the blame upon its "member paper," the "St. Paul Pioneer Press." You recall the charges made against this paper by Walter W. Liggett, quoted on page 268. Note that the Associated Press did not cease taking its news through a paper which had failed to resent such grave charges as these.
I cannot find that the "A. P." ever did raise this issue with one of its member-papers. An interesting light is thrown on this very important subject by a controversy between the "Sacramento Bee" and the "San Francisco Star." The "Bee" printed a long defense of the Associated Press, and the "Star" discussed it as follows:
Another damaging admission is that the Associated Press doesn't
care a picayune what manner of pirates buy a newspaper that has an
Associated Press franchise. It mentions the case of the "San Francisco
Globe," which bought the special privilege news service of the "Post"
when it bought the name of that paper. The franchise went with the
name to a band of industrial pirates who wanted a special privilege
news service to supplement their special privilege traction service in
this city.
The "San Francisco Star" is a weekly, and so its editor
does not need to be afraid of the Associated Press. I have
a letter written by this editor, James H. Barry, to Prof. Ross
of the University of Wisconsin:
You wish to know my "confidential opinion as to the honesty of
the Associated Press." My opinion, not confidential, is that it is the
damndest, meanest monopoly on the face of the earth—the wet-nurse
for all other monopolies. It lies by day, it lies by night, and it lies
for the very lust of lying. Its news-gatherers, I sincerely believe, only
obey orders.
In great labor centers, from which strike-news comes,
you find this situation: that even if the Associated Press
wished to deal with a fair newspaper, there is no fair newspaper
to deal with. In Lawrence, Massachusetts, in Paterson,
New Jersey, in Trinidad, Colorado, in Bisbee, Arizona, the
newspapers are owned by the local industrial magnates and
their financial and political henchmen. In Montana the
Anaconda Mining Company, a Rockefeller concern, owns or
controls practically every newspaper in the state; so of course
the Associated Press sends no fair labor news from Montana.
I asked Ex-Governor Hunt of Arizona how the Associated
Press had treated him while he was giving the miners a
