There had been, too, a slipping away from the common standards of honesty. The growth of the large corporation and the rise of public utilities had given political power a financial value hitherto unknown. The tendency was to apply material rather than moral standards; to ask, "What has he?" rather than "What is he?" A nation-wide influence for good was sadly needed.
The Evening Post was a paper fitted to be such a national influence. It had been founded as a conservative organ; the men who had edited or controlled it from its inception had been men who, if not followers of Hamilton politically, agreed with him in viewing with distaste the "excesses" of journalism. Some of these conservatives, in the old days, were robust men—Coleman for instance or Bryant, who carried constructive criticism to the point of belaboring W. L. Stone, the editor of the Commercial Advertiser, over the head with a cane. But no paper in America was better fitted for the work in hand.
It is unquestionably true, as William James says, that Godkin influenced the men who wrote editorials more than any other individual in the country. On the other hand it was also said by intellectual men that he was not always fair in his criticism of those men and measures that he did not favor, and that "he was apt to convey the idea that if any one differed from him on a vital question, like the tariff, or finance, or civil service reform, he was necessarily a bad man."[1]
It was this tendency that led many to believe that his influence on the intelligent youths of the country was not for the best, and he was blamed for painting the condition of the country and of politics as so bad that the one was not worth while entering and the other was not worth while saving. The result was that many educated
- ↑ Historical Essays, 276.
