THE HOME FRONT
BOHN, WILLIAM E.
The Home Front By WILLIAM E. BOHN The Death of a Newspaper IN Morri* Ern*t'» hook. The Ffrst Freedom, you will And all the statistic* ef the deathrate among Mr paladiuma of liberty. You will...
...Yes, it was a good paper," they would say...
...Oratory such as his is seldom heard in Washington, and if be bad "held forth in Congress, it would be described as a filibuster in reverse...
...Much of the'color of the session came when one or another of the proponents of a resolution, sack as the Rev...
...Any man or paper has a right to be old-fashioned...
...They voted against universal military.training, for a strike fund and an educational fend, and better unemployment compensation...
...Members of the Communist Party, the Kit Klux Klan ar any other extorsive oi gnuizniinn, thall he burred from member ah ii...
...And at the end, as the delegates file up to the platform the reader says: "Gather now a few grains from soil of each state represented here...
...Tha strike had killed it The men wha had walked the picket lines to secure tha better salaries and conditions demanded by the Newspaper Guild were left standing en the street...
...On the platform the largest placard read: THE CONFERENCE OF THE EXCLUDED We are excluded by Conrress from Employment Insurance Old Age Pensions Wages and Hours Law Labor Relations Act Other placards read: To the disinherited belongs the future and America's only farm Labor Union...
...of L. family and partly to have the attendance of the many union officials and other friends who spoke ta the delegates...
...Tht Philadelphia...
...One, chap told how he learned to read during the process of figuring eat the foimie* m Tk« Htc(ikI...
...It is a bit extra old-fashioned, somewhat exceptionally unaffected by modern thinking...
...Newspapers ah* . vioiisly nerve a public interett...
...A tabloid, Tht Daily Ni*>», was added in 1926—so the present city of more than 2,000,000 inhabitants has but three dtlly papera...
...Most of them seem to agree that the Guild stepped out too far...
...His capital would bring better returns invested in another enterprise...
...Tha old place, sleeping soundly under the shadow of the big-hatted itatue of William Penn which tops the City Hall, had the mood of a funeral...
...I tappet* ha thinks he will be serving their Interett* if he converts them to hia views...
...jrt'stW*"""*' e * « T "',**" Whaie -emit It It...
...Again" toward (he end of the sessions the delegates performed the "Ceremony of the Men on the Land," whieh begins with the reader saying: Bowed try the tvefght of centnritt A* Irons s Upon hia hoe and gazes on the ground, The evnptines* of age* in his fact...
...After reading their three columns one could start his day thinking that after all the world is a pretty decent sort of place...
...A more alert aaaTaj leal public would be a help...
...We still can read dailies which nave character and per* aonality...
...H* hat, (a fact, not promised ta da anything which is oat of line with hie Itth Cent wry la* publlcanism...
...There is even variety enough so that each can read the news in a journal to his taste...
...An iagenieu* person could find good things to say about each of them, hut net one of than can to any appreciable extent replace the old World...
...But no congressman would have called forth the chorus of "Amen*" and "Yes Sir, that's right" which made the convention sound at time* like a southern revival meeting...
...Another morosely added that he had been used to the paper all his life, knew just where to find everything, other papers always seemed strange to him, just didn't knew what he'd do without his Record...
...But look at poor Philadelphia...
...Although there am some three nlllion farm Workers throughout the country, aa...
...Since at present the membership ef the union is predominantly in the south, most of the weathered hands and faces in the small Methodist auditorium were Negro, and since the union is strongly interracial, the white minority mingled with the black majority on the friendliest of terms...
...Barney Taylor, chief organiser far the anion and southern correspondent of The New Leader, propeeed and gat unanimous approval for supporting Americans for Democratic Action, and claimed that by this action tha union was the first one to officially tpontor this new group, it was logical for the union to take this action ainee its constitution takes an equally strong stand against Communists in its membership, i.e...
...Mingle, them in one heap—at a symbol of th4 land on fchich tt*e live and labor...
...These protested against the illegal importation of Mexican "wetbacks," who are brought in by the big planter* in order to bring agricultural labor prices down and who get their nam* from the fact that they get their backs wet by swimming tha - Bio Grande at night...
...And now, as the folks in Philadelphia were saying, there is no place where we can read him...
...I would be witling to trade five or six of our metropolitan smart-boys for him...
...The point of the article which w* published two weeks ago was that thia liberal had driven his men into a strike by his unliberal attitude in the reeent negotiations...
...New papers have been started, the Newt, PM and the Pott in its new incarnation...
...There we had Heywood Broun, Alexander Wollcott and Franklin P. Adams side by side...
...the union hat bean called the (potentially) largeat in the country, mechanisation of cotton and other crops la destined to threw more ef the farm workers into city occupations...
...I was reminded of the period of mourning which we went through here in New York at the time of the throttling of the old Morning World, That was a paper...
...But our situation here in New Yerk Is comparatively good...
...In the policies of his paper from that time to thia Stern has championed trade unionism and, in general, all the ideas that union men believe in...
...Throughout its 13 years of life as the Southern Tenant Farmers Union, President H. L. Mitchell and a few loyal snpporters have accomplished the nearby impossible task of building an organization of the poorest members of our underprivileged third of the nation...
...And it will be brought borne to you that there are town* upon tewns where one Bean ar one company controls the one or two or throe papers which are left And Morris's point is that where one man controls the marketing of news there is acttalry no "freedam «f the press...
...And then a business man mad* a decision...
...There is less and leas enterprise ' and practically no earn petition...
...ISdjA tha entry info the publishing |*|| great public'organlzations might qLm part of the answer...
...You will learn In* Many papers there were 1900 or 1*20 and how many—or how few—there are now...
...Probably one-ot the most constructive things the union can do in this situation, it to prepare the displaced farm worker for union activity in this cfly job...
...It waa abent aa big as Saa Francisco er Milwaakee fa new...
...Perhaps the aBefiJ ef paper and the control of its priecwE ease tha situation...
...Slowmoving folks in Philadelphia or anywhere else have a right to a paper which is to their taste...
...There are vague suggestions on the part of the manager of the BulUtin that the Rtetri will be sold to a new ewne/and that there is a possibility ef itt revival...
...But I do object to there being only one morning paper at the center ef a great population...
...For the most part the delegates represented southern sharecroppers and farm laborers whose annual incomes average hardly two months wages for the average city dweller...
...BulUtin...
...But than ia u the rub...
...The announcement on Sunday morning in which Walter H. Annenberg solemnly invited readers ef the Retard to buy his paper and thns "beep abreast of the swiftly moving events ef thia complex era" is hardly likely te reconcile the good Philadelphia^ ta suck a sodden and each a drastic change of fare...
...Here in New York I hear violent arg-wment proceeding among tha newspaper boys...
...But that is all right...
...He was known as a liberal...
...J. E. Clayton, spoke to the delegates...
...Bat that comparatively small town boasted fi daily papers., All of theae have new expired except two, one published In the morning and the other in the evening...
...1 wonder how many recall after ail these years the "page opposite the editorial paper...
...There are plane now to organize the orange pickers In Florida, and later the sugar beet workers in and around Michigan...
...And on his back the burden «f the world.' And the audience replies: "Who made him dead to rapture and despair . . . Stolid and stunned, a brother to the ox...
...J. David Stern, the owner of the Record, was tha first to sign a regular contract with tha Guild...
...I have often wondered why he did not break into New York...
...Later that day the delegates listened to William Green, who welcomed them into the A.F.ofL...
...lr...
...Httw It ik* Hkllt Mtntt S«rvt*7 What, s tha answer te all this 7 I eonfera that I don't knew...
...The union ha* for some years had it* member* in . the eastern vegetable fields, with generally satisfactory result...
...Other resolution* were against the Poll tax* for an FEPC, against the practice* ef the southern Farm Bureau Federation, which favors the big planter* in many ways...
...Annenberg is careful not to promise'to taka on any New Deal columnists or to ask his Washington correspondents te report anything that might possibly be of advantage to the Democrats...
...As a result of the Guild's efforts a liberal paper was sold out to a conservative one...
...family, the National Farm I-abor Union can well use any help from the parent or brother unions which may be offered...
...For three day* the hundred or more delegate* met in committees, toured the city, called on government committees and congressmen, but for the most part sat attentively in the small Methodist Church auditorium and listened te speeches and reports...
...In a sense he gave the fledgling union at newspaper workers its start...
...N* ana wants papers run by tha government...
...The three million odd farm workers in this country may in some areas be anxious to organize, but any organizer will tell you that a group of workers which moves from one part of the country to another, part north and part south, perhapa it not easv to hold together...
...So, since information m controlled, the functioning of democracy is interfered with at the- roots...
...People talked sadly of the deceased Record as of a departed friend...
...More than one spoke of the columns, and I was pleased to note that they appreciated one of my favorite columnists, Charles Fisher...
...I have nothing to say against the Philadelphia Enquirtr, which now remains alone in the morning field...
...For the 530 Guild members out on strike thisv...
...The Confereuce of the Excluded By Eliot D. Pratt As reported in last week's issue ef The Nn» Leader the National Pant Labor Union held its first convention under its new name in Washington, D. C. Holding its firat eastern convention was, m part, ta celebrate Ha , new membership as the baby in tha A.F...
...Yet ha wants the whole town to read hia paper...
...Its growth into other widely leparft* area* of' the country shows both its'potentialities and some of the difficulties which it may encounter...
...Private enterprise with competition can obviously serve us better...
...And—wonder of wonders—some citizens even lamented the passing of the Record editorials...
...In 117*, whan tha Reeord was founded, Philadelphia had a. population of 674,022...
...That was back in 1M4...
...As they said, sitting round at the daytime wake, "those editorials were short and anappy and almost always on the right ' aide...
...W| Two weeks ago we published an article giving the strikers' aide of tha ftght which has bee*, rating rewnd the PMladel phi* Rteerd since November 1. On the first day ef February it waa anwon ted that the paper had been taken oyer by...
...vOn the closing day a long list ef resolutions were read and adopted with great unanimity and little discussion...
...Yesterday I was in Philadelphia...
...and to prevent him from lowering wage derhhtid* and becoming t strike breaker...
...So he passed the death-sentence and the paper was no more...
...Moat papers are firing- men rather than hiring them at the present time...
...Many of them must have the feeling thai they have killed—if not the goose which laid the golden egg—at least a bird which produced a mora ar less edible product...
...Yet through picnics, fish frys and other benefits, the folks back home, the 0,000 or so families scattered throughout the back country in six southern states, raised enough money to send a hundred of their delegates to Washington where only one of the group had ever been before...
...And this situation ia especially objectionable when the paper in question has such a long and consistent policy of conservatism as has the Enquirer...
...thing is a tragedy...
...It ia a good conservative paper...
...Thr business against which they fought had defeated them by committing suicide...
...and in a fighting talk on southern labor gave them strong assurances of wholehearted support from the parent union As the new baby in the A.F.ofL...
...Their owners ar* the first ta preach a beat it, Tha very life ef a democracy depend* •pan them, Yet, when it come* ta starting ar stopping papers no em takes account ef tha public interest...
...What t, you expect ia a world where the'pfcj, dtlphia Record is killed and the York Newt counts its,readers by jj million...
Vol. 30 • February 1947 • No. 6
