50 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
newspapers should be the mirror of life, the reflection of the times. They should not attempt expurgation, but they ought not, on the other hand, to distort facts or make them appear worse than they are. Yellow journals are mirrors whose surfaces are not true planes and which therefore produce distorted reflections and images which are mere caricatures.
The Marquis of Salisbury is reported to have said that the special correspondent is coming to supersede the editor.^ ^ He is nearer the spot where things happen which people wish to hear about. But it must be remembered that news itself requires editing ; not merely the editorials, which occupy less and less pro- portional space, but the sitfing and arrangement of news is the function of the editor, and in this he wields an influence of very great importance. Impressions and ideas are thus inculcated quite as effectively as by direct exhortation and argument. There would certainly be some advantages in the complete separation of the functions of reporting and comment. Lord Rosebery has suggested this. The editor of a daily paper is in no position to form a matured opinion upon an event, the telegraphic report of which has just arrived probably in an inaccurate and exaggerated form. The function of comment, it would seem, should be reserved for the weekly, while the daily should confine itself to news. This proposal is, however, quite impracticable. Not only would it be impossible to compel the daily paper to relin- quish this prerogative, but the public, while less interested in comment than in news, demands its editorial pabulum to be served up smoking hot along with the rest of its daily intellectual rations. Its prime requirement is news, but it also wants an immediate interpretation of the news. The newspaper reader is very toler- ant of errors, inaccuracies, and mistakes; the editor may even reverse his attitude when it becomes necessary — consistency, so vitally important to the politician, is not required of the writer of leading articles. But it is all-essential to have an opinion and to have it at once. When a new question arises, editors some- times try to hedge upon it until they can determine the drift of public opinion; but this must be done very cleverly and not last
^Contemporary Review, Vol. XLIX, p. 656.
