EDITORIALS
"Influence" ANEWSPAPER OR A MAGAZINE, now-a-days, that gets into the habit of printing the facts as they are found, without fear or favor, is in no enviable position. Pressure of a magnitude that...
...It is a Senator's privilege to send his telegrams at public expense...
...This will compel us to fight shy of treating our subjects in such a way as to offend postoffice authorities in Washington, or the administration, * * * so I presume we will have to forget that we want to discuss Who Rules and kindred subjects...
...IMAGINE A MAN holding high position in the business world, a position that accords him the title of Captain of Industry...
...The companies here mentioned are too well known to need description...
...Is the Petty Politician of the Cabinet to succeed where the financial barons have failed because of the power vested in him as a public servant...
...March 30,1910—Lorimer to Lee O'Neil Browne, Ottawa, Ill...
...La Follette's, last year, printed disagreeable facts about the "chain of influence" extending from the seat of the money power to the editor's chair...
...Of Browne, Senator Root said on the floor of the Senate: "He procured them (Illinois legislators) to vote as the agent of Lorimer, secured by him to act for him, closeted with him day and night, reporting to him step by step...
...This the Old Guard in the Senate recognizes...
...Well, that is exactly the position of Edward Tilden, president of the National Packing Company at Chicago whose assistance is desired by the investigating committee at Springfield in ferreting out the truth about the election of William Lorimer...
...Tilden is an official of a meat packing company...
...It is in the committee rooms that legislation is considered, shaped, filled with "jokers," or buried in pigeon holes...
...Observe that there is here no direct intimidation on the part of the Post Office Department...
...March 19, 1910—Lorimer to Hines, Chicago...
...Progressive Senators must continue their struggle on the floor of the Senate, rather than in committee rooms, for what the people demand in legislation...
...Lorimer is United States Senator from Illinois, who was given the 46 to 40 vote of "vindication" by the Senate...
...Of this, more later...
...He may, if he chooses, use the wires in getting at the desires of his constituents...
...July 17,1909-Lorimer to Swift Co., Chicago...
...July 17,1909—Lorimer to Armour Co., Chicago...
...Hines is the wealthy Chicago lumberman who was recently quoted by Manager Funk of the International Harvester Company as having said that it cost $100,000 to "put Lorimer across," and having asked Funk to contribute $10,000...
...February 23,1910—Lorimer to Hines, Chicago...
...Not often is this expensive process used by a Senator to get at the desires of the voters who compose his constituency...
...the first named having a vote on tariff schedules, the others financially interested in those schedules relating to lumber and meat...
...February 22,1910—Lorimer to Hines, Chicago...
...Imagine him, arrested by order of the State Senate, charged with contempt, because he refused to obey the orders of the committee...
...And, what is more important, the voters of the various states must not forget that they still have work to do to bring about such changes in the personnel of the Senate as will insure real representative government...
...The record shows other telegrams sent during this period by Lorimer to persons whose names are not unfamiliar in business and politics...
...The character of the committees is, therefore, of prime importance...
...Imagine he is called upon by a legislative investigating committee to appear before it and tell what he knows about the alleged transaction...
...January 21,1910—Lorimer to Hines, Chicago...
...Depleted in numbers, repudiated by Republicans at the polls, they still hold fast to the power that remains to them...
...Why these strenuous efforts to keep secret the documents called for by the committee...
...Would you think such a man was acting with candor...
...Old Guard Stands Pat WE ARE ALL now more or less familiar with the importance of committees in Congress...
...Is there in this disclosure, to which the country is primarily indebted to Collier's, anything to suggest a reason for the raising of a $100,000 corruption fund to "put Lorimer across...
...Aside from the serious question that it brings up as to the right of free speech and free press in our country, it puts us in a hole on the very subject that we want to tackle with a free hand...
...But it is recorded that Senators have been in telegraphic communication with powerful interests affected by pending legislation...
...Evidence appears to be accumulating that another—and even more powerful—"influence" upon editorial expression is to be found in the Post Office Department...
...Lorimer, Lumber, Lard FOLLOWING IS A LIST of telegrams taken from the records of the secretary of the United States Senate: July 1,1909—Lorimer to Hines, Duluth...
...July 5,1909—(Lorimer's) Private Secretary Ward to Hines, Chicago...
...They are in the group of packers commonly referred to as the Beef Trust...
...PUBLIC PLAYGROUNDS are coming to be regarded as being as essential to development of the children as public schools...
...It would seem that one who has nothing to conceal would not rest until he had, with the help of the committee, uncovered every shred of evidence bearing on the charge, so that his good name would remain as briefly as possible under a cloud...
...Is This Candor...
...Despite the efforts of the thirteen Progressive Republican Senators, representing the public sentiment of the country, to have the Republican representation on the main committees fixed so that the Progressives would be assigned in proportion to their numerical strength in the Senate, all the committees that deal with the great problems now before the country were "packed" by the Old Guard with the "tried and true" servitors of special privilege...
...Here we find unmistakable evidence of intimacy between Lorimer and Lumber and Lard...
...February 24,1910—Lorimer to Lee O'Neil Browne, Ottawa, Ill...
...February 15,1910—Lorimer to Lee O'Neil Browne, Ottawa, Ill...
...July 17,1909—Lorimer to National Packing Co., Chicago...
...Collier's has on several occasions, disclosed some of the methods used by powerful advertisers to control news and editorial columns...
...Yet he dare not discuss certain subjects of vital concern to the public because he fears by so doing he will wreck his publication...
...Until that is done, they will continue to pay tribute to special privilege...
...March 12,1910—Lorimer to Lee O'Neil Browne, Ottawa, Ill...
...Mr.- (the proprietor) is somewhat scared since reading of Myrick's knockout because there is no telling where the ax will fall next...
...December 3,1909—(Lorimer's) Private Secretary WaTd, Chicago, to Lee O'Neil Browne, Ottawa, Ill...
...Pressure of a magnitude that almost passed comprehensiou may be brought to bear upon the editor or owner...
...April 25, 1910—Lorimer to Edward Tilden, Chicago...
...February 22,1910—Lorimer to Hines, Chicago...
...The people paid for the sending of these messages...
...And this is from a progressive editor whose ambition is to tell the truth as he finds it...
...Arrogantly, defiantly, ignoring the mandate of Republican voters all over the country, these reactionaries, led by Gallinger blocked every opening, through which might come genuinely progressive bills, with ultra-high tariff Senators, anti-conservationists, and Senators opposed to real railroad regulation...
...Imagine he is named under oath as the custodian of an immense corruption fund raised to "put across" the election of a United States Senator...
...His editorials are read by hundreds of thousands of people...
...Imagine him quibbling with the committee about the production of books and documents believed to contain material evidence, and finally ignoring all demands for detailed testimony...
...At the same time, well-equipped playgrounds are as necessary as well-equipped schools, as the value of systematic play and exercise for the children is regarded as essential as moral and intellectual training.—Oshkosh Northwestern...
...only the feeling of insecurity caused by the recent crusade of the Department against certain publications that have been saying things—true or untrue—distasteful to the Administration...
...It is plain that the Standpat Republicans are determined to serve The System to the last ditch...
...July 17,1909—Lorimer to Morris Co., Chicago...
...For a while yet the fight must go on along the old lines...
...We know, for instance, how a member like Tawney at the head of the appropriations committee can stifle progressive legislation by simply refusing to provide the money to carry on its administration, and how a Senator like Aldrich at the head of the finance committee, accessible always to the Interests, can "revise" the tariff by adding still more to the excessive protection already enjoyed by our giant industries...
...Read this from a letter that recently came to us: "Perhaps you have seen the news item concerning the death blow given to the Herbert Myrick publications by the post-office...
...Funk testified Hines named Tilden as the person to whom contributions to the Lorimer-election fund should be sent...
Vol. 3 • May 1911 • No. 18
