essential in
publishing a newspaper, he is said to have replied, "Raise Cain and sell
papers." Whether the story is true or not, his answer comes as near a
general definition of the governing principle in newspaper offices as
you are likely to get.
Strictly speaking, there is no such thing as ethics of the press. Each
newspaper editor, publisher, or proprietor--whoever is the controlling
spirit behind the types, the man who pockets the profits, or empties his
pockets to make good the losses--his will, his judgment, his conscience,
his hopes, necessities, or ambitions, constitute the ethics of one
newspaper--no more! There is no association of editors, no understanding
or agreement to formulate ethics for the press. And if there were, not
one of the parties to it would live up to it any more than the managers
of railways live up to the agreements over which they spend so much
time.
The general press prints what the public wants; the specific newspaper
prints what its editor thinks the class of readers to which it caters
wants. If he gauges his public right, he succeeds; if he does not, he
fails. You can no more make the people read a newspaper they do not want
than you can make a horse drink when he is not thirsty. In this respect
the pulpit has the better of the press. It can thrash over old straw and
thunder forth distasteful tenets to its congregations year after year,
and at least be sure of the continued attention of the sexton and the
deacon who circulates the contribution-box.
What are the ethics of the press of Chicago? They are those of Joseph
Medill, Victor F. Lawson, H. H. Kohlsaat, John R. Walsh, Carter Harrison,
Jr., Washington Hesing, individually, not collectively. As these
gentlemen are personally able, conscientious, fearless for the right,
patriotic, incorruptible, and devoted to the public good, so are their
respective newspapers. If they are otherwise, so are their respective
newspapers.
As I have said before this club on another occasion, the citizens of
Chicago are fortunate above those of any other great city in the United
States in the average high character of their newspapers. They may have
their faults, but who has not? Let him or her who is without fault throw
stones.
If the newspaper press is as bad as some people always pretend to think,
how comes it that every good cause instinctively seeks its aid with
almost absolute confidence of obtaining it? And how comes it that the
workers of evil just as instinctively aim to fraudulently use it or
silence it, and with such poor success?
To expose and oppose wrong is an almost involuntary rule among newspaper
workers--from chief to printer's devil. They make mistakes like others,
they are tempted and fall like others, but I testify to a
well-recognized intention of our profession, the rule is to learn the
facts, and print them, too--to know the truth and not hide it under a
bushel. Nine-tenths of the criticisms of the press one hears is the
braying of the galled jades or the crackling of thorns under a pot.
The press stands for light, not darkness. It is the greatest power in
our modern civilization. Thieves and rascals of high and low degree hate
and malign it, but no honest man has reasonable cause to fear the abuse
of its power. It is a beacon, and not a false light. It casts its
blessed beams into dark places, and while it brings countless crimes to
light, it also reveals to the beneficence of the world the wrongs and
needs of the necessitous. It is the embodiment of energy in the pursuit
of news, for its name is Light, and its aim is Knowledge. Ignorance and
crime flee from before it like mist before the God of Light. It stands
to-day
"For the truth that lacks assistance,
For the wrong that needs resistance,
For the future in the distance,
And the good that it can do."
It has no license to do wrong; it has boundless liberty and opportunity
to do good.