CHAPTER III.

The aim of the Americans for many years deliberately was to make a city government where no officer by himself could have power enough to do much harm. The natural result of this was to create a situation where no officer had power to do good.

The idea of allowing citizens in their wards to elect representatives, who should wield all the powers vested in English, French or German town councils, was regarded by Americans as savouring of suicidal recklessness. To trust the elected representatives of the people in an American city, as we trust the town councils of Birmingham and Glasgow, seems rash and reckless to the American statesman. A very thoughtful writer in theAnnals of the American Academy of Political and Social Sciencefour years ago, singled out the English municipal system as one which no sane American would dream of applying to a great American city. He said:—

It may be safely said that this whole organisation of the Birmingham government is an exaggeration of the features which have had the worst effects in the United States. It must make the mouth of a Tammany chief water to think of such a simplification of his labours and increase of the opportunities for plunder.

Notwithstanding this, American observers have followed Mr. Chamberlain in declaring that Birmingham is the best governed city of the world. That, however, in no way reassures the American pessimist, who has put on record his conviction that “the vicious principles evolved in English municipal government will overcome any safeguard, and that it is only a question of time when English cities have a taste of what New York has been through.” The result of this deep-rooted conviction in the American mind, that the elect of the people is certain to steal if he gets a chance, was thatcity governments came into existence dominated by the one desire to paralyse in advance the city council, to limit its opportunities of stealing, and place it more or less at the mercy of the State Legislatures. The result of this system born of cowardice and lack of faith was to transfer almost all power in New York from the city authorities to Tammany Hall. Tammany, in theory at least, was broad based upon the people’s will, nor was there any limitation to the authority of the Boss.

After a time the absurdity of this system, and the ruinous results which followed, forced upon the minds of the more intelligent citizens the fact that something must be done, and that at any cost. Some centre of local authority must be created which could be trusted not to steal. Mr. Seth Low explains and defends the establishment of the Tsar-Mayor on the theory that cities in their organic capacity are more accurately described as large corporations than as small states. He says:—

The better results flowing from this theory are easily made clear. Americans are sufficiently adept in the administration of large business enterprises to understand that, in any such undertaking, some one man must be given the power of direction and the choice of his chief assistants; they understand that power and responsibility must go together from the top to the bottom of every successful business organisation. Consequently, when it began to be realised that a city was a business corporation rather than an integral part of the State, the unwillingness to organise the city upon the line of concentrated power in connection with concentrated responsibility began to disappear. The charter of the city of Brooklyn is probably as advanced a type as can be found of the results of this mode of thinking. In Brooklyn the executive side of the city government is represented by the mayor and the various heads of departments. The legislative side consists of a common council of nineteen members, twelve of whom are elected from three districts, each having four aldermen, the remaining seven being elected, as aldermen at large by the whole city. The people elect three city officers, besides the board of aldermen—the mayor, who is the real as well as the nominal head of the city, the comptroller, who is practically the book-keeper of the city, and the auditor, whose audit is necessary for the payment of every bill against the city, whether large or small. The mayor appoints absolutely, without confirmation by the common council, all the executive heads of departments. He appoints, for example, the police commissioner, the commissioner of city works, the corporation counsel or counsellor at law, the city treasurer, the tax collector, and, in general, all the officials who are charged with executive duties. These officials, in turn, appoint their own subordinates, so that the principle of defined responsibility permeates the city government from top to bottom. The mayor also appoints the board of assessors, the board of education, and the board of elections. The executive officers appointed by the mayor are appointed for a term of two years—that is to say, for a term similar to his own.—Bryce’s “American Commonwealth,” vol. i.

This Charter first came into effect in January, 1882, and Brooklyn has been governed by Tsar-Mayors ever since. Mr. Seth Low, who was the first Tsar-Mayor in America, and who subsequently served a second time, claims for it the virtues and vices of all despotisms. When you have a good Tsar, nothing can be better. When you have a bad Tsar, nothing can be worse. As he says, the Brooklyn system “made clear to the simplest citizen that the entire character of the city government depends upon the man chosen for the office of Mayor.” It is, of course, playing double or quits. If you get agood man, his immense power enables him to be potent for good, but if you get a bad one, Heaven help the city!

The Brooklyn system was adopted with modification in several towns, notably in Cleveland, in Cincinnati, and to a certain extent in Philadelphia. The same system was carried out to its ultimate extreme in the Charter of the City of Quincy, in Massachusetts. Mr. Gamaliel Bradford, of Boston, in the May number of theAnnals of the American Academy of Political and Social Sciencefor 1893, thus explained the evolution of the Tsar-Mayor as it could be seen in the Quincy Charter:—

It was provided that the mayor should be the only executive official elected at all, and he by general vote of the city, so that he might be the embodiment of the whole administration and responsible for it. That he might be this, he was given the full power of appointment and removal of all subordinates except the school committee, as to whom even the radical framers of the charter shrank from encountering the popular prejudice. It was held that the separate election of officials, whether by popular vote or that of the council, is destructive of all subordination, of all firm or efficient administration, and of all personal responsibility. But the Quincy charter ran counter to another prejudice much more deeply rooted: the requirement of confirmation of the mayor’s appointments by the council or aldermen.The New York charter of 1884 gave to the mayor the full power of appointment, though that of removal, which seems to be necessary to make the other effective, was still jealously withheld. The Quincy charter gives both powers in full measure. Another object aimed at, though with some compromises, was to get rid of boards or commissions, as overriding the mayor and destroying that personal responsibility which was regarded as so important to public opinion. One man in every place, that man directly responsible to the mayor alone, and the mayor himself to the people, at short intervals; this was the guiding theory. To obviate the almost morbid dread of one man power, it was provided that the mayor might be removed from office by a three-fourths vote of the council, and a new election ordered. The theory was developed by another provision wholly new in the practice of the country: that the heads of departments, as well as the mayor, should be required to be present at the sessions of the council, to explain the wants of administration, and to give a public account of their stewardship in response to the questions of individual members. It was expected that in this way the strength or weakness of the mayor would be made clear to the popular apprehension, and that a better and improving class of men would be chosen with a corresponding effect upon city affairs.

The New York charter of 1884 gave to the mayor the full power of appointment, though that of removal, which seems to be necessary to make the other effective, was still jealously withheld. The Quincy charter gives both powers in full measure. Another object aimed at, though with some compromises, was to get rid of boards or commissions, as overriding the mayor and destroying that personal responsibility which was regarded as so important to public opinion. One man in every place, that man directly responsible to the mayor alone, and the mayor himself to the people, at short intervals; this was the guiding theory. To obviate the almost morbid dread of one man power, it was provided that the mayor might be removed from office by a three-fourths vote of the council, and a new election ordered. The theory was developed by another provision wholly new in the practice of the country: that the heads of departments, as well as the mayor, should be required to be present at the sessions of the council, to explain the wants of administration, and to give a public account of their stewardship in response to the questions of individual members. It was expected that in this way the strength or weakness of the mayor would be made clear to the popular apprehension, and that a better and improving class of men would be chosen with a corresponding effect upon city affairs.

Unfortunately, Mr. Bradford was compelled to admit, what Mr. Charles Francis Adams had previously pointed out, that the experiment of the Tsar-Mayor was, in Quincy, by no means justified by its results. Mr. Bradford says:—

It must be admitted, upon the evidence of leading citizens of Quincy, that the charter has thus far failed to accomplish its purpose; that extravagance of expenditure, local jobbing and caucus politics are as rampant as in other cities in the State.

Nevertheless and notwithstanding the disappointment in Quincy, when the Charter of Greater New York came to be discussed, the advocates of what may be called the English or normal system of vesting the government of the town in the hands of an elective council were in a hopeless minority, and the Charter of New York was drawn up upon the Tsar-Mayor basis. The advocates of the Tsar-Mayor used all the familiar arguments which are employed byapologists for autocracy all over the world. Their great keynote was the need for the concentration of responsibility.

“It is necessary,” said Mr. Godkin, “to reduce to its lowest possible point the number of executive officers whom the community has to watch.” Mr. De Witt, Chairman of the Committee, who drafted the Charter for Greater New York, put the matter succinctly when he wrote:—“I am for a Tsar-Mayor, with a short term, and a free right to go again to the people”; and then he added, recurring to the curious vein of fatalism which in Napoleon found expression in a belief in his destiny, “I believe that the Supreme Ruler of the universe moves through the mind of the multitude, and in this age of free schools and ubiquitous journalism, no mayor with plenary power and full responsibility would dare to permit corruption or inefficiency to exist in any department. If he did, the people would have only one head to hit, and one party to demolish.”

This change, to which we may take it American reformers are now definitely committed, may be, as Mr. E. M. Shephard declared, “the most important gain in municipal reform in our time,” or it may be the first step down the inclined plane which leads to despotism. My duty is not to dogmatise, but merely to describe. All that I would venture to observe by way of comment is that the new reform seems to be at variance, not only with the universally accepted English idea, which may, of course, be ignored, but equally with the Jeffersonian theory of the fundamental principle of Local Government. It may be necessary to fight fire with fire, and to cast out the Boss by the Tsar-Mayor, but old-fashioned Liberals may be pardoned if they feel that it is a very dangerous game to cast out the Devil by the aid of Beelzebub, the Prince of Devils.

DR. ALBERT SHAW.Editor of theReview of Reviews, New York.

THE CHARTER OF GREATER NEW YORK.

The Charter of Greater New York is the last, or rather the latest, of a long series of Charters granted by the State Legislature of New York for the government of the city. There were eleven distinct Charters granted between 1846 and 1890, so that the average life of a Charter is only four years. The Charter preceding this was regarded by Mr. Godkin as the best because it reduced the elective element almost to vanishing point:—

No community as heterogeneous as ours can manage its affairs successfully through democratic forms without reducing to its lowest possible point the number of executive officers whom it has to watch, and call to account when things go wrong. As soon as responsibility is widely diffused in such a community, “deals” or bargains between politicians for the division of the offices at once begin.

In no community, homogeneous or heterogeneous, can public affairs be managed successfully when the supreme Legislature always stands ready to remodel the Charter whenever the minority in the City can command the support of the majority in the State. It is bad enough in London when the minority in the County Council can appeal to the majority in the House of Commons. But the House of Commons only interferes by way of obstructing legislation desired by the Progressive majority. It never attempts to revolutionise the constitution of the Council, because the majority at Westminster does not agree with the majority at Spring Gardens.

It would not be a very great exaggeration to say that in the past the only effective government of the City of New York has consisted of Tammany Hall Executive as a Lower House, and the Legislature at Albany as an Upper Chamber. These two bodies were not shadows. They were both governing realities. When Tammany did not control the State Legislature, Albany was the only hope of the despairing Republicans. How constant was the interference of the State Legislature may be inferred from the fact, vouched for by a return presented to a State Commission on the Government of Cities, that in the ten years between 1880-9 no fewer than 399 different amending laws were passed at Albany affecting the Charter of New York City. A State Legislature which passes nearly forty laws every year changing or amending the City Charter is a factor to be reckoned with.

The demand for Home Rule for the city, often repeated, does not seem to be supported in earnest by either party. Both admit the need for it. But neither seem willing to risk anything to obtain it. The Charter of the Greater New York sprang from the Commission appointed in 1896 to consider and report upon the proposed consolidation and unification of the government of the great urban area now known as Greater New York. The subject had long been under discussion, but when the Charter came to be drafted many drew back. Mr. Croker asserted that if the citizens had been permitted to vote yea or nay upon the adoption it would never have come into force. The Referendum was not permitted, and the Charter came into force this year without the preliminary of a popular mass vote.

General Tracy, the Republican candidate at the recent election, was President of the Charter Commission, with Mr. De Witt as Chairman of the Committee. Among the other members were Mr. Strong, the Mayor of New York; Mr. Seth Low, the first Tsar-Mayor of Brooklyn; Mr. Gilroy, Tammany comptroller of the City of New York, and several other influential men. They unanimously agreed to recommend the Charter as it stands at present, although Mr. Seth Low and Mayor Strong dissented from one or two of its provisions.

The Commissioners set to work in the belief that they were framing a constitution for a city which in the lifetime of those now living would have 6,000,000 citizens. Mr. De Witt, the Chairman of the Committee, who tells us that “his embattled energies laboured at the Charter for eight long consecrated months,” contemplated with pride the result of his handiwork. Speaking of the Charter, he declares:—

It is adequate to all the emergencies of the vast future. It is constructed not merely for the present, but for many centuries to come. It has in it all the virtues of existing charters and the vices of none. It will adapt itself to any extent of domain, and to any multiple of population. As well with a population of ten millions as with a population of three millions, it will give to each neighbourhood the utmost care and attention, and to the imperial metropolis, as a whole, the utmost dignity and power. The form of government for Greater New York, it will be the model upon which Greater London will be constructed.

Without making quite such a lofty claim for the Charter as this, there is no doubt that it is an important document, and one which will well repay a careful study. It is somewhat voluminous, filling with its annexes no less than one thousand pages.

It has, however, been made the subject of a very painstaking and lucid analysis by Dr. Albert Shaw, whose “Studies of Municipal Administration in the Old World and the New” entitle him to speak with some authority on the matters dealt with by the Charter. His analysis of the Charter was published in theAtlantic Monthlyfor June, 1897, under the title of “The Municipal Programme of Greater New York.” Mr. De Witt published his clear and conciseidea of the Greater New York inMunsey’s Magazine, under the title of “Moulding the Metropolis.” The Charter itself, with its 1,620 sections, has been published in popular form at 10 cents by the BrooklynDaily Eagle. The text of the Charter, with the aid of Dr. Shaw’s and Mr. De Witt’s analyses, enables any one to form a tolerably clear idea as to what the Charter does and what the Charter means.

Mr. Croker repeatedly assured me, before the recent Mayoral contest began, that the Charter was a monstrosity and an absurdity, that the system of government which it established must inevitably break down, and that not even an archangel could make it work satisfactorily. Mr. Croker can hardly be said to be an impartial judge, but his verdict is sufficiently in accord with that of Dr. Shaw to justify very grave misgivings as to the prospect before the second city of the world.

During my stay in New York I was simply besieged by interviewers, begging me to tell them what I thought of the Charter. I turned a deaf ear to their solicitations, preferring to make a more careful study of the Charter itself with the advantage of the analysis of Dr. Shaw. Even now I rather shrink from expressing an opinion, lest it should be misconstrued as implying any claim on my part to sit in judgment on those who are saddled with the responsibility of governing New York. But when doctors differ, the people decide, and when local experts are at hopeless variance as to the merits or demerits of the Charter, it may perhaps be permitted to a British onlooker, even at a distance of 3,000 miles, to put on record the way in which the Charter strikes him. If this should not be denied me, I may say at once that the Charter seems to have written on its face thoroughgoing distrust of the people. The aspect of the Charter is black with despair. It is far worse as an expression of democratic despair than the Brooklyn Charter, for the Brooklyn Charter at least trusted the Tsar-Mayor, whereas the New York Charter shrinks even from doing that.

In explaining the provisions of the Charter, I prefer to quote from Dr. Shaw’s analysis. He says:—

First comes the mayor, who is entitled the chief executive. He is to be elected for four years and is not eligible for an immediate re-election, and his salary is to be 15,000 dols. a year. The business of city administration is divided into eighteen executive departments. These are the departments of finance, of law, of police, of water supply, of highways, of street-cleaning, of sewers, of public buildings, lighting and supplies, of bridges, of parks, of building, of public charities, of correction, of fire, of docks and ferries, of taxes and assessments, of education, and of health.

The members of all these boards, with one exception, are appointed by the Mayor, not elected by the people. The one exception is the City Comptroller, who is at the head of the Finance Department. He is elected at the same time as theMayor. The Mayor also appoints all the members of the five school boards, which look after education in the five boroughs of Greater New York:—

The system provided for in the new charter puts the executive government wholly into the hands of the eighteen departments, which are practically supreme in their respective eighteen spheres, except as they are limited by two important groups, or boards—namely, the board of estimate and apportionment and the board of public improvements. One discovers with some surprise that the ordinance-making power, which would nominally belong exclusively to the municipal assembly, is, in the Greater New York charter, conferred upon all the executive departments.

Where then, it will be asked, does the Municipal Assembly come in, for there is a Municipal Assembly which is divided into two chambers? To which the answer is that the Municipal Assembly is practically reduced to the function of a debating society; for, says Dr. Shaw:—

The eighteen executive departments take away from the municipal assembly the larger part of the ordinance-making power; the board of public improvements in practice controls municipal plans and policies as regards the construction of works, and the board of estimate and apportionment intervenes to prepare the budget, both on the side of income and on that of disbursement.

It is true that the budget must be voted by the Municipal Assembly, which on that occasion sits as one body. But its control is practically nil. The real financial control is vested in the Board of Estimate and Apportionment. Mr. F. V. Green, writing inScribnerfor October, 1896, points out that the framers of this board carefully avoided the principle of direct election. He says:—

Probably in no other part of the globe, however autocratic its government, is such power of taxation and appropriation committed to so unrepresentative a body as in this foremost city of the land of liberty, whose Government originated in a protest against taxation without representation. And it is a still more curious anomaly that this system, which was established as one of the results of the overthrow of the Tweedrégime, and has been in operation for twenty-three years, is the most successful feature of the present form of city government—the only one of which criticism is seldom heard.

After this non-elective board has approved of the estimates, they are then sent down to the Municipal Assembly to be voted. But, says Dr. Shaw, the Municipal Assembly

must complete its action within a certain number of days. It may not add a penny to the estimates at any point whatsoever. It is permitted to throw out items or to make reductions, but it must not offset these by voting increased sums for any object. When it has completed its consideration, the budget goes to the mayor for his final action. The mayor has authority to veto any amendments that the municipal assembly may have made. That is to say, he may restore any amounts that have been subtracted.

But, it will be said, the Mayor’s veto may be overridden. It may, but only if there is a majority of five-sixths of the Municipal Assembly against him. Such unanimity is practically unattainable.

It would, indeed, seem as if the chief purpose of the Municipal Assembly was to give its members practical lessons in the working of simple sums of vulgar fractions. Again, to quote Dr. Shaw:—

No man will ever become intimate enough with the provisions of this charter—no matter how many years he may sit in the municipal assembly—to know for a certainty, without careful reference to the document, by what kind of a majority a particular piece of business must be carried to have validity. Some actions in the municipal assembly may be taken by a majority of those present and voting, provided there is a quorum. Other things may be done by a simple majority of all those elected; still others require a two-thirds majority of all those elected, others a three-fourths majority, others a four-fifths majority, others a five-sixths majority, and others absolute unanimity. I suspect that there may be still other percentages or proportions requisite for certain actions; but the seven that I have mentioned have caught my attention, as I have endeavoured to run through the document.

In the report of the Commission presenting the Charter, the Commissioners point out that the Charter introduces, “in accordance with established American polity, a variety of checks and safeguards against the abuse of the powers conferred upon the Municipal Assembly.” There is no doubt on that head. The distrust of the popular elected assembly appears at every turn. The popular assembly is emasculated from the very first moment of its existence. It is carefully deprived of the right of initiative in matters of the first moment, and elaborate provisions are made for depriving it of the exercise of the authority which in England we should regard as absolutely indispensable. To begin with, the Municipal Assembly is forbidden to grant any franchise or right to use the public streets except upon the approval of the Board of Estimate and Apportionment, and then only for limited periods, with due provision for periodical re-valuations. The Municipal Assembly is not allowed to sanction any work involving the expenditure of any large sum of money, or to create any debt, to dispose of any franchise, or to levy any tax, without the concurrence of the Board of Estimate and Apportionment. Even then its decision is subject to the veto of the Mayor. In cases of public improvements of great magnitude and cost, the Municipal Assembly cannot vote by a simple majority. Unless it can muster a majority of three-quarters of its whole membership it can do nothing. It is possible, therefore, for one quarter of the Assembly, plus one, to paralyse that body at will. In fact, it is impossible adequately to explain the impotence of the Assembly which, according to ordinary English ideas, ought to be the source, seat and centre of all powers. No doubt clauses exist conferring upon the Assembly certain powers, but at the end of the clauses you will always find that they have not to be exercised excepting on the initiative of some Department which is not elective, or with the concurrence of some Board which is equally free from the taint of a popular elective origin.

All that, however, is consistent enough with the Napoleonic conception of the true method of democratic government. Napoleon,with his ministers of state, never claimed to exercise such control over theCorps Législatifas the Mayor of Greater New York will exercise over his elective assembly. He is allowed a free hand to appoint his own executive, and he can pass his own budget, so long as he can find one-sixth, plus one, of the Assembly to support him. The creation of the Tsar-Mayor, however interesting as indicative of the rooted distrust of elective assemblies which is supreme at present in the American mind, is not the feature of the Charter which reveals most deeply how far the distrust of popular government has gone in the United States. For, after giving the Mayor supreme responsibility, and electing him for a term of four years, these astonishing charter-makers carefully provide that he shall only have a right to remove the commissioners, whom he has been allowed to appoint, during the first six months of his term of office. It is this limitation which shows how thoroughly the modern American distrusts his governing men. Faith in an elective council has perished utterly; but faith in a Tsar-Mayor might have shown the survival of some faith in the elective principle. But the stipulation carefully made in the Charter that the Mayor’s right to remove the heads of departments whom he has nominated shall cease six months after his election, is the most astounding illustration yet afforded of the deep-rooted distrust which the American of to-day has in all elected men.

Ex-Mayor Grace, writing after much experience of the working of city governments, declared:—

The absolute power of removal as well as of appointment of all commissioners and heads of departments should be vested in the mayor, the power of removal to be subject to no check beyond that of filing the reasons for such removals—expressed in writing.

Mr. Seth Low, the first Tsar-Mayor of Brooklyn, and Mr. Strong, the Mayor of the Reform Administration in New York, both declared, in a supplementary report, their conviction that the authority given to the Mayor to make appointments without confirmation ought to carry with it, as a matter of course, the authority to make removals in the public interest without charges at any time. Their protests, however, were overruled. The majority dare not trust the Mayor with such powers. The result is that “for three years and six months the government of the City of New York will be carried on by eighteen separate departments, not one of which is directly responsible or accountable to anybody. They do not derive authority directly from the people, and they certainly owe nothing to the Municipal Assembly. On the other hand, there is no power in the Mayor to hold them accountable.” Says Dr. Shaw:—

It is bureaucracy pure and simple. I am not ready to assert it positively, but I am of the impression, from some knowledge of the subject, that the very shadowy municipal assemblies provided some years ago for St. Petersburg and Moscow had a greater legislative and financial authority than the new municipal assembly of theGreater New York; and I am inclined to believe that neither in the administration of those Russian cities nor in the administration of the Russian provincial governments will one find a bureaucratic system so complete and so indirect in its responsibilities to the public as the bureaucracy which the Greater New York charter creates.

There is no necessity to go further. I have quoted enough to justify the title of “Despairing Democracy”; for here we have a democracy in such depths of despair that it first emasculates its elective assembly, and then hamstrings its Cæsar.

MAP SHOWING THE LIMITS OF GREATER NEW YORK, AS DEFINED BY THE MUNICIPAL CONSOLIDATION INQUIRY COMMISSION.Larger Image

MR. W. R. HEARST.Editor and Proprietor of theNew York Journal.

GOVERNMENT BY NEWSPAPER.

Twelve years ago I employed part of the leisure I enjoyed in the safe retreat of Holloway Gaol in writing an essay on “Government by Journalism.” In that essay, which was published after my release in theContemporary Review, and subsequently republished under the title “A Journalist on Journalism,” I expounded a theory as to the natural and inevitable emergence of the journalist as the ultimate depository of power in modern democracy. One passage I may be permitted to quote, as it bears directly upon the subject of the present chapter:—

The future of journalism depends almost entirely upon the journalist, and at present the outlook is not very hopeful. The very conception of journalism as an instrument of government is foreign to the mind of most journalists. Yet, if they could but think of it, the editorial pen is a sceptre of power, compared with which the sceptre of many a monarch is but a gilded lath. In a democratic age, in the midst of a population which is able to read, no position is comparable for permanent influence and far-reaching power to that of an editor who understands his vocation. In him are vested almost all the attributes of real sovereignty. He has almost exclusive rights of initiative; he retains a permanent right of direction; and, above all, he better than any man is able to generate that steam, known as public opinion, which is the greatest force of politics.To rule—the very idea begets derision from those whose one idea of their high office is to grind out so much copy, to be only paid for according to quantity, like sausages or rope-yarn. Bunyan’s man with the muck-rake has many a prototype on the press. To dress contemporary controversy day by day in the jacket of party, to serve up with fresh sauce of current events the hackneyed commonplaces of politics—that in their eyes is journalism; but to rule! Yet an editor is the uncrowned king of an educated democracy. The range of his power is limited only by the extent of his knowledge, the quality rather than the quantity of his circulation, and the faculty and force which he can bring to the work of government.An extraordinary idea seems to prevail with the eunuchs of the craft that leadership, guidance, governance, are alien to the calling of a journalist. Those conceptions of what is a journalist’s duty, if indeed they recognise that imperious word as having any bearing upon their profession, is hid in mystery. If it may be inferred from their practice, their ideal is to grind out a column of more or less well-balanced sentences, capable of grammatical construction, conflicting with no social conventionality or party prejudice, which fills so much space in the paper, and then utterly, swiftly, and for ever vanishes from mortal mind. How can they help to make up other people’s minds when they have never made up their own?Even as it now is, with all its disabilities and all its limitations, the press is almost the most effective instrument for discharging many of the functions of government now left us. It has been, as Mr. Gladstone remarked, and still is, the most potent engine for the reform of abuses that we possess, and it has succeeded to many of the functions formerly monopolised by the House of Commons. But allthat it has been is but a shadow going before of the substance which it may yet possess, when all our people have learned to read, and the press is directed by men with the instinct and capacity of government.

To rule—the very idea begets derision from those whose one idea of their high office is to grind out so much copy, to be only paid for according to quantity, like sausages or rope-yarn. Bunyan’s man with the muck-rake has many a prototype on the press. To dress contemporary controversy day by day in the jacket of party, to serve up with fresh sauce of current events the hackneyed commonplaces of politics—that in their eyes is journalism; but to rule! Yet an editor is the uncrowned king of an educated democracy. The range of his power is limited only by the extent of his knowledge, the quality rather than the quantity of his circulation, and the faculty and force which he can bring to the work of government.

An extraordinary idea seems to prevail with the eunuchs of the craft that leadership, guidance, governance, are alien to the calling of a journalist. Those conceptions of what is a journalist’s duty, if indeed they recognise that imperious word as having any bearing upon their profession, is hid in mystery. If it may be inferred from their practice, their ideal is to grind out a column of more or less well-balanced sentences, capable of grammatical construction, conflicting with no social conventionality or party prejudice, which fills so much space in the paper, and then utterly, swiftly, and for ever vanishes from mortal mind. How can they help to make up other people’s minds when they have never made up their own?

Even as it now is, with all its disabilities and all its limitations, the press is almost the most effective instrument for discharging many of the functions of government now left us. It has been, as Mr. Gladstone remarked, and still is, the most potent engine for the reform of abuses that we possess, and it has succeeded to many of the functions formerly monopolised by the House of Commons. But allthat it has been is but a shadow going before of the substance which it may yet possess, when all our people have learned to read, and the press is directed by men with the instinct and capacity of government.

Now it so happened by a curious coincidence that just about the time I was penning these sentences in happy Holloway, a youth fresh from Harvard, the heir to one of the greatest fortunes in the United States, was deciding to devote his life to the journalistic profession. Mr. W. R. Hearst was the son of Senator Hearst, one of the lucky handful of men who came out from the development of the silver mines of the Far West with many solid millions of sterling gold in his possession. As heir to the Hearst millions, nothing would have been more in accordance with the ways of the millionaire class than for the young graduate to have given himself up to a life of self-indulgent ease. Young Hearst, however, had no inclination for sloth. Journalism attracted him, and he set himself to learn the business of the craft. Money, of course, was available to secure him ample opportunity to indulge his whim, and before long he began to try his prentice hand as editor and proprietor of theSan Francisco Examiner. He soon proved that he possessed the editorial instinct as well as the capitalist’s purse, and theExaminerbegan to be heard of far beyond the Pacific Coast as one of the smartest specimens of American journalism.

But the Pacific Coast is a long way off. To reign in San Francisco is less than to serve in New York, and Mr. Hearst soon began to turn a longing eye to the Eastern capital. The same loadstone that drew Mr. Pulitzer from St. Louis to make theNew York Worldthe latest and greatest of American newspapers, compelled Mr. Hearst to come to the same city to found a newspaper which would be even later and greater than theWorld. It was with Mr. Hearst as it was with Themistocles when the laurels of Miltiades would not allow him to sleep. The laurels of Mr. Pulitzer were equally productive of insomnia in theExamineroffice. At last, when Senator Hearst died, and the young editor of thirty found himself in undisputed control of a million or two—pounds, not dollars—with a reversionary right, on the death of his mother, to several millions more, he was in a position to realise his ambition. Crossing the continent, he purchased theNew York Morning Journalfrom Mr. Pulitzer’s brother Albert, and began the siege of New York. TheWorldwas then in the height of its prosperity. In ten years it had built up a circulation without a rival in the Western hemisphere. The ParisPetit Journalalone distanced theWorldin Europe. The great gilded dome of theWorldoffice, which every night, radiant with electric light, sits as a crown of flame upon the city’s brow, did not rise more conspicuously above the other buildings in its vicinity than theWorldtowered aloft above its contemporaries. When Mr. Hearst sat down in New York he had one ambition, and—sofar as he allowed any one to see his secret thoughts—one ambition only. He would publish a newspaper which would beat theWorld.

MR. JOSEPH PULITZER.Editor and Proprietor of theNew York World.

He began operations by annexing the pick of the staff of theWorld. Journalists in the United States sit by no means so tightly in their chairs as they do in this country. The Americans are a restless race. Whether it is that the nomad Redskin left a migratory contagion in the air, or whether the force of gravitation has been suspended on their behalf, or whatever else the cause may be, the fact is indisputable. Whether in politics, in the press, or elsewhere, they shift about with a readiness that seems strangely unnatural to the more stolid Englishman, who is apt to root himself like his native oak. Hence it was possible for Mr. Hearst to begin his campaign in New York by taking away from Mr. Pulitzer several of the brightest and brainiest members of his staff. They left theWorldto form the staff of theJournal, with regrets no doubt, but without hesitation. For the terms of Mr. Hearst were better than those of Mr. Pulitzer, and they went. Mr. Pulitzer, alarmed by the secession, induced some of them to return by the offer of still better terms than Mr. Hearst, but the young man with the inherited millions outbid the older journalist who had made his own pile, and theJournalstarted with the cream of theWorld’sstaff. If there be something of Dugald Dalgetty about this sudden transfer of allegiance in English eyes, it was entirely in accordance with the habits and customs of American journalism. A change in proprietors or in editors will be followed by a filing out of all the staff, the members of which no more lament over their fate than gipsies deplore the fall of their tent-poles.

To the men recruited from theJournal, Mr. Hearst added some of the best of his Californian staff, and as he paid the highest salaries going, he had the pick of the pressmen of the continent. He picked as a rule wisely and well. But his first choice and the most valuable member of his staff was himself. No one did more to give the newspaper character and success than the young millionaire, who was to be seen in his shirt-sleeves through the hottest nights in the sultry summer toiling away at proofs and formes until the early hours when he saw his paper to press. Members of his staff who were worked like niggers could not complain when they saw their chief working harder than any of his salaried employees. “A millionaire,” they said, “in his shirt-sleeves! He could not work harder if he were working on space for his daily bread!”

After having formed his staff, Mr. Hearst launched his paper, publishing it at a cent. TheNew York Heraldis published at three cents. TheWorldwas published at two cents. Mr. Hearst published morning after morning an eight and a twelve page paper ata price below the cost of production. Mr. Pulitzer, recognising that at last he had found a real rival, reduced the price of theWorldto a cent. From that day to this the two rivals have wrestled together without ceasing. They both publish morning and afternoon and Sunday editions. They both are profusely illustrated. They both cater directly and avowedly for the million, and the million responds. The weaker of the old-fashioned papers went down beneath the feet of the contending giants as the forests went down under the trampling of St. Tammany and the Devil. But the circulation of theJournalwent up steadily, until in two years Mr. Hearst had a Sunday circulation of 400,000 at five cents, while the average daily sales of the morning and evening journals reached 350,000. The circulation of theWorldwas not seriously impaired. TheJournalgrew not at the expense of its rival so much as at the expense of the other papers which were less up-to-date.

Of course this result was not achieved without prodigious expenditure. Never before were such salaries paid on any newspaper. The secrets of the counting-house are not revealed to the outside world, but Mr. Hearst is said to have half-a-dozen editors and artists, each of whom draws the salary of a Cabinet Minister. Money flowed like water. Nothing was too much to pay for a first-class, exclusive piece of intelligence. Journalists of the old school stood aghast at theJournal’sprices. And, what made the expenditure appear still more outrageous, for a long time there were practically no receipts. Advertisers, even in the United States, are a conservative race. A newspaper appealed in vain for their support. They would come in, but only at low prices. Mr. Hearst said they might stay out; they must come in at his prices or not at all. They took him at his word and stayed out—for a time. But now they are coming in shoals, and the advertisement columns day by day attest the capitulation of the advertiser to the newspaper. The direct cash loss on the first year’s editing of theJournalcould hardly be less than £200,000, if, indeed, it did not largely exceed that sum.

People began to wonder what Mr. Hearst was after. He could not be after the dollars—he had more dollars than he could count. He was not known to have any distinctive political aspirations. He was spoken of sometimes as the Socialist millionaire, but he never professed any belief in Socialism as a dogma of his creed. Was it only to beat theWorld? Who could say. TheJournalplunged heavily and got hit badly by its advocacy of Bryanism and Free Silver, but Mr. Hearst was no fanatic of silver. He was not a fanatic at all. He was a man as modest in private life as his paper was blatant in print. His editorials were searched in vain to discover any consistent or inconsistent creed. TheJournalwas like Broadway in print. Broadway at high noon, with cars swinging backwards and forwards along the tracks, and the myriad, multitudes streaming thisway and that—life everywhere, but one common governing purpose or direction nowhere.

But after a time there was gradually evolved from this feverish chaos of sensationalism some trace of a great conception. Mr. Croker, who, although not glib of tongue, is shrewd of wit and keen of eye, discerned its drift, and set himself to ridicule and belittle what he called “government by newspaper.” Then theJournalitself, taking heart of grace from a series of successes, boldly printed at the head of its editorial columns:—

THE “JOURNAL’S” MOTTO:“While Others Talk, the ‘Journal’ Acts.”

THE “JOURNAL’S” MOTTO:

“While Others Talk, the ‘Journal’ Acts.”

This appeared immediately after the announcement of the release of the fair heroine Evangelina Cisneros from her Cuban gaol by the enterprise of aJournalreporter. It was followed by an editorial entitled “The Journalism that Does Things.” This article expresses so succinctly the aims and objects of a paper which has played so conspicuous a part in the recent history of New York that I have no hesitation in quoting it here:—

The instant recognition accorded throughout the world, outside of Weyler’s palace and offices of most New York newspapers, to the work of the heroes who, in the service of theJournaland of humanity, rescued Evangelina Cisneros from the prison of the Recojidas is broader and deeper than a mere compliment to a single newspaper. It is epochal. It signifies that by a supreme achievement the journalism of action, which is called by its detractors the “new journalism,” and proudly accepts the title, has broken down the barriers of prejudice and vindicated its animating principle.Action—that is the distinguishing mark of the new journalism. It represents the final stage in the evolution of the modern newspaper of a century ago—the “new journals” of their day—told the news, and some of them made great efforts to get it first. The new journal of to-day prints the news too, but it does more. It does not wait for things to turn up. It turns them up.It has taken some time for the understanding and appreciation of these novel methods to become general, but from the very first theJournalhas found an immense constituency eager to welcome them. It has provided for this sympathetic body of readers a continuous succession of notable deeds. We may recall a few examples.TheJournalhas always been an energetic ally of the Cuban patriots. It has rendered them a variety of important services, of which the rescue of Miss Cisneros is merely the latest. Another of a similar, through less dramatic sort, was its action in forcing the Spanish authorities to issue passports to the widow and children of Dr. Ricardo Ruiz, the American dentist who was murdered by his gaolers in Havana.When theCasper Whitneyput to sea with water oozing in through every joint, theJournalsecured an investigation which resulted in the removal of Captain Fairchild, of the inspection service.TheJournalproved by experiments with chartered vessels off Sandy Hook that the ordinary flags of the international signal code could be easily read at night from a great distance under flashlight illumination. This discovery, whose value in saving life and property at sea is incalculable, it dedicated freely to the maritime world.From the beginning theJournalhas taken a practical as well as a theoretical interest in the relief of suffering and the elevation of the classes that have lacked a fair chance in life. Last winter it undertook to mitigate the awful distress that prevailed so widely at that time by opening a depôt in Grand Street, at which hot food was distributed daily to those in need. Thousands of starving people wererelieved by this enterprise. On another occasion, when a fire in East Thirty-fifth Street rendered many families homeless, theJournalinvited them all to a Christmas dinner, and then, with the co-operation of its readers, established them in newly-furnished homes. But the greatest work of theJournalin the direction of the improvement of social conditions has been the establishment and maintenance of theJournalJunior Republic, which has saved about two hundred boys from the slums, and turned them into good citizens, and which contains the promise of unlimited future development and expansion.RIVERSIDE DRIVE AND GRANT’S TOMB.Last winter, when the aldermen had undertaken to grant a perpetual franchise for the use of the streets to a light, fuel and power company, theJournalserved injunctions upon the board and prevented the outrage. At the same time it fought at Albany for dollar gas with such success that even Mr. Platt’s Legislature was compelled to yield to public opinion to the extent of passing a bill providing for a general reduction. The practice of invoking the law against unfaithful public servants has been repeated recently with signal success in the case of Commissioner of Public Works Collis and his pet contractors, who have been compelled to raise the siege of Fifth Avenue.When the East River murder seemed an insoluble mystery to the police, theJournalorganised a detective force of its own, and in two or three days identified the victim, Guldensuppe, and his assassins. And when the Long Island Railroad attempted to excuse its wholesale manslaughter at Valley Stream by alleging that an engine could be seen for a distance of one thousand five hundred feet, theJournaltook a counterpart of the wrecked tally-ho outfit to the scene, and proved by actual measurement that the driver could not have seen the approaching train until his leaders were on the track, with the engine eighty-four feet away.These are a few of the public services by which theJournalhas illustrated its theory that a newspaper’s duty is not confined to exhortation, but that when things are going wrong it should itself set them right if possible. The brilliant exemplication of this theory in the rescue of Miss Cisneros has finally commended it to the approval of almost the entire reading world.

Action—that is the distinguishing mark of the new journalism. It represents the final stage in the evolution of the modern newspaper of a century ago—the “new journals” of their day—told the news, and some of them made great efforts to get it first. The new journal of to-day prints the news too, but it does more. It does not wait for things to turn up. It turns them up.

It has taken some time for the understanding and appreciation of these novel methods to become general, but from the very first theJournalhas found an immense constituency eager to welcome them. It has provided for this sympathetic body of readers a continuous succession of notable deeds. We may recall a few examples.

TheJournalhas always been an energetic ally of the Cuban patriots. It has rendered them a variety of important services, of which the rescue of Miss Cisneros is merely the latest. Another of a similar, through less dramatic sort, was its action in forcing the Spanish authorities to issue passports to the widow and children of Dr. Ricardo Ruiz, the American dentist who was murdered by his gaolers in Havana.

When theCasper Whitneyput to sea with water oozing in through every joint, theJournalsecured an investigation which resulted in the removal of Captain Fairchild, of the inspection service.

TheJournalproved by experiments with chartered vessels off Sandy Hook that the ordinary flags of the international signal code could be easily read at night from a great distance under flashlight illumination. This discovery, whose value in saving life and property at sea is incalculable, it dedicated freely to the maritime world.

From the beginning theJournalhas taken a practical as well as a theoretical interest in the relief of suffering and the elevation of the classes that have lacked a fair chance in life. Last winter it undertook to mitigate the awful distress that prevailed so widely at that time by opening a depôt in Grand Street, at which hot food was distributed daily to those in need. Thousands of starving people wererelieved by this enterprise. On another occasion, when a fire in East Thirty-fifth Street rendered many families homeless, theJournalinvited them all to a Christmas dinner, and then, with the co-operation of its readers, established them in newly-furnished homes. But the greatest work of theJournalin the direction of the improvement of social conditions has been the establishment and maintenance of theJournalJunior Republic, which has saved about two hundred boys from the slums, and turned them into good citizens, and which contains the promise of unlimited future development and expansion.

RIVERSIDE DRIVE AND GRANT’S TOMB.

Last winter, when the aldermen had undertaken to grant a perpetual franchise for the use of the streets to a light, fuel and power company, theJournalserved injunctions upon the board and prevented the outrage. At the same time it fought at Albany for dollar gas with such success that even Mr. Platt’s Legislature was compelled to yield to public opinion to the extent of passing a bill providing for a general reduction. The practice of invoking the law against unfaithful public servants has been repeated recently with signal success in the case of Commissioner of Public Works Collis and his pet contractors, who have been compelled to raise the siege of Fifth Avenue.

When the East River murder seemed an insoluble mystery to the police, theJournalorganised a detective force of its own, and in two or three days identified the victim, Guldensuppe, and his assassins. And when the Long Island Railroad attempted to excuse its wholesale manslaughter at Valley Stream by alleging that an engine could be seen for a distance of one thousand five hundred feet, theJournaltook a counterpart of the wrecked tally-ho outfit to the scene, and proved by actual measurement that the driver could not have seen the approaching train until his leaders were on the track, with the engine eighty-four feet away.

These are a few of the public services by which theJournalhas illustrated its theory that a newspaper’s duty is not confined to exhortation, but that when things are going wrong it should itself set them right if possible. The brilliant exemplication of this theory in the rescue of Miss Cisneros has finally commended it to the approval of almost the entire reading world.

These things, all of them, or almost all, are good. Some of them are very good. But all of them together do not prove that in Mr. Hearst we have the man of whom Mr. Lowell spoke when he said:—

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