Life — October 27, 1904 — page 4: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Published every ‘Thursday. a year to ad: Fostnase to foreucn ‘countries ti the Postal date of publication, 2 cents No contribution will be returned unless accompanied by stamped and addressed envelope. The illustrations in LAFR. are copyrighted, and are not to be reproduced, Prompt notification should be sent by sub- seribers of any chauge of address. all time, we never heard so much about the respect due to the Presi- dent as we have heard in the last three years. The thing is a little over- done. So far as we know, there never was a President who did not comport himself with proper dignity, and did not enjoy the respect that is due to his. office. Lincoln's manners were largely formed in taverns; Grant's in camps. Both men were extremely simple in their deportment, yet they were men of natural dignity, and the Presidential office got no slight through them. There is no superfluous starch in Dr. Roosevelt. He is entirely hearty and approachable, but he knows how to behave. But somehow there has been a disposition to put palings around him, and take special pains to have the Presi- dent, as expressed in his robust person, receive careful Presidential treatment. And there has been a like solicitude about what is said about him. He must be spoken of with just so much abatement of the natural breath ; called by such and such names, and no others ; criticised with a prescribed moderation, and on indicated points, and no others, It would seem’ as though the idea had got into some heads that Dr. Roosevelt needed a guardia We think he is almost as LIF E« able as any former President to take care of himself, and that the people who meet him, and talk of him and write about him, do so, with a few awful exceptions, with decency, O candidate for the Presidency can be kept in cotton while he is running, whether he be President at the time or not. Whatever charge of misconduct or unwisdom can be estab- lished against him may be so established with entire propriety. Before elec- tion the country is entitled to know the worst. After election it should make the best of its choice. It has been alleged that it is highly indecent to represent Mr, Cortelyou asa black- mailer of corporations, because such a suggestion reflects on the President of the United States, whose own Mr.C. is. ‘That's nonsense. The impeachment of Mr. Cortelyou’s discretion has not been convincing, but if the charges against him could have been proved, it would have beencommendable to prove them, whether they involved the Presideat- Candidate or not. As it is, we think Mr. Cortelyou has been slandered, though the selection of a Secretary of Commerce for a job which involved get- ting campaign subscriptions out of cor- porations had obviously weak points. Ke a3) 'HESE reflections have been incited by an incident. Commenting on The World's unfortunate story that Mr. Morgan had visited the President at Oyster Bay in his yacht, Lire lately exclaimed: ‘* However did it come to print the story that it did print, if the story was not true?’’ We have been surprised at being reproached with great vehemence on account of this last sentence by a critic who found in it a suggestion that possibly, notwithstand- ing Mr, Loeb’s denial, the story might be true. Such a suggestion, we were told, implied a willingness to conceive that there might be a flaw in the ve- racity of the President; a d’se majesté extfemely shocking in a journal so nearly civilized as Lire. Well, we did use the words quoted. We don't believe they have seemed treasonable to many readers, but if there is any /¢se mayesté in them, bere are our wrists ready for the manacles, and a file of marines can catch us any morning after breakfast. The truth is, that without doubting Mr. Loeb’s denial, we thought The World must have had some shred of fact or proba- bility to hang its story on. But it seems not. Some journalistic merchant must have sold The World an elabo- rate lie, in which there was not even a thread of fact. Mortified at being taken in, it ducked under and went on to the next story, without having the decency to retract this false one. Now, discoursing about what it calls ‘the Cortelyou Scandal," it bellows laugha- bly that ‘silence is confession.” So it is, for The World, but it might better have confessed in print, and apologized. iw is a pity that The World should so persistently represent the great defects, as well as the great abilities, of the mind that made it. But after all, mere ability—including industry, energy and constructive force —could not have made The World the kind of successful paper that it is, Nobody can achieve that sort of success unless he is endowed with the necessary de- fects. We are afraid it is true that no one can create a vastly successful American newspaper in these times who —besides being miscellaneously able— is not something of a blackguard, some- thing of a liar, a good deal of a dema- gogue, and something of a pandar. The man who is a little too fine for the job, however able, will find himself forever preferring a smaller success that is less costly to his soul. And that, of course, is not true as to newspapers alone. In many other lines of activity, the able man who lets his scruples boss him will often see his rivals go ahead. But never mind. The world’s pie is mighty big. Such a moderate piece as is consistent with decency is allthat any wise man wants. comicbooks.com