When I speak of good taste and of
good moral tone I do not mean the kind of good taste which is offended
by every reference to the unpleasant things of life, I do not mean the
kind of morality which refuses to recognize the existence of immorality-
-that type of moral hypocrite has done more to check the moral progress
of humanity than all the immoral people put together--what I mean is the
kind of good taste which demands that frankness should be linked with
decency, the kind of moral tone which is braced and not relaxed when it
is brought face to face with vice.
"Some people try and make you believe that a newspaper should not devote
its space to long and dramatic accounts of murders, railroad wrecks,
fires, lynchings, political corruption, embezzlements, frauds, graft,
divorces, what you will. I tell you they are wrong, and I believe that
if they thought the thing out they would see that they are wrong.
"We are a democracy, and there is only one way to get a democracy on its
feet in the matter of its individual, its social, its municipal, its
State, its National conduct, and that is by keeping the public informed
about what is going on. There is not a crime, there is not a dodge,
there is not a trick, there is not a swindle, there is not a vice which
does not live by secrecy.
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