YELLOW JOURNALISM.

Press, Volume LII, Issue 15750, 17 November 1916, Page 8

YELLOW JOURNALISM.

i- THE u KNOCK-OUT BLOW" h TO THE HEARST PAPERS. is g * y (from a special correspondent.i SAN FRANCISCO. October 17. ' n William Randolph Hearst was born ,e in California, and as a much-vaunted j r. '-Native Son, ' became the owner of a ir syndicate of American newspapers, thanks to the millions' of philanthropic t parents. His newspapers developed i into the kingpins of that type ol' writing known as "'Yellow journalism." h Items of the most trifling character be1_ came converted into hair-raising cata- }" clysms of world-wide importance, and ! 1S men were made famous —or infamous — e in a night! The string of newspapers e stretched from San Francisco and Ijos ; Angeles to New York and Atalanta, and the San Francisco •'Examiner'; was ,r self-styled "The Monarch of the d Dailies." s Shrieking headlines were a feature of '• these publications, and to show the popularity (?) of Hearst himself in his own home town suffice it to state that c when he came to San Francisco to ad- -, dress, a political meeting in his own bcy half, the large theatre was crowded to e overflowing, but for the whole of the hour and a half that he attempted to t speak from the platform not a single a word could be heard owing to the cons tinuous uproar of his fellow-townsmen, r who greeted him with_ abuse for his newspaper policies. Yet, next inorn- " ing, his papers contained glowing reV ports of now he had been received eu--0 thusiastically, and had been lionised by ® his thousands of admirers! His speech was given verbatim, although it had ■- never been heard. ® His news items were generally head- , eel with "W. R. Hearst's Service, Long--5 est Leased Wire in the World." This 'l was lampooned frequently by other 1 journals, and jnade to appear as "W. R. Worst's Service, Longest Leased " Liar in the World." Wiien the war y broke out in Europe, Hearst made " gigantic arrangements to outstrip all 6 the journalistic world in the collection , of "news" from every sphere of the war operations. According to his rer presentations, one might bo led to be- " lievo that Hearst had a newspaperman behind every soldier in the whole war! 2 Naturally, whenever anything great oci c.urred, Hearst got the "news" at : least a day before the I/ondon press! When the "news" reached New York r the matter went through the process of 3 "dressing up," and when Hearst re- "/ peatedly endeavoured to improve on the " official war announcements issued by the lVess Bureau in London, and made " it appear that- the Admiralty had ad--1 mitted "an overwhelming defeat" in the •Jutland battle, the London authorities 7 began to think that Hearst's activis ties, through his International News - Service, were being carried somewhat t beyond the realms of honourable jourf najism. Investigation showed that ex- - traneoug matter had been added in New - York, and the word "overwhelming" - was found to have been inserted in New - York offices of Hearst.. Warnings were i given, but Hearst still persisted in his r distortions, and newg continued to appear in his syndicated newspapers J garbled, and the result was that when 3 the Allies gained a victory the wording , was juggled to give the reverse ideav The proprietor of the "Monarch of the Dailies" at length so angered the British lion that Hearst was refused the j use of the cables and mails from England. He was forbidden to receive any ] news despatches issued by the British Press Bureau, and, to quote an expression pf Mr Lloyd George, Hearst was j given a "knock-out" blow from Bri- ' tish territory. Hearst's publications were filled with I inflammatory articles twisting the Bri- ! tish lion's tale, but nobody outside his 1 offices worried in the least. All decentminded Americans hailed the action of ! London with the utmost gratification, i for they had learned to appreciate the : emanations of the venal Press of Amel rica at their true worth. Hearst's London manager sent a nfessage to ' > Randolph inviting him to retract and 1 dismiss the guilty detractors of the truth, but Hearst contented himself ' ■ with despatching a reply full of further f abuse, and reviling the British Govern- • ment, and threatening to defy John Bull! Although Hearst raved and roared, ho had to be content with the j plain and unvarnished truth as transi mitted by the Associated Press from 1 ! London to the three solitary papers of * ; his syndicate which were subscribers to that service. As may already be 1 known in the Antipodes, Hearst's pol- ' icy ever since the war started has been 1 ■ to pander to the German-Irish element, ; , and to lose no opportunity to vilify Bri- ] tain and all Iter possessions. Time I after time his lying accusations have 1 | been exposed, and now that John Bull '' has forbidden him in England, Hearst < is wildly rampant, and is swearing his j patriotism by the American flag to the ' titter ridicule of all America. ' Many are the editorials which have 1 commented on Hearst's repudiation by j England, and possibly one of the best i is that of the San Francisco "Bulletin," 1 which says:—"Nobody can be surpris- : ed, particularly at the action of Eng- { land, in shutting tho door to Mr Hearst c and the International News Service. < Some such logical action could be expect- I ed as the result of the fiction-writing J game which the I.N.S. has been play- c ing, with serious Governments, and seri- < ous men as puppets. . . . The i Hearst note in journalism • . . is a always done in five or seven colours, c with the spotlight well arranged, and T the sound of shuddery music in the dis- c tance. At its worst, it is very excit- c ing; at its best it induces heart failure. - Mr Hearst's success with his lurid Mag- c dslena Bay conspiracies that never were a hatched, his planet-sliaking battles c that never were fought, his world cata- e jtlysms that somehow never seem- c 'eel to cataclvse has been finan- i: cially so great that many nn A me- d riean journalist has been forced into n untruth and inaccuracy, simply be- - cause truthfulness and ethical writing v roado so few millionaires. The prize, v till lately, has gone to the handsomest "i: storyteller. p "But there is a retribution- The British Government, it seems, does not jlike ,to be made the hero in a eeflhs of Prisoner of Zenda romances. ... v After the third notable offence, the lion put his large paw down, most solid- r]y upon Mr Hearst. The I.N.S cannot use the official British Press Bureau }■ any more, and it cannot use the trans- 11 Atlantic cables, nor the mails, out of England. Actors in a world-tragedy a do not care to stride before the public a clad in fanciful costumes, and talking '• the rubbishy language of the melodra- I uiatic stage. On our side of the At- 1-1 lantic there are earnest-minded folk 11 who want to get the truth about the ?' war, and who do not care to glean their is ! idea of Europe's history from a set of n inspired typewriters in New York- Most e: of the dull, imaginative folks ceased t< long ago to place any reliance upon the ls Hearst war 'news.' ~ The British Gov- e: eminent ought to have their thanks for n increasing, through this unprecedented w rebuke, the number of Americans who s< will henceforth recognise doubtful mat- h ter when it is properly labelled. . . • w "The British Government cannot -m quiet the clatter of typewriters in New pi York, or hush the click of telegraph in- tl struments from that centre westward, pi Anybody, anywhere, can put TLondon, ir October 12' at the head of a 'peppery' m 'news' itern. Any reporter can re- m write Associated Press despatches so O that their own mother would not know ' N them. Any young man with a lead di pencil can sink England's largest battle- tv ships, and wreck Europe's cabinets with h« a freedom which the Kaiser can- only es

gasp at from star. As the result of this step against the I.N.S. England will very likely have its navies captured and sank, its armies cat to shreds, its provinces hurled into rebellion, and its economic fabric riddled through— on paper. The dismemberment of that luckless Empire may suffer through America like the fall of Babylon- of old. The other Allies may suffer horriblv as well. 'An offended lion is nothing compared to an enraged yellow journalist-' "