against free silver cost that paper one third of its subscribers, and involved a financial loss of more than $150,000. The war upon the open saloon, five years before national prohibition, entailed a still heavier loss to the Portland Telegram.
Power of Head-Writer
On what do you young women and young men form your individual opinion—the editorial page, or the news dispatches, or the headlines? It would be interesting to question the student body and learn how you are influenced in the forming of opinion upon political, moral and social questions that bulk large in the public mind. About 35 years ago Judge Matthew P. Deady, who for many years was the honored president of the board of regents of the University of Oregon, called one afternoon at the Oregonian office. In those days the entire telegraphic report was contained within three columns published under single-line heads.
I introduced a new telegraph editor to Judge Deady. He asked, "Are you the man who puts the headings on the telegraph news?" The inquiry being answered in the affirmative, Judge Deady remarked, "Then you are the man who moulds public opinion." I wonder what estimate Judge Deady would have placed on the influence of a heading in big black type that ran clear across the front page and about one-sixth of the way down.
Partisanship in Papers
I am sure that the students of this university will not form opinions from the headlines covering news of vitally important matters before the American people at this time. Within the hour of this assembly you would scarcely have time to listen to a reading of the list accompanied by the briefest explanation. Take only two out of forty or fifty—the two on which America must soon make a decision. Shall the United States Senate ratify the Four-Power Pacific treaty? Should the United States government recognize the Soviet government of Russia?
If you were sufficiently interested in the Pacific treaty to follow the news, you must have learned yesterday that the Senate is already in a bitter partisan fight—the same kind of partisan fight that prevented our entrance into the League of Nations. It is so bitter that some party leaders appear to be oblivious to the needs of the world. We are going to see this partisanship in every congressional district from now until the November election. One party "points with pride" and the other party "views with alarm" the very same things. It has been so ever since we established government by party 120 years ago, and until a radical change comes, if ever it comes, we shall have partisanship. The newspaper will be partisan just as it has always been, but with more of independence than the politician has. You may have observed that one "regular" Republican paper in Portland has repeatedly denounced the Republican Senate for seating Newberry.
American Government Best
You need not lose sleep over the recrudescence of extreme partisanship this year. We have these fights every two years, with a particularly hard fight every fourth year. The people follow the leaders of the two major parties. We battle until the polls close, sit up to get the election news, then we instantly abide by the will of the majority, and all of us go back to our task next day as good friends as ever, but prepared in our mind for the next fight; and because we have had these clashes of opinion in every political campaign, with the partisan newspapers always in the thick of things, and because the final test of strength is made at the ballot box, we have perpetuated the best government on earth.
Since more or less biased newspaper opinion on purely political matters is almost inescapable, must you look elsewhere for a basis for your own opinions? I think not. We of America have now a group of a relatively new kind of opinion-makers. They are the star reporters
[ 3 ]
