One Patron of Journalism
ONE PATRON OF JOURNALISM URELY Voltaire as patron of journalism in France may be conceded. The choice seems quite logical to anyone who knows French journalistic methods. To such, Voltaire is...
...everyone has condemned me, but I have persisted...
...It is evident from his private correspondence that he Was far leSS interested in a Huguenot father who had—according to the evidence—strangled his son because of that son's conversion, than in an excellent occasion to pursue his perennial warfare against the state and against religion, with an excited mob at his back—a mob which he had himself excited...
...A correspondent of one of our important daily papers, to illustrate the creative power of the press in such matters, published in his Sunday edition a full page of romance, woven of purest moonshine, concerning a beautiful but fictitious American missionary in Korea, one Emily Brown, for love of whom the emperor had consented to establish as state religion the particular belief that she professed...
...The tale was adorned with photographs of gorgeous native wedding processions, of Emily herself in simple American garb, and of the American minister to Korea who had "given her away," together with portraits of the American adviser to the emperor and the British Commissioner of Customs, who happened to be prominent in the public view at the moment...
...The Cardinal replied: "I do not believe that a Protestant is more apt to commit an atrocious crime than a Catholic...
...One of the best illustrations of his genius for publicity is the famous Calas case (famous because of him) revived recently by a correspondent of the New York Times, quoting Hendrik Willem Van Loon...
...His school has made no advance upon his methods—it would be difficult to do so—but it is, on the whole, a school worthy of the master...
...The little philosopher gnome was a past master in "publicity", in selecting popular appeals to increase his own importance and nourish his own vanity—an outstanding quality of his which possibly might account more nearly for his philosophies than most people would be willing to grant...
...It is a most perfect example of the forming of opinion by "publicity", and the influence of publicity upon "history...
...Henri-Robert ("de TAcademie Fran^aise, ancien batonnier") has a series of essays (Les Grands Proces de l'Histoire, Payot, Paris) entirely worthy of the preface written for them by Louis Barthou, a brilliant resume of the evidence of celebrated cases to which he has had access in his long connection with the courts of justice In France...
...In the height of his furious charge he finds time to write to a lady: "It is true, mademoiselle, that I asked M. de Chazelles for information concerning this horrible affair of Calas...
...that school which has spread from France to all the Latin countries, and which has some eminent exponents in our own...
...So violent was the storm he raised, so great the pressure he was able to bring to bear upon the government in three years of ceaseless repetition and insistence, that the parliament of Paris (having no jurisdiction whatever over the parliament of Toulouse) declared the latter's act invalid and "rehabilitated" Calas, long since dead, in order to calm public opinion...
...Years later, quite serious books of reference carried "Emily Brown" with Rajah Brooke in lists of foreigners who had become rulers in the East...
...As soon as he could find out sufficient detail to enable him to know at least the names of the people concerned, he proceeded to bombard the outside world with "facts" of his own invention, regardless of public knowledge in the city and province where the incident occurred...
...These briefs for Calas," the cynical little philosopher cduld write in a letter to d'Alembert, September 15, 1762, "are only written to work up men's minds, to give me the pleasure of ridiculing and holding up to execration a parliament and the white penitents...
...He writes everywhere and to everyone from whom he could hope to obtain any fact upon which to base his proposed campaign...
...neither do I believe, without convincing proof, that magistrates conspire together to commit a horrible injustice...
...The Toulouse parliament, be it noted, sovereign in its own province of France, has ever refused utterly to erase from its files—as ordered—the act of condemnation...
...People here [he had only heard it that day, and the people of his village heard it from him!] believe him innocent...
...He writes to Cardinal de Bernis: "May I beg your Eminence to tell me what I should think of this frightful affair of Calas, broken on the wheel at Toulouse, for the murder of his son...
...He married her, according to the Sunday page, and raised her to be empress...
...So, having no single fact upon which to base his proposed attack, no single confutation of the evidence upon which Calas was executed, Voitaire-like he throws mere facts and evidence to the winds and charges home on liberty of conscience...
...Voltaire understood extremely well the manipulation of the time-worn proverb: "Where there is smoke, there's fire...
...Some twenty years ago a farcical example of this same school of journalism occurred in Korea...
...Maitre Robert reconstitutes the conditions of the period, political, social, and religious...
...he takes the evidence upon which the elder Calas was tried, condemned, sentenced, and broken on the wheel, and shows how completely all that evidence was ignored by Voltaire when he saw in this trial an opportunity to mount his hobby and run a course with both Church and state, as defender of tolerance and liberty of conscience...
...Voltaire had many ancient scores to pay—private and public scores...
...Voltaire, Defender of Calas, is one of the five studies of famous semi-political trials which compose the first volume...
...ONE PATRON OF JOURNALISM URELY Voltaire as patron of journalism in France may be conceded...
...Whether Calas was innocent or guilty, Voltaire's methods show forth more clearly in his handling of that murder trial...
...To such, Voltaire is unquestionably the brilliant forerunner of that school which trims its facts to fit its thesis...
...I told him of the outcry of all the foreigners [ !] who surround me, but I could not possibly have given him my own opinion on the matter, for I have none whatever...
...the king and parliament, the Church, judges and police...
...He admits to Damilaville that: "Catholics and Protestants alike have told me that there is no doubt of Calas's guilt...
...It cannot honestly be said (except in darkest ignorance) that Voltaire contributed anything here to light and justice...
...They have all advised me, unanimously, not to touch such a bad case...
...This did not in the least prevent or interfere with his exhortation to all his fellow workers in the cause: "Criez, et qu'on crie...
Vol. 3 • February 1926 • No. 13
