S

Monopoly

HALL WE HAVE regulated competition or regulated monopoly? That is the most important question of this campaign, not even excepting the tariff. New-party advocates of legalized monopoly state the trust problem as if we must choose between destructive competition or regulated monopoly; whereas the alternative actually is between regulated competition and regulated monopoly.

Competition is an incident of industrial liberty; regulation is essential to the preservation and best development of competition, just as regulation is necessary to the preservation and best development of civil and political liberty. To preserve the civil and political liberty of the many, it was found to be necessary to restrict, in some respects, the liberty of the few. It was found that unlicensed political liberty leads. to oligarchy or despotism. The physically strong were long ago curbed in order to protect those physically weaker. More recently such protection has been extended to the realm of business. Recognizing actual differences in strength between employer and employee, we restricted theoretical freedom of contract by factory laws prescribing conditions and hours. The liberty of the financier, the merchant, and the manufacturer to deceive his less astute customer, expressed in the phrase caveat emptor, is yielding rapidly before pure-food laws and postal-fraud prosecutions to better conceptions of business ethics. Similarly, competition must be limited in order to preserve competition. The strongest believers in competition are most zealous that it be regulated. To prohibit that destructive competition which leads to monopoly-to prohibit that excess of liberty of contract which, through combination, would destroy industrial liberty-is not "attempting by law to make people compete." No one seeks to compel people to compete. The purpose of the Sherman law and of the perfecting amendments proposed by the La Follette-Lenroot-Stanley bill is merely to prevent the killing of competition to prevent competition being rendered impossible.

Nor does the refusal to sanction industrial monopoly interfere with the natural law of business. There is no natural monopoly to-day in the business world. The Oil Trust, the Tobacco Trust, the Sugar Trust, the Steel Trust, are all most unnatural monopolies. The first three acquired their control of the market by ruthless and unconscionable conduct-conduct which was not only a sin against society but involved flagrant violations of the ordinary criminal law. Without the aid of railroad rebating, bribery, corruption, and espionage none of those trusts would have acquired the vast wealth and power which enabled them to destroy weaker competitors. The Steel Trust, while apparently free from the grosser forms of suppressing competition, acquired control of the market, not through greater efficiency but by buying up existing successful plants and ore supplies at fabulous prices and levying tribute through control of transportation systems. It is not interfering with any natural law of business to refuse to allow a few financiers to purchase huge concerns at many times their intrinsic values and then, through controlling the market, cast the burden of such excesses upon the innocent consumer. Not a single industrial monopoly exists to-day which is the result of natural growth. In every case of monopoly, competition was suppressed either through ruthless practices or by an improper use of inordinate wealth or power. If the law prohibiting such practices is clearly defined and enforced, as is the purpose of the La Follette-Lenroot, the Stanley and the Oldfield bills to accomplish, no similar trust will arise in the future. In attempting to dismember existing illegal trusts, we are, therefore, not interfering with a natural growth; we are endeavoring to restore health by removing a cancer: for if the phrase be used in its proper economic and social sense, there is no such thing as a "good trust." The evils of industrial monopoly are inherent, not incidental: they may be mitigated by control, but they cannot be removed by any law or prevented by any commission if industrial monopoly is allowed to exist.

We fear it cannot be successfully denied that the new party, in its platform, in Colonel ROOSEVELT's speeches, in the declarations of Mr. GEORGE W. PERKINS, has very positively committed itself to an abandonIt relies upon amement of the democratic principle in industry. lioration of an evil, instead of endeavoring to prevent the evil from existing and increasing. With much emphasis it declares for monopoly There is no other as economically and socially efficient and desirable. substantial trust issue. Whether the country decides to adopt for the

future the policy of preserving competition in industry or the policy of legalizing monopoly, in either event there must be decided and introduced judicial and administrative machinery adequate and appropriate for carrying out the policy adopted. No machinery exists to-day adequate to carry out either the policy of competition or the policy of monopoly. If the future industrial policy of the country is once settled, and the decision is accepted in good faith, the selection of the proper machinery for enforcing and administering that policy, whichever it be, is a matter of detail, though of very important detail. It is, moreover, a detail upon which there should not be fundamental differences. Substantially all are agreed that whether we are to have competition or monopoly, our judicial machinery must be supplemented by administrative machinery. The Interstate Trade Commission is no invention of the new party. As long ago as August 21, 1911, two days after Senator LA FOLLETTE introduced his bill to perfect the legal machinery of the Sherman law, the Democratic Senator NEWLANDS, a strong believer in competition, introduced a bill for the establishment of an Interstate Trade Commission. The Progressive Republican Senator CUMMINS and his associates on the Senate Committee on Interstate Commerce have been cooperating with Senator NEWLANDS in perfecting both measures. As to the precise provisions of the Trade Commission bill there may be differences of opinion, but all agree that such a commission should be established, with ample powers of investigation, publicity, and supervision, to aid in administering the law. The great question remains: What law shall it be? Shall it be law legalizing monopoly or law preserving competition?

THE

STATE INFLUENCES

HE DEMOCRATIC State ticket in Illinois, chosen by ROGER SULLIVAN, is one of the worst that could be selected. The general inside opinion is that SULLIVAN is playing a double game. The Bull Moose, meantime, has nominated one of the best State tickets ever seen in Illinois. No matter how you vote for President, vote for the best ticket in your State, whether it be Democratic, Progressive, or Republican. It will be well if the Saratoga Convention of October 31 can learn a lesson from Illinois, which could easily have been carried for WILSON if a strong State ticket were behind him, but which is now extremely doubtful. MCADOO would be an ideal nominee for Governor of New York.

IN OUR CITIES the relation of the police to vice and to public safety constitutes one of the most difficult municipal problems. The advantage of such a sensation as the Rosenthal case ought to be some stimulus to constructive thought. We are decidedly pleased that Mr. EMORY R. BUCKNER has been selected as counsel for the investigation. Mr. BUCKNER is a young man who gives every sign of unusual ability and character. He worked his way first through the University of Nebraska and then through the Harvard Law School. He was in the District Attorney's office under Mr. STIMSON, who recommended him to Mr. WHITMAN, and the most intelligent and progressive lawyers think highly of him. In any investigation of this kind the character of the attorney in charge is of the first importance. The public has every reason to believe that the work in this very important emergency will be well done.

PHILO

SOMETHING FOR NOTHING

HILOSOPHICALLY CONSIDERED, the moral of the Rosenthal case is the damage of trying to get something for nothing. It is an almost universal fault. It is the trouble with many of the exploits of our Eigh finance. It used to be the purpose of the bravos and buccaneers of every land. It is why the tipping system is undesirable, a fee passing by imperceptible stages so easily into a bribe. The gambler ROSENTHAL and his associates were trying for easy money; the police have been first accepting and then demanding a share in the spoil. We all dream of having fortunes given or left to us. The root of life's evil, is the desire to receive that for which we give no full equivalent.

M

OUR LAW

ARTIN VAN BUREN, in his always interesting "Inquiry Into the Origin and Course of Political Parties in the United States," after saying that the interference of judges in politics is always distasteful to "sincere Republicans," adds: "Their want of sympathy, as a general rule, for popular rights is known throughout the world." Certainly the bench and the bar are on trial in more than one respect at the present moment. There are many reasons. One of the most constant irritations is the habit of American courts of playing an absurd technical game instead of going for the obvious meaning of the law, as the English judges do. It looks like a private sport instead of a serious public service. We have just been reading an account in a Washington paper of a proceeding in which a hotel proprietor was fined only $25 for "dispensing" intoxicating liquor to an eighteen-year-old girl. Judge PUGH expressed regret that he could not take away the convicted man's license. He could have done it had the word been "selling," but, as it was "dispensing," $25 was the limit of punishment. About the same. time there appeared in a Chicago paper the following paragraph:

ALBERT GROUSSMAN, convicted of pandering, was sentenced to one year in the House of Correction and fined $300 on July 17 by Judge NEWCOMER in the Municipal Court. A week later a petition for a writ of habeas corpus was offered in the Circuit Court to Judge KERSTEN, who released the prisoner on $1,500 bond, setting a hearing for August 1. GROUSSMAN did not appear. The inference is that he preferred forfeiting his bond to taking the chance of spending a year in the bridewell. The petition was based on an alleged misspelling of GROUSSMAN'S name. There is no more odious crime than the one dealt with in this paraTe graph, yet a man convicted of it-striking at the helplessness of women and undermining all that we care most about in civilization-may escape punishment because of the misspelling of his name, which is carrying the farce of American legal practice pretty far. In the last analysis it is probably up to the Bar Association and the law schools to take this matter in hand and lead public opinion toward an effective solution.

THE BEST EDITORIALS

F ALL WRITERS, in all languages, which one, if they lived to-day, would have talents best suited to writing worthily and daily for the millions--that is to say, the best editorials? Would VOLTAIRE'S talent be best suited to that form, among the French? Would MACAULAY, among the English, or would SWIFT? Or has some reader a suggestion better than any one of these?

TH

THE RESULT IN ALASKA

HE ELECTION in Alaska was very significant about the state of public opinion in that region. The candidate of the Progressive party was overwhelmingly elected; the Republican candidate was correspondingly buried, in spite of the prominence of the Taft boss of Alaska at the steam-roller convention in Chicago; the Socialist ran neck and neck with the Republican, although he had no money; and the Democrat, who ran on a violent anti-Pinchot platform, and was reported to have GUGGENHEIM's support, was a very bad fourth. The reports about Alaska public opinion which are sent about the United States by those interested in exploiting Alaska are scarcely borne out by this election.

I

POLITICS AND TAXATION

N WYOMING, under the Warren régime, the chairman of the Republican State Committee has acted regularly as the attorney for the great corporations which take from the State so large a share of its resources. The chairman of the State Committee likewise has been the legislative lobbyist in Wyoming for these corporations. C. W. BURDICK, the present chairman, is, for instance, attorney for the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, a Rockefeller corporation. The law of Wyoming provides that the gross value of the output of mines, after deducting the expense of production, shall be the measure of assessment. The report of the output of the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company's iron mines in Laramie County, Wyo., for the year ending December 31, 1911, shows a total of 566,082.90 tons, the gross value of which is represented to be $375,142.97. By a singular coincidence, the expense incurred in production is exactly the same amount to a cent, leaving no value to be assessed. In Carbon County, Wyo., after 8,199 acres of coal land belonging to the Colorado Industrial Company, a subsidiary of the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, had been listed by the assessor for the year 1910 at $20 per acre, making a total valuation of $163.980, Mr. BURDICK made an affidavit, on behalf of the corporation, that 5.596 acres of this land was grazing land. Upon this affidavit a rebate of $103,526 in valuation was granted. According to the United States Geological Survey, these "grazing lands" are among the most valuable coal lands in Carbon County. Wyoming makes practically a free gift of its resources to the great corporations.

PASSING THE BATTER

HILE THE BASEBALL interest is at its height, let us insert another plea for changing the rules so as to make impossible the intentional passing of a batter, at least unless it is done with such skill as to leave the umpire doubtful. Speaking of our former editorial on this subject, the New York "Evening Mail" says:

Ninety-nine fans out of every ninety-nine will agree with him [the editor of COLLIER'S] in this suggestion. The greatest moment of battle-the most appealing and the most thrilling-arises when the star batsman comes up at a critical juncture with runners in front waiting for the crack of his trusty club. Nothing else so grips and holds the audience, and the anticlimax which arrives as the pitcher deliberately tosses high and wide from the plate takes away the one big incident of the afternoon. Such a rule would be fair to all clubs-far more pleasing to all spectators-and in addition is easily planned. One of the best known umpires of the game states that it would be a simple matter to detect any deliberate attempt at issuing a pass and that the most effective punishment would be to call a balk, advancing the runners on base. Whatever they decide, the big leagues should at least discuss the change. It is not fair to the hundreds of thousands of fans to deprive them of heavy hitting in crises, the most exciting single aspect of the game.

Ο

PLEASANT TALK

F GOOD CONVERSATION, EMERSON says:

It requires people who are not surprised and shocked, who do and let do, and let be, who sink trifles, and know solid values, and who take a great deal for granted.

That is the kind of enthusiastic summing up of an intellectual pleasure in which EMERSON is unsurpassed. Nobody found good thinking more fun than he did. In dreaming about ideal conversation, one would think of the "Mermaid Tavern," with SHAKESPEARE, JONSON, MARLOWE, and the other Titans; of SOCRATES, PERICLES, and the genius. of Athens; of GOETHE and SCHILLER; of the salons of France; of the studios of the Italian renaissance; but for our part we should insist on including the conversations which EMERSON held with MARGARET FULLER in the hills and fields of Massachusetts, and we think there are few more exhilarating books than "Margaret and Her Friends." It is the enthusiasm for ideas that makes the charm of that book, reflecting the talk of the most remarkable literary group yet produced in America; and without enthusiasm for ideas conversation can never amount to much.

SWAN

WHERE WOMEN CAN HELP

WAMP DRAINAGE-the turning of the seventy-five millions of acres. of waste wet land in this country into neighborhoods free from malaria, where at least ten million more Americans could make comfortable homes—is a task that ought to appeal particularly to women, who feel that they should apply to municipal and national affairs the same special knowledge and experience which they use in the management of their own homes. There is a tremendous amount of agitation and publicity work to be done before our people-not brought up behind dikes and ditches like the Hollanders-are educated up to the point of using their waste swamp land. They will migrate to Canada readily enough and live under a foreign flag and yet leave untouched the much more fertile lowlands at their very doors. To be sure, before most of these swamp areas are in condition to be taken up, laws must be passed, large drainage projects undertaken, a great deal of organization done. It is in keeping the subject alive that women can help. There are indeed, already, several women's organizations for this purpose. Many more women would be actively interested if the subject were brought to their attention. The cleaning up of such waste areas as the Dismal Swamp, the Okefinokee Swamp in Georgia, and the vast amount of immensely rich overflowed land along the lower Mississippi, is sublimated housekeeping of the same sort as that which cleans up an ash heap or mud hole in one's back yard.

Yours very truly,

(Thiss) 6. Hinifred 1rown_

Owner.

HE WOODLEY

REGISTER PUBLISHING COMPANY

PUBLISHED WEEKLY

FINE BOOK

PRINTERS

THE GASSAWAY TIMES.

ONE DOLLAR A YEAR

E, WOODLEY MOR AND

JOB WORK

EPHONE

POINT PLEASANT WEST VIRGINIA

(Feb. 17, 1912.)

GASSAWAY. BRAXTON. CO..

W. VA

Feb.

10th.

1912

Dr. C. L. Trevitt, 34treet,

Washington, D. C.. Dear Sirie

Arewering youre of the sixth inst, will say that we are pleased to quote you a price of 4 cents per line, per issue, for the matter relative to Statewide prohibition, either general news matter or copy for editorial columns.

Our regular rates are 5 cents per line for reading notices, and we would have replied to your letter at an earlier date, but desired to take the matter up with some of the directors of the company, at which time it was decided in view of the fact that the policy of this paper in against statewide prohibition, that the above rate of 4 cents per line be made you.

It is understood, of course, that the full amount of business promised, i.e., $1000. worth, be given us during the period mentioned and also that we reserve the right to drop such matter as we deem too radical for use in our publication. We would, of course, ask that our editorial columns not be over crowded with that class of matter, as we have local issues that demand space and attention also.

We would be pleased to have your contract at an early date and can start the matter at any time agreeable to you, Trusting that we may have an immediate reply,

we beg to remain,

very truly yours,

REGISTER PUBLISHING COMPANY,

W. H. Needham Gen. Mgr.

Your letter 6th. inst. I an mailing you under seperate cover a copy of our publication in which you will find on page 3 a column fo plate reading matter furnished us by yiur people, is this the kind of matter you desire and are the editorials to be plate. if so I would Le wiling to run anywhere from one to two and one half columns per week, pay two calusne reading watter and one half column of editorial from now until the fifth of November for the Bum you offer and in accordance with your proposition. Kindly let me hear from you at an early date

ALL KINDS OF FINE JOB PRINTING

ESTABLISHED 1869.

PATENT

THE HANCOCK COUNTY COURIER

BELL PHONE NO. 66.

BEST ADVERTISING

MEDIUM

N THE issue of COLLIER'S of March 2 last appeared the following editorial:

"Speaking of liquor, by the way, a prohibition amendment which comes up in West Virginia on November 5 is causing the liquor interests to act according to their lights. The 'Post-Chronicle' of Morgantown prints a letter from C. L. Trevitt of Washington, D. C., telling how awful it will be if the hundreds of thousands of dollars invested in breweries, distilleries, and saloons are wiped out; adding that it is a fight to the death, and outlining a campaign of education. This edu cation consists in offering $1,000 or more for editorials, preferably written by Trevitt himself, but, as he adds: 'I am willing to pay for editorials, even if written by yourself.' On Trevitt's letterhead appears the following: 'Literary Agent. Essays and Speeches prepared for Congressmen and others.' There are 219 publications in the State of West Virginia. Of this number, 33 are daily newspapers, 165 weekly newspapers, 5 semiweekly publications, and 14 monthly publications. Not even the monthlies were skipped by this literary agent. Whoever wins, the poor liquor interests are being put to great expense; but then they get most of the money of a large part of the population, so, perhaps, it is all fair in the end."

A representative of the liquor interests in West Virginia protested to us that no such person as "C. L. Trevitt" had any authority to speak for those interests, and charged that the Trevitt letter had really been sent out by enemies of the liquor interests.

COLLIER'S thereupon pursued some investigation. This investigation disclosed that "35 B Street, N. W., Washington, D. C.," the address of C. L. Trevitt as shown by his letter, is the Bliss Building, in which building is the office of the Anti-Saloon League. We found that Mr. Trevitt's mail was delivered at this office, and forwarded from there to Mr. William E. Johnson, who is a brother-in-law of C. L. Trevitt. Both Johnson and Trevitt live near a little station known as Oak Crest, on

an electric car line twenty miles out from Washington. The batch of letters addressed to the West Virginia editors had been sent by Mr. Johnson to the secretary of Rev. Edwin C. Dinwiddie, superintendent of the "National Temperance Legislative Bureau," with offices in the rooms occupied by the Anti-Saloon League, with the request to Mr. Dinwiddie's secretary to mail them at the Washington Post Office. Mr. Johnson had also asked Mr. Dinwiddie's secretary to forward to him, as he should from time to time advise her of his address, all mail which should come to 35 B Street, N. W., for C. L. Trevitt. These instructions were followed. Both Mr. Dinwiddie and his secretary claim not to have had any knowledge of the contents of the Trevitt letter mailed from their office to the West Virginia editors.

THE TROUBLE WITH THE DEPARTMENT

WILLIAM E. JOHNSON is the press secretary of

the "General Assembly's Permanent Committee on Temperance of the Presbyterian Church in the United States," with offices in the Conestoga Building, Pittsburgh, Pa., one of the church organizations making up the "National Interchurch Temperance Federation."

COLLIER'S then sought Mr. Johnson. William E. Johnson is known among the liquor interests and their friends as "Pussy foot." The name of "Pussy foot" Johnson is almost a household word in the camp of the liquor interests in Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Minnesota, and other Western States.

Until the fall of 1911, when he resigned, Johnson was employed in the Interior Department as Chief Special Officer of the United States Indian Service, with special duties in the suppression of the liquor traffic among the Indians. Some dissatisfaction was expressed by officials of the Interior Department with certain phases of Johnson's work. The officials declared that "no fault had been found with Mr. Johnson's integrity or his character," although some $200,000 of public funds had passed through Johnson's hands. Johnson asserts that his work

interfered with the activities of certain politicians, an that this fact led to friction between himself and th department. It was charged by the department official that Johnson was overzealous in the defense of a youn New Mexico Indian named Juan Cruz, who, as one o Johnson's deputies, had attempted to take a bottle o whisky from four Indians, was assaulted and beaten up and in self-defense, as claimed, fatally shot one of th four Indians. Johnson charged that the Indian agent appointed by the Government, was himself the owner o a drug store in Santa Fe where, contrary to law, whisk was sold to Indians. Four of Johnson's deputies wer killed during one period of eighteen months, and h himself has taken many desperate chances. But the most interesting phase of Johnson's activi ties occurred two years ago in Minnesota.

The United States Supreme Court had decided tha Federal laws against selling liquor to citizen Indian were void, because the Constitution reserved all polic powers to the States. But Johnson dug up some of Indian treaties. One of these was dated in 1855, whe the Chippewa Indians ceded a large portion of the nort half of Minnesota to the Federal Government, to b opened up for settlement. The treaty of cession be tween the Indians and the Government provided that th existing laws governing the introduction of liquor int the Indian country should continue in full force an effect until otherwise provided by Congress-and Con gress had never repealed this provision. Every bott of liquor, therefore, in that whole section of Minnesota now thickly populated by white people, was contraban and at the mercy of "Pussyfoot" Johnson. Now John son was a Prohibitionist first and a Government officia afterward. He got busy. His campaign struck terro to the hearts of the liquor people. He is a man mettle, cool, courageous, pugnacious, practical. He an his deputies held forty-five deputy sheriffs in Minnesot at bay, while they destroyed hundreds of dollars' wort of liquor. Then they quietly submitted to arrest.

Johnson was trying to separate the sheep from the goats in the editorial sanctums of West Virginia. Ten years ago he had trapped with the same bait 168 Texas newspapers whose editors were willing to poison the sources of public information for a price.

Referring

to his "catch" of West Virginia editors, and holding up a batch of letters, Johnson said: "These were the rascals I was after. I have no apologies to make. I went out after scamps and got them. It is not the first time I have set bear traps for crooks."

ASKING FOR MONEY IN ADVANCE

JOHNSON held up a letter signed "J. W. Miller," dated

February 9, 1912, and said: "Miller is a Sunday-school superintendent." He is also the "publisher and proprietor" of the Putnam "Democrat" of Winfield. He wrote:

"I will say I am in business life, not seeking pleasure. I am in the market for business, and I accept your proposition.... I stopped carrying liquor advertisements three years ago, simply to gratify my wife and a few friends. . . . I am hard up, too, and the sooner you send your matter and a small check, the better it will be for me." Mr. Miller adds a postscript:

"I consider this an honorable business, and I have the same right to accept it that a lawyer has to take a case for a man who either sells or favors the legal sale of liquor over the 'bootlegging' process which is being conducted everywhere.”

This telegram, dated February 12, was from Charleston:

We accept your business for two thousand for Logan County, one-half cash by wire, balance April first. State Editorial Association in session here now. Can influence association for other counties also. Matter will be railroaded through at to-night's session if you accept these terms. Wire quick, Charleston.

GEO. A. DEAN, Logan 'Banner.'

(Miss) E. Winifred Brown, "owner" of the Raleigh "Herald" of Beckley, writes under date of February 10: "We will publish your articles, one-column length, for $25 each, published weekly, if you will consent for us to conduct an open column' upon the prohibition question, inviting both sides to discuss the controversy, but of course giving you the better position, and, whenever necessary, supplying answers to their arguments, and with editorial comment upon the same by either you or myself, and in a veiled way favoring you. Editorials $25 each. Remittances with copy, and statements made for matter furnished by us and an early settlement of same." Miss Brown adds: "The drys, as elsewhere, are not a brainy set, so should be accordingly influenced by the articles."

The Oil Man's Magazine ("The National Oil Journal") of Parkersburg is evidently an influential journal. It is edited by Herbert P. McGinnis, and carries the announcement on its letterheads: "Forty contributors and special correspondents."

necticut piling up money to fight consumption, and that the poor toilers have raised $20,000. If all the money raised, and to be raised for a hundred years, were appropriated to making better homes for the poor laborers, better clothes, bedding, and food, and shorter hours for work, and better ventilation in the mills and factories, it would serve its best purpose."

That's good reading matter as far as it goes. Here is the rest of it:

"Next, if those having that contractible, not inheritable disease, will use whisky and cod liver oil, egg nogg three times a day, and creoterpin now and then, consumption is mastered."

Walter Decker writes that he has been "business manager on the Keyser 'Tribune' for several years, and in that capacity the editor showed me your recent letter to him. He is an ex-preacher and very radical in his stand against the liquor industry. When, the past week, we used an article in which reference was made to Patrick Henry, the great patriot and orator, having once

a long talk with some of your people, at any place you may name, in regard to this matter of getting the best results in Upshur County."

Mr. Barnes adds a caution: "I would advise you, in negotiating with other newspapers in Buckhannon, to see that they don't get your money and fail to deliver the goods-this has been done here."

Thomas B. Garner, manager of the "Progressive West Virginian" ("Independent and Reasonable in all Things"), writes:

"Make your terms more explicit. How much are you willing to pay in cash for your eight months of advertising use of columns for any publications you may wish to insert? . . . We are right on the borders of Kentucky and will be in the thickest of the contest. . . . The temperance feeling here is very strong among a certain class, and should I decide to accept your offer, I should have to be insured against loss."

FIVE CENTS A LINE

proofs."

Mr. Decker recites this little incident that befell Patrick Henry as a bartender, to show Mr. "Trevitt" what an uphill fight the liquor interests will have. He says the "Tribune" can be bought for $6,000 cash. It has over 2,000 regular subscribers, been established for forty-one years, oldest paper in the county, pays about $5,000 per year. If Mr. "Trevitt" would not want the paper after the campaign was over, a purchaser could be had. If this arrangement fails to meet with Mr. "Trevitt's" approval, the narrow-minded editor who blue-penciled Patrick Henry's career as a bartender is likely to sell the paper to one of his own kind.

H. R. Mills, proprietor of the Buena Vista "Times," calls Mr. Trevitt's attention to the fact that his letter was published in one of the West Virginian papers, and says he is "very much surprised that a member of the newspaper fraternity should treat a confidential communication in this manner." He says it is best to talk such matters over, and he is willing to come to Washington, and to pay his own expenses if a contract is closed.

NEUTRAL-FOR A PRICE

.H. BARNES, editor of the Buckhannon “Delta,”

says that his county has never had a saloon, and that "there is a strong 'Pecksniff' attitude on the liquor question; that is, the citizen spouts prohibition and sports a jug." He says his paper cannot afford to take a stand against the amendment, although personally he is opposed to it. "At any rate, we could not afford to accept your proposition for $1,000. We would rather take half that and exclude the Prohibition stuff for you. We have already made a semifinal announcement that we would take no sides in the matter. . . . Being in politics and knowing the rank and file of the voters as I do, I can do you infinitely more good by keeping the paper neutral and

in Wood, Ritchie, Tyler, Roane, Harrison,

Wetzel, Lincoln, Pleasants, and Kanawha Counties, "and also some in Ohio and Penn..

sylvania." He offers his news columns for 10 cents per line, and "50 cents per line inch" for editorial page. Mr. McGinnis gets down to business. "We do not want to hold you up without a gun," he writes, “and would be glad to sell you space on, up to, and through the coming general State election, November 5. But we must have money in advance, and we will not consider any small amount of business that you could give us at any price. We feel that our medium has a wider circulation than most weekly papers, and an influence greater than the leading dailies of our State. that reason we are not prepared to be trifled with. If you mean business, all you have to show us is the goods." Then he adds:

For

"You will, of course, appreciate the necessity of keeping the entire contents of this letter strictly confidential, and we rely upon your manhood, as such, to treat all of our relations in the same manner."

J. R. Clifford is the president of the National Independence Political League (formerly the National Negro American Political League). He is also the editor of the "Pioneer Press" of Martinsburg, and says he is "well known in Washington and the country over and can give reference of the best white and colored men in your city" (Washington). He told Mr. "Trevitt" that he wrote an editorial "not long ago" to the effect "that I would rather be a drunkard and love my fellow men and so go forth before God, risking my future fate, than to be a prohibition-Christian, hate my fellow men, and go there."

Mr. Clifford adds: "I have been publishing plate matter for the past six months, sent me by some unknown persons, on the line you suggest, but I quit it, because my space is worth much to me."

It will help you to read some newspapers intelligently if you peruse for a moment the plate matter that Mr. Clifford incloses. Here it is: "Ink on paper tells of 75,000 persons of Con

field, under date of February 9, writes:

"I will give you from one to two columns of space each week, from March 1 to November 5, for the sum of $1,200, payable quarterly, $400 per each quarter in advance, and if you decide to accept this proposition I will run over to Washington the last of next week and enter a contract with you to that effect. . . . I assure you this, if I undertake the fight that Putnam County will vote against prohibition, as I have never yet lost out, and feel sure that I can win in this one. I also have the County Committee with me, and I will name the chairman and the election officers, and if I go into this fight will have about three influential workers at the polls in each voting precinct on election day, and I fear no defeat.... I carry a couple of liquor advertisements in the 'Herald,' but always get double price for such advertisements."

Between February 9 and February 15 Mr. Hicks evidently got an intimation that Mr. "Trevitt's" bait was hooked, for on the latter date he wrote again. This time he signed his name in type.

"I see some of the papers have taken offense at your letter," he wrote, "and have published it, stating that there was no such party in Washington as C. I. Trevitt, etc., and you had no authority to write the letters that you wrote to the newspapers of the State, etc. I trust you will keep the contents of my letter strictly confidential, and I will treat yours the same, and will ask you to please return my other letter with this one to me by return mail, and would be pleased to meet you and go over the situation."

On February 9 W. L. Starbuck, publisher of the Wetzel "Tribune," offered to "run your matter at five cents per line, and as much of it as you want for all but the editorial matter, which will cost you ten cents per line."

Three days later, February 12, Mr. Starbuck again wrote that he was interested in other papers besides the Wetzel "Tribune," and could get control of still others. "If your people will agree to take $3,000 worth of publicity in the three papers, and pay $2,500 of it in advance, I will get the three papers and make all of them WET, not only until the election, but will continue to run them Wet."

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Between two days somebody had evidently put Mr. Starbuck wise, for, on February 13, without waiting for an answer, he again wrote. This time he didn't even say "Dear Sir."

C. L. TREVITT, Washington, D. C.

After consulting the editors, relative to your proposition on the amendment question, beg leave to advise you that I cannot accept your offer. Very truly, W. L. STARBUCK.

H. E. Woodley, manager of the Gassaway "Times," informed Mr. "Trevitt" that he was "mailing under separate cover a copy of our publication, in which you will find on page 3 a column of plate reading matter furnished us by your people." Mr. Woodbury "would be willing to run anywhere from one to two and one-half columns per week, say two columns reading matter and one-half column of editorial from now until the 5th of November, for the sum you offer and in accordance with your proposition."

J. F. Haverty, owner and publisher of the Wirt County "Journal," advised Mr. "Trevitt": "I can handle the matter you refer to, upon the terms set forth, with the exception of editorial matter, upon which, at the present time, I cannot give you a rate. I think it would be better for both myself and the interests you represent for my editorials to remain neutral, as it were, any comment I might make being of a purely disinterested character, referring to your articles from an unbiased, open standpoint. I trust you get my meaning. A little later, perhaps, after the situation has been properly developed, it would be proper for me to 'open up' along decisive lines. I am taking this precaution for the reason that haste will have to be made slowly in a county like this,