And here is the assistant managing editor; I have interviewed such a managing editor as this, not once, but fifty times; and not only in San Francisco, but in a score of other American cities:
He is acute and politic, as you discover when first you hear him
call up Henry N. De Smith to ask for a decision. Such action is very
seldom necessary. The assistant managing editor knows the owner's
prejudices and failings by long association. He is versed in a most
essential knowledge of what may be printed in the paper, and what
it would be dangerous for the public to know. Under his care comes
the immense problem of general policy, the direction of opinion in the
city in the paths most favorable to his master's fame and fortune.
Nothing unpleasing to friend or advertiser must by any chance appear.
It means nothing to him that given such conditions, advertising becomes
a kind of legitimate blackmail, for his mind is not attuned to delicate
moral vibrations.
Such is San Francisco; and lest you think that is prejudice,
or an anomaly, come to Chicago and have a glimpse of the
insides of the "Chronicle," given in a book of confessions,
"The Career of a Journalist," by William Salisbury:
It was no easy matter, either, to be Copy Reader on the "Chronicle."
In addition to the average Copy Reader's immense fund of knowledge,
one had to know almost by heart the names of the sixteen corporations
in which owner Walsh was interested, such as banks and street railways
and gas and contracting companies. He had to know, too, the names
of the prominent men Mr. Walsh liked or disliked, so as to treat them
accordingly. A mistake in such things would much more quickly
bring a telephone order from Mr. Walsh's banking offices for changes
in the staff than any other error.
It may seem an extreme statement; but I doubt if there is
a newspaper-office in America in which such things as this do
not happen. There may be newspapers whose owners sternly
refrain from using them as a means of personal glorification;
there may be newspapers which do not give special attention
to the owner's after-dinner speeches, and to the social events
that go on in the owner's home. But is there any paper which
does not show consideration for the associates and intimate
friends of the owner? It happened to me once to be sitting
in a hotel-room with a millionaire who was under arrest and
liable to serve ten years in jail. This man's relatives were
among the rulers of the city, and I heard him go to the telephone
and call up his relatives, and advise them how to
approach the newspapers, and precisely what instructions to
