The Brass Check: A Study of American JournalismSinclair, Upton
General
The Brass Check: A Study of American Journalism
Sinclair, Upton
Associated Press; Journalism -- United States; Press -- United States
I answer that there were many ways in which the “A. P.” could have
handled this matter without mentioning my name: a fact which I plainly
pointed out to Mr. Rowsey. The first time I spoke to him—over the
telephone—I was speaking, not for myself, but for Senator Robinson. She,
a duly elected representative of the people of Colorado, speaking in
their legislature, had nailed the Governor’s lie, and it was Mr.
Rowsey’s unquestionable duty to report her words. It was only when I
realized how completely the “A. P.” was in the hands of the
coal-operators that I “butted in” on the matter at all. And when my
telegram was refused by Mr. Rowsey, I was careful to point out to him
that there were other ways he might handle this news. He might give the
story as coming from Senator Robinson; he might send extracts from the
editorial of the “Rocky Mountain News”; he might send a dispatch saying,
“It is generally reported in Denver,” or “Protests are being made in
Denver.” All this I made clear, and he in return made clear why he did
not do so. Anyone who had been present at our long and partly humorous
interview would have perceived that this was no error in judgment of an
individual employe of the “A. P.,” but a definite policy of the great
machine. Mr. Rowsey went so far as to say to me that he was a Socialist,
in sympathy with my point of view, and that he personally would have
been willing to send out a straight story.
In exactly the same way, when I took this story to various newspapers
and magazines, I tried to suppress my own personality. I said to the
editors: “If you are not willing to discuss the grievance of Upton
Sinclair, then make an investigation of your own. Send a representative
to Denver and interview Senator Robinson and write about the efforts of
a progressive woman senator for fair play in this strike. Take the
telegrams which passed between the President and the Governor of
Colorado, take the pretenses of the fake mediation commission and the
false reports of the Associated Press about it, and write the story
without mentioning my name.” But all such suggestions were in vain.
There was no capitalist magazine or newspaper in the United States that
would take up the conduct of the Associated Press in the Colorado
strike.
In one of its published statements in the “New York Evening Post,” the
Associated Press had explained its stern attitude toward the editors of
the “Masses”:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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