Saturday, December 20, 2014

The Sheriff of Nottingham was a government employee

I just thought that fact needed to be stated.

Following up on a previous blog posting where I went a little bit into the revisionist history of Robin Hood, "Who polluted Robin Hood?", wouldn't recognition that the Sheriff was a government employee pretty much put the whole thing to bed?

"Robin Hood stole from the rich and gave to the poor"

No, not really. The Sheriff of Nottingham was a government employee. Robin Hood stole from the government and gave to the poor, because they were being oppressed by the tyranny of high taxation and only dear Robin had the spine to stand up and fight back.

Robin gave them back what was already rightfully theirs.

The Sheriff of Nottingham was a government employee.

Thursday, December 18, 2014

Where and when did this conservative vs establishment battle begin?

Rush talked about a politico story back on November 3rd which relies heavily on establishment insiders giving good talking points to left wing journalists, so as to be able to hit members of the Tea Party harder over the head. Since then, we have seen the GOP win the election overwhelmingly, and then go on to give Obama everything he wants. Specifically a trillion dollar spending bill and amnesty.

There are a lot of people out there who believe that the Republican Establishment is out to GET conservatives, and quite frankly, I don't see how anybody can argue against it. Not anymore, not after what happened to Chris McDaniel in the Mississippi Primary. Particularly, in the ads that were ran which were of a racial nature.

Many people believe, because they have seen it actually happen, that many in the Republican party would prefer to see a Democrat win an election over a conservative.

What I am going to do here is put forth a timeline, going backward. This is not meant to hit every possible example, but rather simply to establish points in time as we move.

So, let's stroll backward. It's not hard to find articles which highlight how the Republican Establishment willingly chose to sabotage Ken Cuccinelli's Gubernatorial candidacy. But this battle doesn't start here. Not even close.

Even before the 2010 sweep, people like Trent Lott were making comments that "We don't need a lot of Jim DeMint disciples," in D.C. "As soon as they get here, we need to co-opt them." What I didn't know at the time when I first saw this, was just how bad this would get and that these people in the establishment would do this sort of sabotaging right up to general elections. But, all this nastiness doesn't start here in 2010 either.

There have been a lot of nasty races since 2010, a lot of name calling both in and outside of these races. It is not my intent to recount them all. Many of you will(or have, even) do much better than I can at it. I'm not making a list, I'm making a timeline. So lets keep going.

Lott's quote is useful for not only putting on display the view leading into one of the biggest Republican elections in recent times(2010), but it also allows for a brief mention of the Bush years. Demint took a lot of heat for simply doing the right thing - and these were during the mid 2000s.

Let's go back to the 80's. In a lot of ways, the Establishment versus Reagan fights are a thing of unwritten legend. Going back that far, there was only left wing media so none of it got reported on at the time. But there are some which bubble back to the surface, such as one that has actually become widely known. The story of how those in the establishment tried multiple times to remove the famous line "Tear Down this Wall". Other stories involve things such as the 1986 amnesty bill, which everybody conveniently forgets was co-authored by a republican member of congress who preferred his Democrat cohorts - and he was not alone. So much for a unified party behind Reagan, congress had to have its arm twisted, hard, to get border security in that bill, and they still haven't made good on their promises nearly 30 years later.

The Establishment versus Reagan narrative is very easy to see in the challenge to Ford in 76, so I will gloss over it and continue going backward - why did the Establishment not like Reagan? Well, he didn't like them. But this doesn't start with the 1968 "Stop Nixon" movement, the bad blood here starts with how so many in the Establishment sabotaged Barry Goldwater's run for presidency in 1964. Reagan was there, he saw it first hand. Not only did they take out Goldwater, but they were so slimy, that Reagan openly called the Establishment "traitors" following his 1966 run for Governor. They tried to take him out during his Gubernatorial run. He said: (December 10, 1964)

We don't intend to turn the Republican Party over to the traitors in the battle just ended. We will have no more of those candidates who are pledged to the same goals as our opposition and who seek our support. Turning the Party over to the so-called moderates wouldn’t make any sense at all.

Now, you would think that surely the mid 60's, yes, this has to be where the battle begins. Nope.

There is this story, which recounts a little bit of Tom Dewey's role in the Republican Establishment. This is the mid 1940's, we are getting closer. But we still need to go back further.

Hitting the right key words(knowing the language of the left), we can see where Hoover made his own jabs in his day at those who wanted to see Constitutional rule over progressive rule. Much to Hoover's credit, FDR shocked him into seeing the errors of his ways. Most people (in the context of Hoover's conservative beliefs) now remember Hoover for what he said/did post-presidency - his early days as a progressive member of Wilson's government are nearly universally forgotten. Hoover deserves a lot of credit for coming around to it and embracing the Constitution. Keep in mind, this is the early 1920's. We still have to keep going backward.

We have to go back to 1910, to Theodore Roosevelt. This is where the Republican Establishment became established.

In an article titled "ROOSEVELT WANTS PARTY HARMONY", we see Roosevelt saying the following: (direct PDF download)

My position in regard to the Governorship this Fall is this: I want to find the best man for the office; the man who is most acceptable to the rank and file of the Republican Party and the independent voters. I intend to do everything in my power to see that such a man is elected.

In terms of some of today's well known figures, the above quote will sound just like what some members of the Establishment say, and you know exactly who this sounds like. It hasn't changed in a century. They've been saying the same thing for 100 years. What Roosevelt says next, though, is rather profound:

I want you to make it clear, that I am seeing both sides. I wish you would make that emphatic. My main interest is in the State, but on National issues I want to see both regulars and insurgents, party men and independents. I want to see Democrats as well as Republicans.
"But you don't want to see Democrats win," he was asked.
"Not if the Republicans do the right thing," replied the Colonel.

I guess if the Republicans do the wrong thing, Roosevelt did want to see Democrats win. But what was the wrong thing? Keep in mind, the "insurgents" were the progressive republicans. He himself, Theodore Roosevelt, was an "insurgent republican".

I seem to remember that Theodore Roosevelt started a third party just two years after this, in which the vote was split and Wilson won. I've seen people write that they thought that TR did this on purpose, well, now it would seem that after all he did do it on purpose.

I guess the regulars made headway and the Republican party did the "wrong thing" in Roosevelt's view. Roosevelt, like most other progressives, was quite fond of the use of this word "reactionary". In other words, this quote from the one New York Times article above is not a one-time a stand alone item. Roosevelt made it clear where he stood. He stood with the government and its perpetual growth. He stood against the "reactionaries".

The current battle between those inside the Republican Party who believe in the Constitution, and those who do not, is as old as the progressive movement itself. This all goes back to Theodore Roosevelt. He was the first. How many people within the Establishment today have you seen speak glowingly of TR? There's your answer.

Knowing this history is very helpful for understanding why people like Ted Cruz are so opposed within the party, and why Cuccinelli and McDaniel are not moving forward with their careers.

Its helpful for understanding what we are seeing right now with the CRomibus and the amnesty approval.

But most importantly, it's helpful in looking forward, for what we're about to see happen come 2016.

The progressives in the Republican Party are going to do everything they can to put a stop to the "reactionaries".


Know the history - know the future.

Saturday, December 13, 2014

Narrative journalism and narrative protesters, and Upton Sinclair

Jim Geraghty published an interesting article the other day about 'Narrative Journalism' titled "What If the Media’s ‘Narrative Journalism’ Harms Their Own Causes? It has been widely discussed in light of what it contains, so I am going to go right for what is outside the box.

Narrative Journalism, in this context, also necessarily implies narrative protesters. The narrative being pushed by the journalist does not have to be true by any means, but to the protesters, it is very real. The challenge is that we as citizens are supposed to be able to trust the journalist establishment without fear that they are manipulating information with the primary goal of manipulating us. But that's what establishes narrative protesters. Each of these major protests fits within the narrative, and is scripted. You can see how the script plays out over and over again, it repeats itself. Yes, each protest is different, but yet each protest is the same. They follow the same template.

Just look at today's protests, compare it with yesterday's protests, with protests from last decade, and keep going backward. They all have the same structure, and all with the same goals. Don't look at the micro, look at the macro. So where does this come from?

It comes primarily from the Sacco and Vanzetti trial. Upton Sinclair knew that they were guilty. The problem here is that Upton Sinclair was a believer in the revolution - and the revolution is more holy than the truth is to the revolutionist. Sinclair had insider information that nobody else had, that if anybody else had gained this information they may have been more willing to be honest.

Well, it happened the way it happened and all we can do at this point is learn from it. First, you have the narrative packaged by members of the media - this builds up expectations. It doesn't matter that the reporting is a lie, the lie is coming from journalism so that makes it true, and people come to expect that certain things will occur because they have been told that certain facts are true. So when a verdict that they expect does not come down, the people watching get upset. They go out and protest because they think they've been lied to.

Thus, the narrative protest hits the streets.

Sadly, the people really have been lied to, but they aren't blaming the correct group. They aren't lied to by jurors. Not by judges. They aren't being lied to by congressmen, senators, or the president. The mass of the narrative protesters was lied to by the narrative that the journalists spun, and the journalists are still getting away with it even though they've been using this template for close to 100 years.

The only way to do damage to a lie so well established for so long a period of time, is to have the truth readily available and at your service. You have to know it well. You have to live it. Upton Sinclair's letter to John Beardsley is key to any attempts to break this system of Narrative Journalism and Narrative Protesting. One thing leads to the other.

Make sure you have downloaded a copy. The copy that I put online is the real thing, it even has the stamp on it. You can also access a typed transcript of that letter, here, for quick searching.

http://tinyurl.com/lu42pb9

Saturday, December 6, 2014

Upton Sinclair's letter of deception about Sacco and Vanzetti

Upton Sinclair's 1929 letter to John Beardsley

Dear John:

I will write you a few notes about the matter concerning which we were talking last night.

When I went to Boston the last time in October 1928 I was completely naive about the Sacco-Vanzetti case, having accepted the defense propaganda entirely. But I very quickly began to sense something wrong in the situation. There was an air of mystery about the Boston anarchists, and I saw they had something to conceal. Then in Sacco's cross examination I detected what seemed to be a slip in his alibi. I began asking catch questions, and ultimately I got the admission from one of the leading defense witnesses that his testimony had been framed. I got a virtual admission of the same thing from another witness. It became certain to me that Sacco at least had been concerned in the dynamitings which had occurred in New England just after the war, and I supposed that this was what was being hidden from me. I remained of the opinion that both men had been unquestionably innocent of the crime of which they were accused. Their trial had manifestly not been a fair one, and on that basis I was prepared to defend their right to a new trial. That was my state of mind at the time that I agreed with The Bookman for the serial publication of "Boston".

But on my way to Denver, where I had arranged by telegraph to meet Fred Moore, I turned the matter over in my own mind, and doubts began to assail me. Alone in a hotel room with Fred I begged him to tell me the full truth. His reply was "first tell me what you have got." I decided to take a chance at the worst, and I told him that I knew that the men were not merely terrorists, but that they were guilty of the holdup. His reply was, "Since you have got the whole story there is no use my holding anything back," and he then told me that the men were guilty, and he told me in every detail how he had framed a set of alibis for them. He said that there were quite a group of terrorist anarchists who had been supporting the movement by various kinds of pay-roll holdups, and that all the practises were well known to Carlo Tresca and Gurley Flynn.

This naturally sent me into a panic. I telegraphed Seward Collins of The Bookman saying that I could not write the book, and I cabled half a dozen translators and publishers abroad canceling arrangements which I made for serial publication. But on my way to Los Angeles I thought the matter over, and I realized certain facts about Fred Moore. I had heard that he was using drugs. I knew that he had parted from the defense committee after the bitterest of quarrels. Sacco in a letter had addressed him as, "your implacable enemy." Moore admitted to me that the men, themselves, had never admitted their guilt to him; and I began to wonder whether his present attitude and conclusions might not be the result of his broodings on his wrongs. The first thing I did when I got to Los Angeles was to see Lola Moore, Fred's former wife, who had divorced him. She had been all through the four or five years of the case with him, and she expressed the greatest surprise, when I told her of Fred's conclusion, saying that he had most positively not been of that opinion when he had dropped the case and left Boston.

I faced the most difficult ethical problem of my life at this point. I had come to Boston with the announcement that I was going to write the truth about the case. If I had dropped the project it would have been universally said and believed that it was because I had decided the men were guilty. I had, of course, no first hand knowledge of their guilt, but I did have first hand knowledge of the framing of testimony. I decided that I would write the story on the basis of telling exactly what I knew. I would portray all sides, and show all the different groups and individuals telling what they knew and what they believed. I would take my stand on the point that the men had not been proved guilty, and that their trial had not been fair. That was all that the law required in order to prevent the execution, and it was all that my thesis required.

I put the problem up to Floyd Dell who happened to come out here, and he read the chapters which I had so far completed, and said that what I was doing was exactly correct. Of course, word spread among the committee in Boston what I was doing, and they flew into a panic, and I had a long string of horrified and indignant letters and telegrams. They strenuously denied that there had ever been any perjury in the case - which, of course, I knew to be perfectly absurd. They also denied that Sacco had ever been a terrorist -- though on this point I was finally able to back Gardner Jackson down. I saw him in New York before the book went to press, and we went all over various scenes line by line, and argued for hours. Gardner admitted that I was all right about Sacco, but he claimed that I was doing Vanzetti an injustice. Charles Boni had listened to our discussion. I asked him his opinion, and he said that Gardner had admitted everything that I was claiming, and a little more. Vanzetti as a pacifist was a perfect absurdity, because I talked with a Socialist whom he had chased with a revolver, and young Brini told me of having witnessed a similar scene as a child in his home.

The rumors of Sacco's guilt were very general in the Italian colony in Boston, and there is no possible question that these rumors, brought to Thayer and Fuller and Lowell in a thousand forms by the police, were the real reason for the execution. When I was in New York last fall I made another effort to satisfy my own mind about the problem. I asked Roger Baldwin, who is, himself, an anarchist, and knows the whole crowd. He told me there was no possible doubt of the guilt of Sacco and Vanzetti, and that the militant anarchists had financed themselves that way for years, both here and abroad. They never took the money for themselves, but only for the movement, and this constituted them idealists and heroes from the point of view of extreme class war theories.

I then took this proposition to Robert Minor, who was an anarchist up to the time of the Russian revolution, and who knows the whole movement. Bob said that he had heard these rumors from the beginning, and had investigated them carefully, and was convinced that they were not true about Sacco and Vanzetti. He says he has never known a class war case of this sort in which there were not similar rumors, and people who will tell you all about it from the "inside." Sometimes they are started by police agents and sometimes by a certain type of weak minded person who takes a pleasure in having the real inside story about a sensational mystery.

So you see that in the end I don't really know any more about the thing than I did in the beginning, and can only take my stand as I did in "Boston", upon the thesis that men should not be executed upon anybody's rumors.

This letter is for yourself alone. Stick it away in your safe, and some time in the far distant future the world may know the real truth about the matter. I am here trying to make plain my own part in the story, and the basis of my seemingly controdictory moods and decisions.

Sincerely,

Upton Sinclair

http://tinyurl.com/o4k59zm

Sunday, November 23, 2014

Who polluted Robin Hood?

Robin Hood was not a jacobin nor a socialist, robbing from the rich and giving to the poor. But here, I will highlight where he was transformed into one.

The title of the book is: "Robin Hood: A Collection of All the Ancient Poems, Songs, and Ballads, Now Extant Relative to that Celebrated English Outlaw ; to which are Prefixed Historical Anecdotes of His Life", authored by Joseph Ritson, who was sympathetic to Jacobinism. This book was first printed in 1795. This book is a collection of his works, which means that he was spreading this filth around in who knows how many publications in how many countries prior to collecting them. Ever wonder why now, that idea of Robin Hood as a communist is so widespread? This is why.

About Ritson's Jacobin viewpoint, see "Joseph Ritson: a critical biography", by Henry Alfred Burd. P. 177 (here)

Previous to this, most old stories of Robin Hood had him stealing from the Sheriff of Nottingham(Child Ballad 122), or, from characters such as The Bishop of Hereford. (Child Ballad 143; alt) There are a few outliers, such as Martin Parker's Ballad(154), which Ritson cites, but it was Ritson who mainstreamed this idea where no longer do the Sheriff or King John get rich via taxes, and instead, it is Robin Hood who does the redistributing.

Now, for a small examination of Ritson's writing, particularly page xlvii:

In a word, every man who has the power has also the authority to pursue the ends of justice, to regulate the gifts of fortune, by transfering the superfluities of the rich to the necessities of the poor; by relieving the oppressed, and even, when necessary, destroying the oppressor. These are the objects of the social union, and every individual may, and to the utmost of his power should, endeavour to promote them.

This kind of language seems very familiar. Who does that sound like to you?

http://tinyurl.com/nx23zuq

Friday, November 7, 2014

Edward Ross explains his resignation from Stanford University

Following the (at the time) infamous "Ross Affair", Professor Edward Ross had this to say about his resignation:
At the beginning of last May a representative of organized labor asked Dr. Jordan to be one of the speakers at a mass meeting called to protest against coolie immigration, and to present 'the scholar's view.' He was unable to attend, but recommended me as a substitute. Accordingly, I accepted, and on the evening of May 7th read a twenty-five minute paper from the platform of Metropolitan Hall in San Francisco. . . . I tried to show that owing to its high, Malthusian birth rate the Orient is the land of 'cheap men,' and that the coolie, though he can not outdo the American, can underlive him. I took the ground that the high standard of living that restrains multiplication in America will be imperiled if Orientals are allowed to pour into this country in great numbers before they have raised their standard of living and lowered their birth rate. I argued that the Pacific is the natural frontier of East and West, and that California might easily experience the same terrible famines as India and China if it teemed with the same kind of men. In thus scientifically co-ordinating the birth rate with the intensity of the struggle for existence, I struck a new note in the discussion of Oriental immigration which, to quote one of the newspapers, 'made a profound impression.' On May 18th, Dr. Jordan told me that quite unexpectedly to him Mrs. Stanford had shown herself greatly displeased with me, and had refused to re appoint me. He had heard from her just after my address on coolie immigration. He had no criticism for me and was profoundly distressed at the idea of dismissing a scientist for utterances within the scientist's own field. He made earnest representations to Mrs Stanford, and on June 2d I received my belated re-appointment for 1900-1. The outlook was such, however, that on June 5th I offered my resignation.

When I handed it in Dr. Jordan read me a letter which he had just received from Mrs. Stanford and which had, of course, been written without knowledge of my resignation. In this letter she insisted that my connection with the university end, and directed that I be given my time from January 1st to the end of the academic year. My resignation was not acted upon at once, and efforts were made by President Jordan and the president of the board of trustees to induce Mrs. Stanford to alter her decision. These proved unavailing, and on Monday, November 12th, Dr. Jordan accepted my resignation in the following terms:

'I have waited till now in the hope that circumstances might arise which would lead you to a reconsideration. As this has not been the case, I, therefore, with great reluctance, accept your resignation, to take effect at your own convenience. In doing so I wish to express once more the high esteem in which your work, as a student and a teacher, as well as your character as a man, is held by all your colleagues.'

Last year I spoke three times in public - once before a university extension centre on 'The British Empire,' once before a church on 'The Twentieth Century City,' and once before a mass-meeting on coolie immigration. To my utterances on two of these occasions objection has been made. It is plain, therefore, that this is no place for me. I can not with self-respect decline to speak on topics to which I have given years of investigation. It is my duty as an economist to impart, on occasion, to sober people, and in a scientific spirit, my conclusions on subjects with which I am expert, and if I speak I can not but take positions which are justified by statistics and by the experience of the Old World. . . . I am sorry to go, for I have put too much of my life into this university not to love it. My chief regret in leaving is that I must break the ties that bind me to my colleagues of seven years, and must part from my great chief, Dr. Jordan.

Saturday, November 1, 2014

Henri de Saint-Simon and Technocracy

In "The Coming Of Post-industrial Society", Daniel Bell writes the following: (Page 76-77)
Industrial Society, as St. Simon insisted, was the application of technical knowledge to social affairs in a methodical, systematic way. With industrial society, thus, has come the technicien - the French usage is more apt than the English "technician," for its sense in French is much wider - the trained expert in the applied sciences. It has implied, too, that those who possessed such knowledge would exercise authority - if not power - in the society.

St. Simon's vision of industrial society, a vision of pure technocracy, was a system of planning and rational order in which society would specify its needs and organize the factors of production to achieve them. Industrial society was characterized by two elements, knowledge and organization. Knowledge, he said, was objective. No one had "opinions" on chemistry or mathematics; one either had knowledge or not. The metaphors St. Simon used for organization were an orchestra, a ship and an army, in which each person fulfils a function in accordance with his competence. Although St. Simon clearly outlined the process wherby a nascent bourgeoisie had superseded the feudal nobility, and though he predicted the rise of a large working class, he did not believe that the working class would succeed the bourgeoisie in power. As he tried to show in his sketch of historical development, classes do not rule, for society is always governed by an educated elite. The natural leaders of the working class would therefore be the industrialists and the scientists. He forsaw the dangers of conflict, but did not regard it as inevitable. If an organic society were created, men would accept their place as a principle of justice. The division of labor meant that some men would guide and others would be guided. In a society organized by function and capacity, doctors and engineers and chemists would employ their skills according to objective needs, not in order to gain personal power. These men would be obeyed not because they are masters but because they have technical competence; to be obedient to one's doctor, after all, is a spontaneous but rational act. For this reason the St. Simonians, in a set of phrases that later were used by Engels, gave their new social hierarchy the slogan, "From each according to his capacity, to each according to his performance," and the industrial society, as they describe it, was no longer the "rule over men, but the administration of things."

The administration of things - the substitution of rational judgement for politics - is the hallmark of technocracy.

Saturday, September 27, 2014

William Thomas Stead personally taught "Government by Journalism" to William Randolph Hearst

If you are someone who is upset about the state of Journalism today, and the one-sided ideological view that they take on every issue, then the essay "Government by Journalism" will be a real eye opener for you.

But William Thomas Stead was not content only with manipulating his readers through his one single paper, the Pall Mall Gazette, Stead looked for someone who would truely bring his idea to new heights - manipulate readers in greater numbers than he could ever possibly reach. He said:

I have been long on the look out for a man to appear who will carry out my ideal of government by journalism

This is how the interview begins, then Stead explains to Hearst in greater detail:

I am certain that such a man will come to the front some day, and I wonder if you are to be that man. You have many of the qualities such a man must possess. You have youth, energy, great journalistic flaire, adequate capital, boundless ambition - yes, you have all these. But - but, I am not sure you have got a soul, and if you have not a soul all the other things are as nothing

This notion of Hearst "having a soul" is very important, but I'll get to it at the bottom. As for the rest of this paragraph, Stead is absolutely convinced that Hearst is the best man for the job in regards to Government by Journalism. So what is this "Government by Journalism"? In Stead's own writing, in a paragraph specifically written about journalists, Stead writes that:

They decide what their readers shall know, or what they shall not know.

Sound familiar? Stead even gives an example of how this works, right after that line. He writes:

One man is a favourite with the press, and his speeches are reported in the first person. Another man has offended the reporters or the editor, and his remarks are cut down to a paragraph.

They do this today to Sarah Palin, Ted Cruz, and many others. It was Stead who was the pioneer in this, and he exported his ideas to America via William Randolph Hearst. So now that you have an idea of what Government by Journalism is, what else did Stead say in regard to his meeting with Hearst?

After I returned home and was settling down to work I was startled by receiving every now and then from Mr. Hearst cablegrams addressed to his London correspondent asking him to obtain and to telegraph what I thought upon what the Journal was doing in this, that, or the other direction. I do not for a moment argue post hoc propter hoc, but it was almost immediately after that midnight talk that Mr. Hearst began to realise the ideal of a journalism that does things. He took up the question of municipal ownership. He engaged Arthur Brisbane, the son of Brisbane the Fourierist, to write editorials. He began the battle against the Trusts; he made the Spanish-American war. For weal or for woe Mr. Hearst had found his soul; for weal or for woe he had discovered his chart and engaged his pilot, and from that day to this he has steered a straight course, with no more tackings than were necessary to avoid the fury of the storm.

That paragraph is explained by these two comments from Hearst: (from the interview section)

"Journalism is only a business, like everything else!"

This is very important to understand. William Thomas Stead single handedly changed Hearst's mind. At the beginning of the interview, Hearst walked in with dollar signs in his eyes. But at the end of the interview:

"It's very interesting what you say," replied Mr. Hearst. "It never occurred to me in that light before."

After the interview Hearst now viewed his papers as places to influence policy positions, and the rest is what I quoted above, from engaging the Trusts to Municipal Ownership and more.

This is where the part about having a soul comes in. What did having a soul mean to William Thomas Stead? He explains:

But in the inmost soul of him–and he has a soul and has found it–there is a desire to serve the common people. He is a Jeffersonian Democrat, a natural demagogue, and a man who is proud of being the tribune of the people.

Demagoguery is the core of having a soul. Stead tries to cast this as "being in service" to the common people, yet the whole scheme is a fraud and is nothing more than a journalist being in service to their own policy preferences.

I have written extensively about how Walter Lippmann is the "Father of Modern Journalism" (here and here), and was also a "brilliant" manipulator of public opinion. But who would be the Grandfather of Modern Journalism? I believe that to be William Thomas Stead.

He laid the foundation upon which so many of their tactics rest today. In "The Future of Journalism" Stead explains how journalists can regiment themselves around certain people(See starting with paragraph 11), not just to gather certain information but to impart it from the inside. It's top to bottom manipulation, this goes much deeper than just the reporting you see or hear. "The Future of Journalism" was a follow up essay for "Government by Journalism" - this second one is geared more toward the implementation of achieving those goals.

Stead created the idea, and had some success in its implementation, but it was Hearst - Hearst was the vehicle for the mass use and implementation, as well as the vehicle for importing all of this from Britain and into America. Lippmann merely finished the job and perfected it.

Sunday, September 14, 2014

John Day pamphlets

I have found this series to be intriguing, now that I own one. This pamphlet series is 45 publications long, it ran from 1932 to 1934. They are as follows: (author, title)

1: Rebecca West, Arnold Bennett Himself

2: Stuart Chase, Out of the Depression--and After: A Prophecy

3: Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin, The New Russian Policy: June 23, 1931

4: Norman Edwin Himes, The Truth about Birth Control: With a Bibliography of Birth Control Literature

5: Walter Lippmann, Notes on the Crisis

6: Charles Austin Beard,The Myth of Rugged American Individualism

7: Rexford Guy Tugwell, Mr. Hoover's Economic Policy

8: Herman Hagedorn, The three pharaohs: a dramatic poem

9: Marion Hawthorne Hedges, A Strikeless Industry: A Review of the National Council on Industrial Relations for the Electrical Construction Industry

10: Gilbert Seldes, Against Revolution

11: George Sylvester Counts, Dare the School Build a New Social Order? (Special, 56 pages)

12: Hendrik Willem Van Loon, To Have or to Be--Take Your Choice

13: Norman Thomas, The Socialist Cure for a Sick Society

14: Herbert George Wells, What Should be Done -- Now: A Memorandum on the World Situation

15: Victor Francis Calverton, For Revolution

16: Horace Meyer Kallen, College Prolongs Infancy

17: Richard Bartlett Gregg, Gandhiism versus Socialism

18: Pearl Sydenstricker Buck, Is There a Case for Foreign Missions?

19: Stuart Chase, Technocracy: An Interpretation

20: Albert Einstein, The Fight Against War. Edited by Alfred Lief. (Special, 64 pages)

21: Arthur Gordon Melvin, Education for a New Era: a Call to Leadership

22: John Strachey, Unstable Money

23: Ambrose William Benkert and Earl Harding, How to Restore Values: The Quick, Safe Way Out of the Depression

24: Everett Ross Clinchy, The Strange Case of Herr Hitler

25: Walter Lippmann, A New Social Order

26: Elwyn Brooks White, Alice Through the Cellophane

27: Osgood Nichols and Comstock Glaser, Work Camps for America

28: Louis Morton Hacker, The Farmer is Doomed

29: Archibald MacLeish, Frescoes for Mr. Rockefeller's City

30: Committee of the Progressive Education Association on Social and Economic Problems, A Call to the Teachers of the Nation

31: Henry Hazlitt, Instead of Dictatorship

32: Stuart Chase, The Promise of Power

33: Matthew Josephson, Nazi Culture: The Brown Darkness Over Germany

34: Maurice Finkelstein, The Dilemma of the Supreme Court: Is the N.R.A. Constitutional?

35: Lev Davydovič Trockij (Leon Trotsky), What Hitler Wants

36: Audacity! More Audacity! Always Audacity!, Published in Cooperation with The United Action Campaign Committee

37: Harold Rugg and Marvin Krueger, Study Guide to National Recovery: An Introduction to Economic Problems

38: Bertram David Wolfe, Marx and America

39: Marquis William Childs, Sweden: Where Capitalism is Controlled

40: Sir Arthur Salter, Toward a Planned Economy

41: Edward Albert Filene, The Consumer's Dollar

42: Rev. John Haynes Holmes, Is Suicide Justifiable?

43: Mary Catherine Philips and Frederick John Schlink, Discovering Consumers

44: James Rorty, Order on the Air!

45: Stuart Chase, Move the Goods!

http://tinyurl.com/oqxknp4

Update:

Here are all the ones I can find for current reading:

1: Rebecca West, Arnold Bennett Himself

6: Charles Austin Beard,The Myth of Rugged American Individualism (page 13-22)

7: Rexford Guy Tugwell, Mr. Hoover's Economic Policy

9: Marion Hawthorne Hedges, A Strikeless Industry: A Review of the National Council on Industrial Relations for the Electrical Construction Industry

11: George Sylvester Counts, Dare the School Build a New Social Order? (Special, 56 pages)

15: Victor Francis Calverton, For Revolution

16: Horace Meyer Kallen, College Prolongs Infancy

17: Richard Bartlett Gregg, Gandhiism versus Socialism

19: Stuart Chase, Technocracy: An Interpretation

24: Everett Ross Clinchy, The Strange Case of Herr Hitler

24: Everett Ross Clinchy, The Strange Case of Herr Hitler (alt)

30: Committee of the Progressive Education Association on Social and Economic Problems, A Call to the Teachers of the Nation

31: Henry Hazlitt, Instead of Dictatorship

32: Stuart Chase, The Promise of Power

34: Maurice Finkelstein, The Dilemma of the Supreme Court: Is the N.R.A. Constitutional?

36: Audacity! More Audacity! Always Audacity!, Published in Cooperation with The United Action Campaign Committee

37: Harold Rugg and Marvin Krueger, Study Guide to National Recovery: An Introduction to Economic Problems

38: Bertram David Wolfe, Marx and America

41: Edward Albert Filene, The Consumer's Dollar

43: Mary Catherine Philips and Frederick John Schlink, Discovering Consumers

45: Stuart Chase, Move the Goods!

Saturday, September 13, 2014

An old, almost impossible to find pamphlet of progressivism

It's here!

For the most part, I have had a lot of success rifling through the progressives' history via the internet, but if we really want to dig up dirt on these people we need an even greater availability of their words - easily accessible.

I will at some point scan this in, into PDF form for general reading. For now, I do not have the time to do the scanning and conversion that will be necessary. But it's just another thing to look forward to!

These people, these progressives, do not want their history to be seen, which is why we must shine the light. I happen to believe that their history is their greatest weakness.

There are other books currently not visible online which contain more pertinent content than this does, but this still helps to create a more full picture of what we face.

Friday, September 12, 2014

Helping to Make a President, by William Inglis

HELPING TO MAKE A PRESIDENT, BY WILLIAM INGLIS (Parts 1 and 2) From Collier's, October 7th, 1916.

Mr. Inglis was associated with Colonel George Harvey in the conduct of "Harper's Weekly" from 1906 until 1913, when Colonel Harvey sold the paper. During that time Colonel Harvey undertook a campaign of publicity to make Woodrow Wilson president. During the conduct of this campaign Mr. Inglis was Colonel Harvey's first lieutenant.

FOREWORD.- From a college professorship to the presidency of the United States in eight short years is a mighty leap. But Woodrow Wilson took it gallantly and landed in the White House. No such performance is recorded in history. None approaching it so teems with striking and dramatic incidents. None has even had so many close calls - margins so narrow that a feather's weight would have turned the scale. Consider:

If Laurence Hutton had not given a certain dinner party at a certain time in Princeton in 1905; or, If the Lotos Club of New York had not given a dinner to the new president of Princeton in 1906 - it is most improbable that Woodrow Wilson would ever have been mentioned seriously for the presidency.

Again: If a New Jersey politician had not felt under obligations to a New York editor; or, If a New London chauffeur had not found a tiny steel ball in his pocket at a critical moment - Woodrow Wilson could not have been nominated for governor.

Furthermore: If the election of a governor of New Jersey had fallen in 1909, when the Republican party was dominant, or in 1911, which would have been too late, instead of in 1910, when the way was clear - Woodrow Wilson could not have been elected governor, or nominated for president.

Finally: If the Great Commoner had not been thwarted in his latest endeavor to capture the prize for himself - Woodrow Wilson could not have secured the nomination or the election.

By such trifles is shaped the progress of men of destiny. To the lot of a mere reporter, trained to register facts without regard to opinions, has fallen the privilege of telling this remarkable story of events— all of which he saw and a part of which he was.

Paving the Way

I SHALL not soon forget my most important assignment. I received it one morning early in 1907, in the private office of the famous old publishing house in Franklin Square, in the words of my chief, Colonel George Harvey, so far as I can recall them, substantially as follows:

"From this time forward I want you to give your best thought and most of your waking moments to the promulgation of Mr. Wilson's candidacy for president. As you know, I have been plowing the ground for nearly two years. Now is the time to begin to sow the seed. Despite the incredulity and hilarity which the original suggestion evoked, I am now satisfied that the movement can be made a real one. The people want not only a change of men but a change of type. Roosevelt alarms them and they are sick and tired of Bryan. This makes for an opportunity, as I perceive it, to render a real public service by putting at the head of the Government a man who embodies the high intelligence and best traditions of the past. We have such a man in Mr. Wilson. He meets all the requirements, so far as I can see at the present time. Moreover, the country is beginning to regard the possibility with some seriousness. The scoffing has largely disappeared and many who at first regarded the suggestion as idealistic and impracticable are coming around to the view that we cannot aim too high. The thing to do now is to make Mr. Wilson known to the country; in other words, to advertise and exploit him in every conceivable way - and it is to that work that I wish you to give your chief attention.

"There is no possible chance, of course, of securing his nomination next year. Bryan is too strong for one thing, and it would be idle to propose for president a man who has held no public position. Consequently I am looking ahead to 1912 as a feasible time. It happens that the election of a governor of New Jersey takes place at the psychological moment, in 1910. The country will then be disgusted with the Republican party, and the Democrats should make a clean sweep. Meanwhile, we can utilize the great political interest of next year to acquaint the public with the merits and personality of our candidate as a real factor. I want you to help on and follow the movement in every detail. For example, I shall be going to Europe soon, and while I am away, particularly, but afterward, whether I am here or not, I want you to read the editorial pages of the newspapers throughout the country and cut out and save all references, however trivial, to Mr. Wilson, meanwhile making every suggestion you can think of to help make him known and understood. That is the one important task for the next two years. The political part, especially with respect to the governorship of New Jersey, will have to be met when the time comes as best it may be. I think, however, I can see a way to do that. You understand the program," he concluded sententiously; "now go to it."

I have to confess that the undertaking, as thus outlined by Colonel Harvey, impressed me as chimerical, but his earnestness and my regard for his political sagacity largely offset my own opinion, and in any case the project was fascinating. The consequence was that when I left his room I was alive with an enthusiasm which never waned until I heard the nomination at Baltimore pronounced unanimous.

The first thing to do obviously was to post myself on what had already been done. I had been away so much, in Japan and Cuba and elsewhere, that I had not followed the "Wilson movement" closely, and probably had not attached rightful importance to it. So I promptly got out the files of the "Weekly" and groped back to the issue of March 10, 1906, which contained the speech of Colonel Harvey at the Lotos Club on February 3, when the first mention was made of Woodrow Wilson as a presidential possibility. As a matter of historic interest, the portion of that speech referring to Mr. Wilson is printed herewith.

FIRST MENTION OF WILSON FOR PRESIDENT

From a Speech by Colonel George Harvey at the Lotos Club on February 3, 1906

For nearly a century before Woodrow Wilson was born the atmosphere of the Old Dominion was surcharged with true statesmanship. The fates directed his steps along other paths, but the effect of growth among the traditions of the fathers remained. That he is preeminent as a lucid interpreter of history we all know. But he is more than that. No one who reads, understandingly, the record of his country that flowed with such apparent ease from his pen can fail to be impressed by the belief that he is by instinct a statesman. The grasp of fundamentals, the seemingly unconscious application of primary truth to changing conditions, the breadth in thought and reason manifested on those pages, are clear evidences of sagacity worthy of the best and noblest of Virginia's traditions. . . .

It is that type of men we shall, if, indeed, we do not already, need in our public life. No one would think for a moment of criticizing the general reformation of the human race in all of its multifarious phases now going on by executive decree, but it is becoming increasingly evident that that great work will soon be accomplished. When that time shall have been reached, the country will need at least a short breathing spell for what the physicians term perfect rest. That day, not now far distant, will call for a man combining the activities of the present with the sobering influences of the past.

If one could be found who, in addition to those qualities, should unite in his personality the finest instinct of true statesmanship "as the effect of his early environment, and the c less valuable capacity for practical application, achieved through subsequent endeavors in another field, the, ideal would be attained. Such a man I believe is Woodrow Wilson of Virginia and New Jersey.

As one of a considerable number of Democrats who have grown tired of voting Republican tickets, it is with a feeling almost of rapture that I occasionally contemplate even a remote possibility of casting a ballot for the president of Princeton University to become President of the United States.

In any case, since opportunities in national conventions are rare and usually preempted, to the enlightened and enlightening Lotos Club I make the nomination.

I subsequently learned how this initiatory speech of Colonel Harvey's, delivered so early as February, 3, 1906, happened to come about. At the time I supposed naturally that it was only such a complimentary suggestion, put forth on the spur of the moment, as is usual upon such occasions in speaking of a guest of honor. But this was not the case. Mr. J. Henry Harper told me afterward that, when Mr. Wilson was inaugurated president of Princeton, in June, 1905, he received an invitation to attend the ceremonies, and was about to decline when a letter came from Laurence Hutton asking him to a dinner party comprising Mark Twain, Mr. Cleveland, ex-Speaker Reed, Mr. Gilder, and others.

This promised to be interesting, as indeed it proved as recorded in Mr. Gilder's "Reminiscences." Knowing Colonel Harvey's friendship for Mr. Cleveland and admiration of Mr. Reed, Mr. Harper asked him if he would not like to go. He said he would, and in due course received the formal invitations. They stopped with Mr. Harper's friends, the Armours, who had also as guests Robert T. Lincoln, President Harper of the Chicago University, and others. They all went to the inauguration together and, returning to the house, discussed the speeches, especially that of the new president, which all commended highly. Mr. Lincoln, in particular, pronounced it the best of its kind he had ever heard, and President Harper was hardly less enthusiastic. Colonel Harvey concurred and added reflectively and, as Mr. Harper afterward thought, significantly:

"That man could win the people; I want to know about him."

The two motored to Colonel Harvey's place at Deal the following day, and after dinner the colonel excused himself to go to his tower library, and, replying to a question from Mr. Harper, said laughingly: "I am going to study Wilson." He remained till midnight.

Seven months later, when notices came to the Harpers' office of a dinner by the Lotos Club to President Wilson—so I was told later by some one in the office - Colonel Harvey came out with the notice in his hand and said: "I think I should like to speak at that dinner; won't one of you see if you can arrange it?" And that evening marked the beginning of the acquaintance of Colonel Harvey and Mr. Wilson—and of the great event.

Needless to say, the crisp little speech made a hit with the audience; years afterward, when many things bad happened, I asked the colonel how Wilson took it.

"He did not seem dis-pleased," was the reply. "Anyhow, he wrote me a charming note about it before he went to bed that night. I still have it somewhere."

Later I found it in one of the innumerable pigeon-holes at Deal and, for my own satisfaction, made a copy, as follows:

University Club, Fifth Avenue And Fifty-Fourth Street, New York, February 3, 1906.

My Dear Colonel Harvey: Before I go to bed to-night I must express to you, simply but most warmly, my thanks for the remarks you made at the Lotos dinner. It was most delightful to have such thoughts uttered about me, whether they were deserved or not, and I thank you with all my heart.

With much regard, sincerely yours, Woodrow Wilson.

I began at the beginning and read and docketed all of the articles that had appeared in "Harper's Weekly" during 1906. How many pages they filled I would not venture to say. Every conceivable device obviously had been utilized to evoke comment, favorable or unfavorable. The response of the press throughout the country savored rather of amusement than of derision. Nevertheless the originator of the idea had seen to it that it should be regarded with some measure of seriousness. Two of the most able and famous publicists at that time were Mayo W. Hazeltine and Henry Loomis Nelson. From the former the "North American Review" obtained a striking article over the signature "A Jeffersonian Democrat." Mr. Nelson was induced to discuss the proposal at length in the Boston "Herald." Still another, Dr. St. Clair McKelway, who was a personal friend of Colonel Harvey's and on intimate terms with Mr. Wilson, helped on the movement through the Brooklyn "Eagle." Some time in March the colonel went to Charleston, ostensibly to make a speech, but really to enlist the cooperation of Major J. C. Hemphill, the talented editor of the "News and Courier." The effort was successful, and Major Hemphill missed no opportunity thereafter to exploit Wilson in his own inimitable way. Meanwhile the "Weekly" itself was continuing to print numberless editorials and communications discussing the subject from all angles.

The New Jersey Legislature at this time was about to elect a successor to Senator John F. Dryden. The Republicans had a large majority, but the thought occurred to the colonel that some recognition' of Mr. Wilson as a political factor in his own State might be obtained by getting for him the complimentary vote of the Democrats. With this purpose in mind, he visited ex-Senator James Smith, Jr., in Newark, and then, for the first time, I think, enlisted that gentleman's interest in Mr. Wilson's political fortunes. Mr. Smith and Colonel Harvey were friends of long standing, and purely on personal grounds, having no other candidate in mind, the senator readily acquiesced.

Before proceeding further, however, the colonel felt that he should place the matter before Mr. Wilson, and met him by appointment one evening at either the Century or the University Club. He informed me on the following morning that, while Dr. Wilson said frankly that he should regard such a compliment as highly flattering, he could not appear as a candidate for the honor, especially against his former classmate, Colonel Edward Stevens. Thereupon Colonel Harvey visited Colonel Stevens and, after outlining his far-reaching plan, tried to induce him to cooperate by standing aside. This Colonel Stevens refused to do, not so much because he desired an empty honor as that he feared his withdrawal would be regarded as a feather in the cap of the Smith machine. This was rather disheartening, nevertheless on the eve of the caucus the colonel went to Trenton to see if something could not be done, and I accompanied him. There we met James R. Nugent, Senator Smith's lieutenant, who had been instructed by his chief to extend all the aid he could. An insurmountable barrier, however, developed from the attitude of a group of younger assemblymen (which included the man who is now Mr. Wilson's private secretary, Mr. Joseph P. Tumulty), who were as adamant. After becoming satisfied that they could not be persuaded to withdraw their opposition, we abandoned the project and took the midnight train for home. Subsequently as governor Mr. Wilson demonstrated his magnanimity by appointing Colonel Stevens superintendent of highways. One of his other opponents he appointed judge of the Supreme Court, and Mr. Tumulty he made his private secretary.

The publicity campaign proceeded without abatement through the remainder of the year, but seemed to make little headway, and I was beginning to feel discouraged when, one morning in January, I dropped into the private office for information and directions. The colonel was seated at his desk writing, and I took a chair and waited till he had finished. There was a look of elation on his face when he raised his head.

"Here is something," he remarked, "that may cheer you up. I was dining last night with Mr. Pulitzer, who has just returned from Europe. At first he made a good deal of fun of what he termed my 'professorial candidate.' But we talked along until Mr. Pulitzer became really interested and asked all manner of questions about Wilson. I kept arguing with him that the 'World' surely could lose nothing by speaking a good word for a Democrat of the highest class, and finally he said, with one of his big guffaws:

"'Well, I'll tell you what I'll do. I will print an editorial coming out for Wilson if you will write it.'

"Of course, I promptly agreed, and here is the article. I want you to read it over and see if you can suggest any improvement."

I read it as requested, but could see no advantages in making changes. Late that afternoon I met the colonel coming in as I was going out. I eagerly inquired about the fate of the editorial. He laughed and replied:

"It is all right. I took it up and read it to Mr. Pulitzer while we were driving in the park. The only comment he made was: 'It sounds like a speech.' He fairly roared, though, when I rejoined that I had done my best to adapt my style to the 'World's.' That is all that was said, but I am sure it is all right."

Sure enough, the next morning the editorial appeared in the "World" as a double-leaded leader, and made a lot of talk in the press through the whole country. In view of all the circumstances, it seems to me well worth while to reproduce a part of it here:

"If the Democratic party is to be saved from falling into the hands of William J. Bryan as permanent receiver, a Man must be found - and soon. Dissociated opposition will no longer suffice. There must arise a real leader around whom all Democrats uninfected by populism, and thousands of dissatisfied Republicans, may rally with the enthusiasm which springs only from a certainty of deserving success, and at least a chance of achieving it.

"The Man's principles must be sound. He must be a defender of the Constitution, but not the worshiper of a fetish. . . . He must be opposed, as a matter of policy, to gross extravagance in the use of public funds, and he must detest, on principle, any taxing of the people beyond the actual requirements of their government. He must favor immediate reduction of the tariff. He must be a hater in equal measure of paternalism and socialism. He must set his face like flint against government ownership of railroads, initiative and referendum, government guaranties of bank deposits, and all other populistic notions. He must demand from all corporations publicity, obedience to law, and recognition of the superior rights of the whole people, but he must also observe the obligations of the State to protect its own artificial creation in all legitimate and authorized undertakings. He must favor the singling out and rigorous punishment of individual wrongdoers, not merely the fining of an impersonal corporation. He must be a radical conserver, not a destroyer, of both public and private credit. He must be an opponent of imperialism, militarism, and jingoism. He must prefer too little government to too much government, and must insist unceasingly upon rigid application of the basic principle of government by the people through their authorized representatives in Congress in preference to any government by commission. . . .

"Such are the requirements - many and exacting. One Democrat who unquestionably meets these qualifications is Woodrow Wilson, president of Princeton University.

"Dr. Wilson is primarily a scholar - a historical scholar - who in the course of his work and growth has become a statesman of breadth, depth, and capacity, a true Democrat who, though steeped in Jeffersonian doctrines, asks not what Jefferson did a century ago, but what Jefferson would do now; an able theorist, but a no less competent executive, who has had much administrative experience as the head of a great university.

"Not only is Woodrow Wilson qualified in every respect for the great office of president of the United States, but he is an available candidate.

"Who else could surely carry New Jersey? Who would stand a better chance of carrying New York? Who would more certainly restore Missouri and Maryland to the Democratic column and eliminate all possible doubt of the result in any other Southern State? Who has a stronger personal following, fewer enemies, nothing to retract, no entanglements, no commitments to capitalism or demagogism? . . .

"The 'World' has already presented John A. Johnson, governor of Minnesota, as an available Western candidate for the Democratic nomination for president. It takes equal pleasure in presenting Woodrow Wilson as a Southern candidate, no less available and with presidential qualifications exceeded by those of no man whose name will be presented to any national convention."

Fishing for Josephus Daniels

BUT Dr. Wilson himself had no illusions. On May 2 he was interviewed in Pittsburgh with this result as reported by the "World": "Dr. Wilson was asked if he was a candidate for the presidential nomination. A smile stole over his features as he answered: 'While I appreciate most heartily Colonel Harvey's kindness in bestowing on me such an honor, I must say I think there are other wires taller than mine which will attract the lightning.'"

Another editor was brought into camp through a similarly odd circumstance; but that was later, in the early part of 1911. Mr. Harper and Colonel Harvey were guests of Clarence Mackay at his shooting lodge in North Carolina. Mr. Mackay was summoned to New York unexpectedly one night, and his guests remained for another day's trial at the quail. While at breakfast, Mr. Harper told me after his return, the colonel remarked:

"There ought to be some way while we are down here to turn a trick for Wilson. I wonder whom we could get hold of."

They talked of various persons until the colonel said: "I've got it. Let us try for Josephus Daniels. He is the boss of the State as well as the editor of the "News and Observer." He is completely obsessed by Bryan, but he might be induced to consider a second choice. Anyhow, there is no harm in trying."

A telegram of invitation was dispatched forthwith to Mr. Daniels at Raleigh, with the result that he came over to the lodge on an afternoon train and spent the night, the discussion lasting into the wee small hours. I had forgotten all about the incident until two or three months later, when the colonel summoned me to his office.

"Here is a chance," he said. "Mr. Harper told you about my talk with Josephus Daniels. Well, it has produced no results up to date. But I have just received from him a copy of his paper containing a glowing account of a great celebration of some anniversary of his editorship. He also incloses a photograph. Take it and make a full page for the 'Weekly.' Make it as flattering as you know how. It is impossible to overfeed his vanity, and if you plaster it on thick enough, he may feel that he ought to respond in kind toward Wilson."

Mr. Daniels Takes the Bait

I PREPARED the article as directed and it appeared in the following number. Soon afterward the ''News and Observer" began to make pleasing references to Mr. Wilson, with the final result that the North Carolina delegation voted for him at Baltimore and the country obtained the services of a somewhat unusual secretary of the navy.

Meanwhile the powerful support of the noblest Roman of them all had been secured in a quite remarkable way - and thereby hangs a tale. Colonel Henry Watterson had regarded the suggestion of a college professor for president with great glee and had poked a deal of fun at "Harper's Weekly" and other newspapers which had enlisted in the movement. But to every suggestion that I made to Colonel Harvey that he try to enlist Mr. Watterson, the invariable reply was that it was too early, that Mr. Watterson was one who always took his own time and went his own gait, and that we should have to await a favorable opportunity. The occasion finally came in dramatic fashion - but I am getting ahead of my story.

I shall never forget a certain Monday morning in January, 1910. Although not so greatly impressed then as I am now by what had just happened, I nevertheless felt its deep significance. Summoning me to his office, my chief spoke substantially these words:

"As I told you at the beginning, there has been nothing to do in a political way for Wilson these past two years; but the effect of the publicity has been on the whole satisfactory. The time has come now to proceed on a political line. On Saturday I lunched by appointment with Senator Smith at Delmonico's and we put in the entire afternoon discussing the situation. Although one of the shrewdest political observers I have ever known, I doubt if the senator quite appreciates the smash which is going to overwhelm the Republican party next November. But he does think there is a possibility of carrying New Jersey if a strong candidate shall be named. He agreed with me that if the Democrats could be held in line, Wilson would make a most effective appeal to Republican and independent voters. There are several candidates, however, who have always been his friends and supporters and to whom he feels under distinct obligations. But he is very uncertain respecting the party workers and rank and file as to Wilson. He is going to think it over, however, and talk with a few of his lieutenants, and we are to meet again next Saturday."

A week later I was awaiting the arrival of Colonel Harvey at the office with much eagerness and went immediately into his room. He told me with great satisfaction that the senator had come up to the scratch in fine shape, partly because his inquiries had convinced him that he would have little trouble with the regulars and partly because he considered himself under certain obligations to Colonel Harvey for fetching him into contact with Mr. William C. Whitney years ago and thereby winning for himself the senatorship. The colonel added:

"He told me in his outspoken fashion that he was prepared to go ahead whenever I could assure him that Wilson would accept the nomination. He said, however, that I ought to consider one phase of the situation carefully. That was that if he should force Wilson's nomination there would be, in the first place, a great cry about boss dictation, and a good many people would believe and more would say that he was using Wilson as a stool pigeon in order to secure his own reelection to the Senate. I told him that I had realized those drawbacks and had been unable thus far to see how they could be overcome.

"'Well,' he said, 'I have thought it all over carefully, and I am ready to go the whole hog. If you think it advisable, I will make definite announcement to-morrow that under no circumstances would I accept reelection to the Senate.'

"'But,' I argued, 'if you do that, would not a good many of your political friends, whom you will have to depend upon in the State convention and who are interested only in your own political fortunes and care nothing for Wilson, be deterred from putting forth all their energies?' "He admitted that there was something in this point, and, as there did not (Continued on page 37)

Helping to Make a President

(Continued from page 16)

seem to be any need of an immediate decision, it was left in this way, that he would go on and nominate Wilson if he could and that if at any time prior to the convention or the election I should notify him that I thought his presumed candidacy for the Senate was endangering Wilson’s chances for either the nomination or the election he would declare flatly that he would not go back to the Senate under any circumstances. So there the matter stands, and it is up to me to get some sort of expression from Wilson.”

Some weeks later Colonel Harvey went to Princeton to make a speech to a woman’s club in which Mrs. Wilson was interested, and with Mrs. Harvey spent the night with Mr. and' Mrs. Wilson. The two men put in the entire evening discussing the situation. Finally, as the colonel informed me on the following day, he said to Mr. Wilson:

“It all resolves to this: If I can handle the matter so that the nomination for governor shall be tendered to you on a silver platter, without you turning a hand to obtain it, and without any requirement or suggestion of any pledge whatsoever, what do you think would be your attitude? That is all that is necessary for me to know. I do not ask you to commit yourself even confidentially."

Mr. Wilson, according to Colonel Harvey, walked up and down the floor for some minutes in deep thought, apparently weighing all considerations and possibilities with the utmost care. Finally he said slowly:

“If the nomination for governor should come to me in that way, I should regard it as my duty to give the matter very serious consideration."

The Situation Tightens

HERE the discussion ended. Colonel Harvey informed Senator Smith of his conversation, which the senator pronounced satisfactory for the time being. On the eve of the colonel’s annual departure to Europe the two had a further conversation, and the senator agreed to hold the matter in status quo until the colonel should return in May.

As it happened, he was detained abroad by unexpected business a full month longer than he had anticipated. When he did return things were at fever heat in New Jersey, because everybody then realized that the Democrats were practically certain to carry the State, and various candidates were pressing their claims hard upon Senator Smith. I went from the steamer with the colonel to Deal, and remember distinctly that, as we entered the house, the telephone was ringing, and the colonel remarked laughingly: “I would bet that is the senator." And it was. He was at his house in Elberon, and was insistent upon an immediate conference. The colonel went over to see him that evening, and upon his return told me that the situation had reached a poignant stage, which required the promptest action. The senator simply could not hold his people for another week without distinct assurance that Wilson would accept if nominated. He had already overstretched the time allotted by a full month, and had reached the end of his rope. This was on Thursday. By my chief’s direction I got Mr. Wilson on the telephone at Princeton, and the colonel asked him if he could come to Deal over Sunday, saying that it was of the utmost importance. Mr. Wilson replied that he could not very well do so as he had arranged to take his family to Lyme, Conn., on Saturday; but that if the colonel felt presence at Deal was absolutely required on Sunday he would come from Lyme. So it was arranged.

If You Don t Fetch Him

ON Saturday forenoon we were sitting in Colonel Harvey's office. He had just told me that be ad arranged with Senator Smith to come to dinner to meet Mr. Wilson the next evening, when the telephone rang and Mr. Bowen, the colonel’s secretary, said:

“It is Colonel Watterson at the Manhattan Club. He wants you to come to luncheon.”

The colonel started to answer immediately, but suddenly hesitated and said: “Tell him I will let him know in a few minutes.”

I guess for five minutes he sat there meditating. Then he said:

“I am beginning to think, Inglis, that the hand of Providence is in this business. Watterson is the very man that I need at this juncture. I do not feel at all certain that the senator now wants Wilson. In fact, I am pretty sure that, now that Democratic success seems probable, he would prefer some one else. He has already performed his full obligation, and more too. So I have no further claim on him. I am also wholly in the dark about Wilson, because I have not seen him for months and have no idea what may have happened in the meantime to influence his mind. I expect that I will find them both somewhat offish, and I need help. Mr. Watterson, better than any other man in the country, can give me that assistance. Now the question is, can I get Watterson? Anyhow, let us try."

The secretary then called Colonel Watterson on the telephone and Colonel Harvey said to him that he could not lunch with him, but was very anxious to see him and insisted that he come to Deal over Sunday.

Colonel Watterson replied that he had a dinner on that night and was full of engagements for the following day, but Colonel Harvey insisted so strongly that finally he agreed to take the Sandy Hook boat for Deal Sunday morning. Then Colonel Harvey and I went to Deal to play golf in the afternoon.

That evening a telegram was handed to Colonel Harvey as we sat at dinner on the porch. He broke open the yellow envelope, read the message, put it back in the envelope, and went on with his dinner without saying a word.

“Something has happened to disappoint you,” said Mrs. Harvey. “What is it?”

“Only this," Colonel Harvey replied, handing her the telegram. She read it and handed it to me. I still have it. It reads as follows:

LYME, Conn., June 26, 1910.

COLONEL GEORGE HARVEY, Deal, New Jersey: Sorry to find there is no train from her. to-morrow. Deeply regret I shall not e able to attend dinner.

Woodrow WILSON.

“I am just as well pleased," Mrs. Harvey exclaimed. “It would mean a great deal of responsibility and worry for you. ' I am glad you're not to be burdened with it.”

“Maybe," the colonel remarked smilingly, “that is because you don’t like Wilson?”

“Well, I am, anyway." Such was Mrs. Harvey’s spirited rejoinder.

We sat in perfect silence. Disappointment was no name for it. simply benumbed.

"Well," said the colonel finally, “it's now or never. Something must be done. What is it?"

“If it wouldn't seem,” I suggested, “too much like a reflection on Dr. Wilson’s lack of initiative and resource, I’d go up and bring him down."

"How?"

“Lyme,” I replied, “is only fifteen miles or so from New London. I could run over in an automobile and fetch him back there in time for the express from Boston for New York somewhere about noon. That would make it.”

Colonel Harvey sent for railroad guides, studied them while the rest of us were sipping our coffee, and then said:

“It is possible. You can get the 8.26 from Deal and the midnight from New York for New London. Fast train from New London for New York at 12.35 p. in. Sunday. Yes - it’s possible. I’ll go over to the station with you.”

Within a few minutes I had changed from evening clothes, thrown a few things in a suit case, and hurried downstairs to where Colonel Harvey was sitting in a motor car, waiting for me. At the Deal station he suggested that I telegraph some one in New London for a first-class automobile, so I wired the proprietor of the Crocker House, where I had often stayed over race week, asking him to have the best car he could find waiting for me at nine o'clock the next morning.

“If you don’t fetch him," grimly remarked the colonel as I boarded the train, “don’t come back. Go and commit hara-kiri! Don’t send any word."

Often looking backward over the many instances of luck that favored Woodrow Wilson and forced him to be an active presidential candidate in spite of his seeming lack of interest, I think of the fierce, gnawing stomach ache that afflicted me all that day and night. If it had been a little worse, it would have rendered me unable to sit up, much less to travel. It was the only illness I had had in many years, and its spasms not only racked me with pain but left me weaker and weaker after each attack. Just a little more punishment would have put me to bed—but then came the chance to help make the next president of the United States, and everything else was forgotten.

I was asleep in my berth on the midnight train before it left the Grand Central Station. The porter called me at a quarter to four in the morning, and a few minutes later I was in my room at the Crocker House in New London, undressing and going to bed again. Sharp at eight I was called and the old pain woke with me.‘ Breakfast, therefore, was little more than a sip of coffee, and in a few minutes I was climbing aboard a motor car that seemed to my inexpert eye to be of thirty or forty horse-power and rather well on in years. The driver assured me that by the shore road Lyme was twenty miles away, but that by taking a little rougher road straightaway he could save two miles. I chose the shorter road. It was a good road - in spots. Most of it was so soft and yielding that it seemed likely to provoke skids, and now and then we ran over long corrugated sections that caused the seats to rise suddenly and batter us savagely. About nine miles from New London we came upon a big sign in which the County Supervisors gave notice that the next section of the road was under repair and that all who used it did so at their own risk.

"Well?" I asked the chauffeur.

“I think the car can stand it,” he replied . “We’d lose a lot of time by going back."

So on we went, now and then plowing oxlike through a long stretch of soft earth, again climbing goatishly along a slope where no motor car ought to go, and anon slamming into a hole with a chug that seemed likely to break our teeth. But the car won out somehow, and away we flew again over only ordinarily bad country roads. It was not quite half past ten o'clock in the morning when we ran down the broad avenue which is the principal thoroughfare of the ancient village of Lyme, a delightful, smooth road, with long, unbroken grass plots for sidewalks shaded by maples and elms.

The Car Breaks Down

THE chauffeur cocked his hat to the right and listened intently for a few seconds.

“Something’s gone,” he announced as he slowed down and pulled up at the right. of the road. He put a jack under the right end of the forward and raised the wheel from the ground. A young man on the way to paused to enjoy the spectacle of chauffeur at work.

"Do you know where Dr. Wilson staying?" I asked him - "Dr. Woodrow Wilson, president of Princeton University."

"Why, yes," he replied; "the are boarding with Miss Maria Griswold - there's the house; you've run past it. He pointed back some hundred yards, where a lovely and ancient colonial mansion stood framed venerable trees. I thanked him.

"If you can fix up your car away," I told the chauffeur, "we'll start in ten minutes or so. We've simply got to get back to New London twelve-twenty."

"Fate Was With Us"

I WALKED fast to the Griswold home, crossed the lawn, and rang the bell the big front door that gave on a porch. After a few minutes the door swung inward, and I saw that it was being opened by the very man I had come to seek. He had a hymn book in his hand. I bade him good morning, handed him my card and said: “Colonel Harvey has asked me to drop in and bring you down to dinner this evening."

“Oh,” he replied, “I'll have to put some things in a bag. Excuse me.” He stepped briskly to the door of the drawing room, in which Mrs. Wilson and one of his daughters (I think) were waiting for him to join them on their way to church. I was presented to the ladies; then, anxious about catching the train, made my excuses and hurried away to see how the injured car was getting on. As I walked down the avenue I had to laugh at myself a little. From reading Dr. Wilson‘s telegram Saturday evening I had received the impression that he was averse to being made governor of New Jersey or anything else i

that would disturb him in his scholastic retreat; therefore I had prepared an argument, intending to show him how urgent was the need for him to accept the nomination and election for governor of New Jersey, and later the nomination and election for the presidency of the nation; also that as a preliminary of the highest importance he But my pleading was all bottled up and the eloquence I had been rehearsing along the jolting road was all unspent and unnecessary. had simply stated my errand and Dr. Wilson had immediately replied: “Oh, I'll have to put some things in a bag." That was all; no debate, no doubt, no hesitation; the summons had come, and he was ready.

When I got back to the motor car four hundred yards away, the chauffeur was taking out the jack from under the axle and putting it back in the tool box. He was grinning in triumph.

“We did jolt and bump a lot; on that broken road, didn't we?" he said. “We came down so hard that we cracked one of the steel balls in the bearing of the right front wheel. Look!”

He held out on the palm of his hand a bright, shining ball of steel that had been cracked in two as if it were a hazelnut. “But how can you run without it?" I asked in surprise. “Won‘t your wheel stick?"

“Oh, she's fixed all right," he answered. “I just happened to have a spare ball in my pocket and it fitted. She'll run."

As the car rolled smoothly toward the Griswold residence, the old jingle about the want of the nail, the horseshoe, the horse, and therefore of the warrior, causing the loss of the battle, began to repeat itself in my mind. This case was just the reverse. Our chauffeur by the merest luck happened to have exactly the right sized steel ball in his pocket to take the place of the ball that was split in two eight or nine miles from Lyme. Had the jolt of the car been hard enough to make a compound fracture, we should have been hopelessly held up in the back country, out of reach of garage, telephone, or any other help. But no; Fate was with us: the cracked ball did not split till we came to Woodrow Wilson’s door, and then the man had one to put in its place. I often wish that I had kept that split ball, not much bigger than a buckshot, as a rare curio - the few grains of steel that might have kept Dr. Wilson out of the presidency of the United States! Surely he was a man of destiny. In this enlightened age we are all fret from superstition - and yet it is very comforting to observe the evidence when luck is with us. It seemed to me that Fortune had marked him for her own.

http://tinyurl.com/mrc2qyx

Archive.org

Saturday, August 30, 2014

Standard Oil and its Hirelings of the Press

Standard Oil and its Hirelings of the Press

WERE it not for the newspaper press and periodicals of the Hearst's Magazine sort, interests like Mr. Archbold and Standard Oil long ago would have stolen everything to the public back fence. As matters stand, their villain pillage has hardly stopped short of it. Also, it wasn't the law, but the printing press which halted them. The press is the policeman of popular right. President Wilson, observing - and also fearing - the pernicious Criminal Privilege activities of certain subsidized newspapers, in the war over tariff schedules now being fought out in the Senate, was driven only the other day to issue his White House warning to mankind. Said Mr. Wilson:

Washington has seldom seen so numerous, so industrious, or so insidious a lobby. The newspapers are being filled with paid advertisements calculated lo mislead the judgment of public men not only, but also the public opinion of the country itself. There is every evidence that money without limit is being spent to sustain this lobby, and to create an appearance of a pressure of public opinion antagonistic lo some of the chief items of the Tariff bill.

If this be not enough, consider what has been accomplished by the publication of the Archbold letters. Mr. Hearst began reading them, and his newspapers and magazines began printing them, in October, 1908. In less than five years, by their sheer effect, such Archbold-Standard Oil "statesmen," as Mr. Foraker, Mr. Bailey, Mr. Lorimer, Mr. McLaurin, Mr. Grosvenor, and Mr. Sibley have been driven from their high political places. They no longer cumber and disgrace the House and Senate earth. They no longer figure in affairs of importance.

What papers and magazines yielded to Mr. Archbold's enrollment, and accepted his bounty, repaid that little intriguing Standard Oiler in more fashions than one. Be sure that Standard Oil has received a full return for what thousands Mr. Archbold paid such publications as the Pittsburgh Times, the Southern Farm Magazine, the Manufacturers' Record, and Gunton's Magazine.

While not appointed to hunt papers, but only congressmen, even Setter-dog Sibley became impressed by the Standard Oil propriety of getting a greasy hold on the press.

Says Setter-dog Sibley:

Joseph C. Sibley, Chairman.

Committee on Manufactures.

House of Representatives, U. S.

Washington, March 7th, 1905.

My dear Mr. A.

The illness of Mrs. Sibley has prevented my coming to N. Y. Senator B. was to have gone over with me. I think he will go anyway as he has business there. I had a conversation with an important "official" yesterday and he told me there was but one thing to do and that was to start a "back fire." Like myself, he is much alarmed and as an official of the reigning family his hand and tongue are tied.

He thinks the work should be done in the education of public sentiment between now and the meeting of Congress in Oct. It has I think been decided to convene Cong in Ex Session at that Time though The Speaker will try and have it go over until Nov. if he can't do better. I will know in a day or two how he succeeds; Long (Senator) and Curtis (Rep) are the strong men in the Kansas delegation. I have explained matters to them and I think their influence will count some when they go home. Campbell is a clever boy, has no strong points on place yet developed, he seeks notoriety, but is harmless in himself. This agitation in the language of another "started from the top," and will run its course, it is not a deep seated and profound conviction of wrong.

The one thing is to get delay until temperate action can be secured, we will recover from Lawsonitis if we get pure air for a while.

I think the pendulum will swing to the other side after a while but I don't want the devil to pay before it gets back. An efficient Literary Bureau is needed, not for a day, or a crisis, but a permanent and healthy control of Associated Press and kindred avenues. It will cost money but will be the cheapest in the end and can be made self-supporting. The next four years is more than any previous epoch to determine the future of this Country. No man values public opinion or fears it so much as Roosevelt. No man seeks popularity as much as he. Mild reproof or criticisms of his policies would nearly paralyze him. To-day he hears only the chorus of a rabble, and he thinks it is public sentiment. I don't know whether the Industrial Corporations and the Transportation Co's have enough at stake to justify a union of forces for concerted action. It seems to me necessary. I am in position where I see both sides of the game and still think our friends play politics once in four years while the other side play it all the time.

Sincerely yours,

Sibley.

(See pages 30, 31 for fac-similes of two pages of this letter.)

As you read recall the warning of President Wilson - other Sibleys of the House and Senate are writing other letters to "my dear Mr. A." of 26 Broadway, telling of the comings in and goings out of other "Senator B's" and relating their "conversation with an important official," and urging the Criminal Privilege propriety of "a back-fire."

Five years ago, at the startling time when Mr. Hearst began reading and printing the Archbold letters, the people's cry of indignation was everywhere raised. The cry was echoed by such honest ones among the editors - all unbought and unbribed of Mr. Archbold and Standard Oil - as Colonel Watterson. From stump, from pulpit, from press, from people, came condemnation of the slimy Mr. Archbold for his Standard Oil crimes. And yet, with all that good, honest condemnatory example before them, what single syllable of denunciation was heard to emanate from a Duke or a Morgan or a Vanderbilt or a Schwab or a Stillman or a Carnegie or a Havemeyer?

Steel, sugar, tobacco, coal, every trust on the black-flag list, had been and was buying Senators and House men, judges, and governors, as industriously as were Mr. Archbold and Standard Oil. The only difference between them and Mr. Archbold was that no one had come forward thus far with their letters. They had not been found out. Wherefore, equal in selfish interest as equal in their works, our thousand and one expositors of Special Privilege - the Vanderbilts, the Morgans, the Carnegies, the Stillmans, the Dukes, the Schwabs, and the Havemeyers—maintained a masterly, not to say a polite silence, while Mr. Hearst uncovered the Archbold corruptions.

While making his investments in other than oil fields, Mr. Rockefeller and his co-workers in the vineyard of Criminal Privilege, in no wise rejected the ink-and-paper field. Standard Oil years ago set flowing a growing, broadening, deepening stream of gold into the channels of the monthly, weekly, and daily press. Some publications it bought outright; others it only bribed.

There was a personage of the Tribe of Highbrows whose title was Professor, and whose name was Gunton. He posed as an authority on political economy, which exalted Criminal Privilege, and counseled the poor to creep back into their cages. The better to preach these doctrines, in New York at 41 Union Square, Mr. Gunton evolved and printed Gunton's Magazine. Both Editor Gunton and Gunton's Magazine pleased Mr. Archbold.

As witness the following:

Sept. 28, 1899.

My dear Professor:

I have your very kind favor of yesterday with various enclosures for all of which I beg you to accept many thanks. I am greatly interested and much amused over the incident which you relate regarding Governor Roosevelt. Think he is doing splendidly. The recent speech of Senator Foraker in Ohio is also very good. I have no doubt you noticed it.

Very truly yours,

Jno. D. Archbold.

Prof. George Gunton,

41 Union Square, City.

And this Letter a month later:

[Oct ??? ]

My dear Professor:

Responding to your favor, it gives me pleasure to enclose you herewith certificate of deposit to your favor for $5,000., as an additional contribution to that agreed upon to aid you in your most excellent work. I most earnestly hope that the way will open for the large scope as you anticipate.

Very truly yours,

Jno. D. Archbold.

Prof. George Gunton,

41 Union Square, City.

(See top of this page for fac-simile.)

Evidently the "dear Professor" had been writing his "dear Mr. A." of some literary flight he meditated, and the latter little gentleman was only too eager to finance it - with Standard Oil money, of course. How familiarly that "certificate of deposit in your favor" breaks upon the eye! Five thousand dollars!

Later Miss Tarbell, eminent as a magazine writer, took occasion to show that the appreciative Mr. Archbold, for fifteen years, had been paying into the personal palms of Mr. Gunton an annual $15,000; and - all in the name of Standard Oil - had backed his magazine and rostrum efforts to the tune of 8250,000 more.

After an annual $15,000 for fifteen years to Mr. Gunton, the following to Mr. Magee will sound flat, feeble, and cheap.

January 17th, 1899.

Hon. W. A. Magee,

Pittsburgh Times,

Pittsburgh, Pa.

Dear Sir:

As per understanding, herewith enclosed find Certificate of Deposit to your order for $1250, the receipt of which kindly acknowledge.

Truly yours,

Jno. D. Archbold.

(See page 26 for fac-similc.)

Twelve hundred and fifty dollars!

It was all it was worth, however.

And yet, there's this to be thought of. Mr. Magee, here addressed as connected with the Pittsburgh Times, belonged to the great House of Magee, the head of which ruled over Keystone politics at his particular Pittsburgh end of the alley. The Times might mean but little, taken merely as the Times. But what if, in this Archbold-Standard Oil connection, the name included that Magee boss-ship? How important the latter would be to Governor Stone, and Congressman Dalzell, and others of the Standard Oil herd who lived in the smoke-thrown Pittsburgh shadow? Possibly Mr. Archbold wrote other letters to Mr. Magee, and enclosed other and more satisfying certificates of deposit.

Down in Baltimore there's a magazine called the Manufacturers' Record. Connected with its management, twelve years ago, was Mr. Edmonds. Apparently, Mr. Edmonds and Mr. Archbold had met - and agreed - in a business way; for early in 1901 one finds Mr. Archbold writing this:

26 Broadway.

February 13th, 1901.

Mr. R. H. Edmonds,

Baltimore, Md.

Dear Mr. Edmonds:

I have your several very interesting favors. I return you Senator McLaurin's letter with the clippings.

The whole affair at Washington has been most interesting.

Have been sorry indeed to hear of the Senator's illness. Mr. Griscom undertook to have a talk with him on Monday through a mutual friend. Your own work in all this matter has been most admirable. Very truly yours,

Jno. D. Archbold.

The sick statesman alluded to was Senator Gorman. The "talk," which Mr. Griscom was to have had with him, would have borne upon the Shipping Bill, a measure concerning which Mr. Archbold never ceased to get excited. There's nothing in this magazine's possession to indicate just what was that "whole affair at Washington" which Mr. Archbold found "most interesting." But since a certain man was in the White House, and a certain boss was in the Republican saddle, it's a safe wager that "the whole affair" concerned Special Privilege in a favorable, rivet-fastening way.

Mr. Edmonds' work "has been most admirable"; later he is, no doubt, to receive good news as related to Mr. Grasty and the Southern Farm Magazine. For says Mr. Archbold:

26 Broadway.

December 18th, 1901.

Mr. Thomas P. Grasty,

C/o Buck & Pratt,

Room 1203, 27 William St., City.

Dear Mr. Grasty:

I have your favors of yesterday, and beg to return you herewith the telegram from Mr. Edmonds to you. We are willing to continue the subscription of $5,000 to the Southern Farm Magazine for another year, payments to be made the same way they have been made this year. We do not doubt but that the influence of your publication throughout the South is of a most helpful character. With good wishes, I am,

Very truly yours,

Jno. D. Archbold.

(See page 24 for fac-simile.)

For how many Southern Farm Magazines should that 5000-dollar subscription pay? Also, would it confer upon its editorial utterances a Standard Oil hue?

Mr. Archbold not alone takes annual care of the Southern Farm Magazine to the extent of a comfortable and comforting $5000, but he recalls that Mr. Edmonds has a hookup with the Manufacturers' Record. To remember is to act with Mr. Archbold, and he indites the following:

26 Broadway.

Oct. 10th, 1902.

Mr. R. H. Edmonds,

Baltimore, Md.

Dear Sir:

Responding to your favor of the 9th, it gives me pleasure to enclose you herewith certificate of deposit to your favor for $3,000, covering a year's subscription to the Manufacturers' Record. Truly yours,

Jno. D. Archbold.

Does any gentleman know if Mr. Archbold has kept up or discontinued his Standard Oil "subscription" to the Manufacturers' Record and the Southern Farm Magazine? What are those earnest papers just now saying of oil and wool and sugar and income tax?

The plot thickens; Mr. Grasty comes to New York, establishes himself at the Waldorf-Astoria and addresses Mr. Archbold. Also, the greatest little letter writer of any age makes next day's haste to answer. Says he:

26 Broadway.

December 11th, 1902.

Mr. Thomas P. Grasty,

Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, City.

My dear Mr. Grasty:

I have your favor of yesterday. It may be the first of the week before I can bring the matter up you so ably present, but I shall hope for favorable consideration of it at the hands of my friends here. There is no doubt whatever of the excellent work being done by your publications, and by yourself and Mr. Edmonds on all the lines, and I feel that it would be almost an act of presumption to make any suggestions with reference to your course. If anything at any time occurs to us, however, we will not hesitate to speak of it, in response to your kind suggestion. The Lindsay matter was certainly most admirably handled.

Very truly yours,

Jno. D. Archbold.

How exasperating to have but the fraction or merest fragment of so entertaining a correspondence! And the world might have had it all, had those with the facts in their keeping acted upon specific instructions to bring to the fore what all men should see and know.

Mr. Grasty abandons the WaldorfAstoria for the Hotel York, and composes a long and earnest letter to Mr. A.:

Hotel York, Dec. 4, 1903.

Dear Mr. Archbold:

In the article, "Teachers Vs. Doers," in the Manufacturers' Record this week, there is a world of good common sense. Although Mr. Morgan is commended as the leader in rescuing transportation properties and thereby meeting the needs of the country . . . nevertheless I want to say to you that I believe that it would be a good thing if Mr. Morgan could be peacefully and quietly supplanted as the most conspicuous representative of financial power. . . . You can scarcely realize how much harm has been done by his "undoing," or by what people consider the exposure of his methods. But whatever we may call it, the effect of the discredit which has befallen him, has been to make the public believe - or at least to take seriously - sensational stories, concocted for demagogic effect, which prior to these disclosures were considered as unfounded and unworthy of credence. ... I honestly believe that the interests of such immeasurable magnitude as Mr. Morgan is supposed to dominate, ought to be under the control of wiser men men with sense enough to see and avoid such palpable pitfalls as surrounded the ship-building deal. A substitution of controlling power a change of generals seems to me the only way to escape the consequences of (and to head off) public distrust of our great organizations and to stop the supply of fresh ammunition to the "trust busters."

Now, among the latter I put Theodore Roosevelt and W. R. Hearst in the same category - and Hearst today has an organization of immense efficiency made up of first class, high-priced brains backed not by a barrel but by a hogshead, and is liable to be the Democratic nominee for the presidency. That Roosevelt will be the Republican nominee is a foregone conclusion. Now in times of depression the slogan, "Anything for a change," goes a long way. If a chance be even possible and in my opinion it is probable people who stand for the maintenance of American institutions and for the "greatest good to the greatest number," ought to be arranging to prevent the possibility of such a disaster as Hearst's election to the presidency. Mr. Gorman is the only man that can beat him, if I read correctly the signs of the times.

Yours truly, Thomas P. Grasty.

Mr. Grasty's views hold one's interest like a novel by Walter Scott. Also "palpable pitfall" is good. You see it was on the sharp heels of the ship-trust explosion, and the exposure of that memorable "watering" of some $10,000,000 of actual assets to nearly $40,000,000 in stocks and bonds. The cautious Mr. Archbold never answered this letter.

The Grasty feeler as to Mr. Gorman is as transparent as glass. It's drawing in toward a presidential nomination, and Mr. Gorman - who's been a never-failing candidate since the first Cleveland inauguration in 1885 - is Mr. Grasty's choice.

Mr. Grasty's next letter is, also, too long to print in full:

Telephone, 6243-38th.

Hotel York.

Thursday, Jan. 7, 1904.

Dear Mr. Archbold:

As you see I am back in New York. There are several matters for which I think one may "thank god and take courage " at the beginning of this year of grace. One is that the business men of this Country have apparently decided not to be "bull-dozed" by labor. Another matter for congratulation is that the U. S. Steel Corporation - an institution of incalculable significance & potential for evil or for good, - seem to be about to come under the control of men who do not make "mis-cues." Another is that the fear lest the Democrats may get together & nominate a strong, safe man, is likely to have a good effect on the President in bringing him to think more seriously & soberly & sanely than when he imagined he was going to have a "walk-over—" or rather a triumphal procession to a second term. . . . In this week's Record you will probably see a statement of the case from a very sensible editor down in Virginia. Whether you agree with it or not, I can but feel that it is not desirable from the standpoint of the interests you are identified with for any course or any policy calculated to stir up strife & embroil us in what might menace our commerce, to go uncriticized and unrebuked. "Hot-heads" are bad enough in private life: "hot-heads" at the helm of the ship of state must be put through a cooling process.

A final word about Gorman. It would be worth millions beyond computation to the business interests merely to have him nominated by the Democrats. He is the one possible candidate with whom an understanding can be reached. On this aspect of the case I want to tell you a few things that I can not quite say on paper. Yours truly,

Thomas P. Grasty.

One can see with the eye of fancy the dry grin on Mr. Archbold's face at this lofty lecturing by Mr. Grasty. Not but what Mr. Archbold will "thank God" as deeply as ever could Mr. Grasty, "that the business men of this country have apparently decided not to be bulldozed by labor."

Mr. Grasty's disclosures touching Mr. Gorman are interesting, especially those which Mr. Grasty "cannot quite say on paper." The confident Mr. Grasty, however, was barking at a knot. There was never the ghost of the shade of the shadow of a Gorman chance in 1904.

Six days elapse, and Mr. Grasty again writes Mr. Archbold:

Hotel York.

January 13th, 1904.

Dear Mr. Archbold:

I referred two months ago (in one of my letters to you) to W. R. Hearst's activities, and to the progress he was making. . . .

I send you herewith a clipping from today's N. Y. Times, showing a scheme that had never been suspected, i. e., to get the convention for the one city in which the Godless element is supreme.

I have heard that Mr. Morgan has said he'd rather have Hearst than Roosevelt. I want Mr. Gorman to feel that my friends are his friends. He has just asked me to come to see him. He is in some perplexity over a situation in Baltimore which 'tis thought I may be in a position to give some suggestions about. I do not mind saying to you that my relations with him are closely confidential by reason of a peculiar situation which I can't explain in a letter.

Whether he is nominated for the Presidency or not, he will as long as he lives, be the most powerful friend that any of us could have at Washington. His marvelous gift of heading off foolish moves, his ability to keep from being done what ought not to be done, make him a more useful friend than the fellow that "does things." As I was about to say, he ought to be the Democratic nominee, but if not, he will as long as he lives be a senator and a leader. He was never known to go back on a friend.

Yours truly, Thomas P. Grasty.

You will note that in all of these letters, Mr. Grasty never once speaks of Mr. Archbold's "reply." That isn't a Grasty impoliteness; Mr. Archbold has sent no reply. In vain does the fowler spread his net in the sight of any bird. Mr. Archbold knew that Mr. Gorman inspired, if he didn't quite dictate these letters, and was looking over Mr. Grasty's shoulder as they were taken down. To have written Mr. Grasty would have been to write Mr. Gorman, and Mr. Archbold wasn't ready to submit his own and Standard Oil's presidential preferences to the Maryland Machiavelli. Mr. Archbold is not without qualities which adorn the turkey gobbler, and the tail of his vanity is a broad and spreading tail. It will take a very much surer hand than Mr. Grasty's, however, to throw the cunning salt on it.

When the people's face puts on a frown, Mr. Rockefeller, Mr. Carnegie, and Mr. Archbold do not, to be sure, slash the tail off a dog. For, in pious circles, even more than any simple robbery, it might shake one's position. Avoiding, therefore, that dog curtailment, they institute a hookworm inquiry, or build a library, or give a million to a college, or arrange to pay perpetually the gas bill of St. Paul's. And in this they are wise. Any of these, as tempting aside the popular tongue, would serve much better than the vulgar de-tailment of some dog.

http://tinyurl.com/pbdrctl