Part 9

Even in dealing with those subjects concerning which a given paper is not honest with its readers great care must be exercised. So far as possible it must conceal the evidences of selfish interest and present its case on grounds of public policy. Now arguments based on such grounds are always worthy at least of consideration. A very large part of political discussion, not only journalistic but of other kinds, is “inspired” in this fashion, and it not infrequently happens that what may be in accord with the self interest of individuals and groups is also in accord with public interest. If this is not the case a competing paper ought to be able to expose pretty effectively the false assertions of its wily contemporary. In dealing with national questions which are discussed by newspapers in every part of the country this function of mutual criticism is in general well performed. Cases occur, however, especially in connection with municipal issues, where practically every paper of wide local circulation is either silenced or actively engaged in the support of a crooked deal. Under such circumstances a fight in defence of public interest is almost hopeless. The more nearly the press of a given district approaches this condition of corrupt paralysis, however, the brighter are the opportunities for an opposition paper. In journalism as everywhere in the world of social phenomena the inviolable law prevails that a function cannot be abused without corresponding harm to the agency which allows itself to be perverted. If it should ever happen,—although at the present time the prospect seems remote enough,—that a thoroughgoing control embracing the daily papers of the whole country should be established in defence of consolidated interests, it is certain that some new agency of publicity would spring up in the interest of the people as a whole. In the end the daily papers themselves would be the worst sufferers from a general perversion of their activities. As a matter of fact a new and powerful journalistic organ has already developed an influence not incomparable with that of the daily press. The wonderful growth of the low priced monthly and weekly magazines during the decade just past has been explained on various grounds:—the cheapening of paper and of illustrations, the second-class mailing privilege, the effectiveness of such media for advertisement, and so on. No doubt these factors go far toward explaining the great expansion of magazine circulation, but in spite of much journalistic prejudice to the contrary circulation and influence are not necessarily correlative. And the influence, as distinct from the circulation, of the magazines has been due very largely to the boldness and effectiveness with which they assailed many public abuses with regard to which for one reason or another the daily press was silent or even favourable. Of course the detached situation of the magazines made it easy and even profitable for them to pursue policies which might have cost the newspapers dear. In any event a new way was found for the effective journalistic presentation of the public interest.

In discussing the alleged corruption of the learned professions as a whole reference was made to the powerful influence of professional codes of ethics. One must recognise the journalistic instinct and journalistic traditions as strong factors of similar character. Even where editorial and reportorial staffs have given way, for purely bread and butter reasons, to what they knew were the selfish suggestions of controlling financial interests these same interests must sometimes have wondered at the lukewarmness of their paper’s support, and also, perhaps, at the enthusiasm which it manifested for some good cause indifferent to them. Moreover professional standards are rising in this field as well as elsewhere. No one has given clearer or more forcible expression to the highest of these newer ideals of journalism than Mr. George Harvey of the _North American Review_, whose words, by the way, present the extreme of contrast to those quoted earlier from Mr. Swinton. After pointing out that the great editorial leaders of the past generation,—Greeley, Raymond, Dana, Bennett,—were shackled by their own political ambitions, Mr. Harvey asks:

“What, then, shall we conclude? That an editor shall bar acceptance of public position under any circumstances? Yes, absolutely, and any thought or hope of such preferment, else his avowed purpose is not his true one, his policy is one of deceit in pursuance of an unannounced end; his guidance is untrustworthy, his calling that of a teacher false to his disciples for personal advantage, his conduct a gross betrayal not only of public confidence, but also of the faith of every true journalist jealous of a profession which should be of the noblest and the farthest removed from base uses in the interests of selfish men.” ...

“He [the journalist] is, above all, a teacher who, through daily appeals to the reason and moral sense of his constituency, should become a real leader.... Above capital, above labour, above wealth, above poverty, above class, and above people, subservient to none, quick to perceive and relentless in resisting encroachments by any, the master journalist should stand as the guardian of all, the vigilant watchman on the tower ever ready to sound the alarm of danger, from whatever source, to the liberties and the laws of this great union of free individuals.”[46]

Discussion of the “tainted money” charge so far as it affects our universities and colleges can not, of course, be presented with complete objectivity by the present writer. Nothing can be promised beyond an earnest effort to attain detachment and impartiality. On the other hand, a decade spent in the active teaching of the principal debatable subjects in three institutions of widely different character may furnish a basis of experience of some value.[47]

First of all there must be no blinking of the importance of the subject. “It is manifest,” wrote the acute Hobbes, “that the Instruction of the people, dependeth wholly, on the right teaching of Youth in the Universities.” Quaint as is the language in which he defends this proposition the argument which it contains is applicable with few changes to modern conditions.

“They whom necessity, or couvetousnesse keepeth attent on their trades, and labour; and they, on the other side, whom superfluity, or sloth carrieth after their sensuall pleasures, (which two sorts of men take up the greatest part of Man-kind,) being diverted from the deep meditation, which the learning of truth, not onely in the matter of Natural Justice, but also of all other Sciences necessarily requireth, receive the Notions of their duty, chiefly from Divines in the Pulpit, and partly from such of their Neighbours, or familiar acquaintance, as having the Faculty of discoursing readily, and plausibly, seem wiser and better learned in cases of Law, and Conscience, than themselves. And the Divines, and such others as make shew of Learning, derive their knowledge from the Universities, and from the Schooles of Law, or from the Books, which by men eminent in those Schooles, and Universities have been published.”[48]

In spite of the development of other intermediate agencies of public instruction since the seventeenth century, and particularly of the press and our elementary school system, the influence of universities and colleges was never greater than it is at present, and it is an influence which is constantly increasing in strength. The number of universities and colleges is larger, their work is more efficient, their curricula are broader, the number of college bred men in the community is greater, and their leadership therein more perceptible than ever before. Professors are enlisting in industrial, scientific, and social activities outside academic walls in a way undreamed of so long as the old monastic ideals held sway. By extension lectures and still more by books and articles they are reaching larger and larger masses of the people. Newspapers formulate current public opinion, but to the writer, at least, it seems plainly apparent that the best thought of the universities and colleges to-day is the thought that in all likelihood will profoundly influence both press and public opinion in the near future. Academic observers of the sound money struggle of 1896, for example, must have smiled frequently to themselves at the arguments employed during the campaign. There was not one of them which had not been the commonplace of economic seminars for years. The newspapers and the abler political leaders on both sides simply filled their quivers with arrows drawn from academic arsenals. Extreme cleverness was shown by many journalists and campaign orators in popularising this material, in adapting it to local conditions, and in placing it broadcast before the people, but of original argumentation on their part there was scarcely a scintilla. It is significant also that the battle of the ballots was decided in favour of the contention which commanded the majority of scientific supporters. Subsequent political issues, great and small, have developed very similar phenomena, although of course it would be absurd to assert that in all cases the dominant opinion of the _literati_ prevailed at the ballot. There are also certain academic ideals of the day with which practical politics and business are demonstrably and crassly at variance. Not until the fate of many future battles is decided can we estimate the full strength of the university influence on such pending questions. Victory would seem assured in a sufficient number of cases, however, to make it clear that just as the wholesomeness of the public opinion of to-day is conditioned by the independence of the press, so the wholesomeness of the public opinion of to-morrow will be determined largely by the independence of our colleges and universities.

As compared with the press, universities possess certain great advantages which justify the public in demanding from them higher standards of accuracy and impartiality. The professor enjoys some measure of leisure; the editor is always under the lash of production on the stroke of the event. It is also a very considerable advantage that the editorial “we” and the anonymity of the newspaper are foreign to college practice. There is, of course, a pretty well recognised body of opinion on methods and ideals common to the faculties of our learned institutions, but in the separate fields of departmental work any opinion that may be expressed is primarily the opinion of the professor expressing it. His connection with a given institution is, indeed, a guaranty of greater or less weight as to his general scholarly ability, and he will, of course, be mindful of this in all that he says or writes. But beyond this his personal reputation is directly involved. Those who make a newspaper suffer collectively and more or less anonymously for any truckling to corrupt interests. The college president or teacher guilty of an offence of the same sort must suffer in his own person the contempt of his colleagues, his students, and the public generally.

Newspapers, moreover, are usually managed by private corporations frankly seeking profit as one of their ends. Universities and colleges, on the other hand, are much more free from the directly economic motive. There are, however, certain large qualifications to the advantages which institutions of learning thus enjoy. Every university and college is constantly perceiving new means of increasing its usefulness and persistently seeking to secure them. The demands made in behalf of such purposes may seem excessive at times, but it is clear that an educational institution which does not appreciate the vital importance of the work it is doing, and consequently the importance of expanding that work, is simply not worth its salt. In a great many cases the readiest means of securing the necessary funds is by appeal to rich men for large gifts and endowments. As the number of munificent Mæcenases is always limited and the number of needy institutions always very considerable, a competitive struggle ensues, different in most of its incidents from the directly profit seeking struggles of the business world, but essentially competitive none the less. In the campaign of a university or college for expansion a large body of students makes a good showing; hence too often low entrance requirements weakly enforced and low standards of promotion. At times even the springs of discipline are relaxed lest numbers should be reduced by a salutary expulsion or two. Courses are divided and subdivided beyond the real needs of an institution and salaries are reduced in order to secure a sufficient number of teachers to give the large number of courses advertised with great fulness in the catalogue. A large part of crooked collegiate athletics is due to an indurated belief in the advertising efficacy of gridiron victories as a means of attracting first, students, and then endowments. So far as charges of corruption against our higher educational institutions are at all justified they are justified chiefly by the practices just described. Fairness requires the statement, however, that a marked change of heart is now taking place. Public criticism has placed athletic graft in the pillory to such an extent that enlightened self-interest, if no better motive, should bring about its speedy abolition by responsible college managements. Many sincere efforts have been made by members of faculties singly and through organisations covering certain fields of study to raise and properly enforce entrance and promotion standards. Finally in the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching there has been developed an agency of unparalleled efficiency for detecting and exposing low standards. A college may continue to publish fake requirements, to crowd its class rooms with students who belong to high schools, to pad its courses, to underpay and overwork its instructing staff, but if it does these things it cannot, even if otherwise qualified, secure pensions for its professors, and in any event its derelictions will be advertised broadcast in the reports of the Foundation with a precision and a conviction beyond all hope of rebuttal. Let cynics smile at a process which they may describe as bribing the colleges to be good by pensioning their superannuates, but unquestionably the work of the Foundation has resulted in a new uprightness, a new firmness of standards, a higher efficiency that bodes well for the future of American education. Parents may give material encouragement to this movement by reading the publications of the Carnegie Foundation, as well as college catalogues and advertisements, before they determine upon an institution for the education of their children.

Although the conditions just described are the principal evil results of the competitive struggle for college and university expansion, the accusations of corruption against institutions of learning have usually dealt with their teaching of the doctrines of economics, sociology, and political science. Endowments must be secured; as a rule they can be had only from the very rich; among the very rich are numbered most of the “malefactors of great wealth”;—_ergo_ university and college teaching on such subjects must be made pleasing or at least void of all offence to plutocratic interests.

There is a certain disproportion between the means and the ends considered by the foregoing argument which is worth notice. To found or endow a college or university requires a great deal of money. Any institution worthy of either name is made up of numerous departments,—languages, literature, the natural sciences, history, and the social sciences,—of which only the last named are concerned with the moot questions of the day. If one cherished the Machiavellian notion of corrupting academic opinion to his economic interest he would be obliged, therefore, to support an excessively large number of departments the work of which would be absolutely indifferent to him. Endowment of the social sciences alone would be rather too patent. That they are not over-endowed at the present time in comparison with their importance relative to other departments is a condition the large mournfulness of which seems beyond all possibility of doubt to the writer. Nor should it be forgotten that the teachers of the social sciences form but a small minority of the whole body of university and collegiate instructors in all subjects. Nevertheless they are subject to the rigid general standards of accuracy, fairness, and impartiality prescribed by the profession as a whole, and enforced severely whether the offender be a biologist, a philologist, or an economist. Criticism is far more relentless and constant in this sphere than laymen are wont to suspect, except on the rare occasions when some more than ordinarily virulent controversy is taken up by the daily papers. Under such conditions any academic tendency either toward servility or toward demagogy is not likely to go long unchallenged.

Considering the high cost and small profits of university manipulation in this light it is very doubtful whether so indirect a method of social defence would appeal to our financial pirates. Whatever their defects or vices, men of this type have at least received the rigorous training of the business career. They are not philosophers of farsighted vision, nor are they easily perturbed by fears of distant dangers. Troubles near at hand they see very clearly; indeed, one of the chief grounds of clamour against such men is the crass directness of the bribery to which on occasion they resort. Interests under fire appeal rather to political hirelings, to venal lawyers, to the courts, to legislatures, or to the press for effective protection and defence. College doctrines are too remote, too uncertain of manipulation to be of assistance. Although they did not learn it from the poet, business men are certainly not unmindful that:

“was ein Professor spricht Nicht gleich zu allen dringet.”

Given both the motive and the means, however, the task of corrupting the college teaching of economic, political, and social doctrines would seem almost hopelessly difficult. A given institution, may, indeed, be endowed almost exclusively by a certain man of great wealth. With very few exceptions knowledge of such munificence is made public property. If then the president or professors of such a university should endeavour to justify or palliate the business conduct of the founder their motives will be suspected from the start and their arguments, however artfully they might plead the case, discounted accordingly. If discretion were thrown to the winds (there is perhaps one case of this sort) the net effect of the work of such apologists, instead of aiding their financial friends, might profoundly injure and embarrass them. Those who are familiar with the character of the American student know that he would be the first to detect any insincerity in the discussion of public questions by an instructor or college official. If the prosperity of the college were due almost entirely to a single bounteous donor its venal professors would, of course, have no direct motive to defend the economic misconduct of any other than their particular friend among the captains of industry. Possibly they might develop a policy similar to that of newspapers in the same predicament,—silence or soft speaking regarding the sins of their great and rich friend combined with louder trumpetings against the social misconduct of other and indifferent financial interests. In the case of all our important institutions of learning, however, funds of very considerable size in the aggregate have been received from many sources in the past, and new gifts, even when they are of large amount, represent merely fractional additions thereto. Those who know our colleges and universities will find it hard to believe that the old academic ideals and traditions of well supported institutions, their scientific honesty and earnest devotion to broad public service, are to be cheaply bought by gifts of half a million or more from the _nouveau riche_. There is such a thing as loyalty to the small gifts often made with the highest motives and the greatest sacrifices by generations long since dead. Few institutions desire to disregard this sentiment, and no institution can disregard it with impunity.

Finally there are the great state institutions of the country, maintained almost wholly by taxation and hence free from any corrupting influence that large endowments might exercise. There can be no doubt that the possession of these two fundamentally different kinds of economic support is a great safeguard to the independence of university instruction in the United States. No country is more blatant in asserting its _Lehrfreiheit_ than Germany, but there the exclusive reliance of universities upon state support, coupled with the tremendous strength of government, makes necessary very considerable modification of the Teutonic boast of absolute academic freedom. To be sure state institutions in the United States have been charged at times with similar subservience to legislatures and political leaders. Whatever perversion of this sort may have occurred it was at least not turned to the advantage of corporate misdoing. Indeed it probably had a directly opposite and strongly demagogic trend. Fortunately our state universities are becoming so powerful, so well fortified by high and honest traditions, so beloved by great and rapidly growing bodies of influential alumni that the days of their dependence upon political favour are well nigh over. It is now beyond all doubt that they are destined to a career of immense usefulness to our democracy, and it seems highly probable that they will overtake, if they do not ultimately excel, the great endowed institutions of the country. If the latter should ever show themselves subject to the influence of predatory wealth the development of well supported public universities should supply the necessary corrective. At the present time, however, a strong presumption of the general devotion of both classes of institutions to the public welfare is afforded by the fact that no recognisable distinction exists between the general doctrines of economics, political, and social science as taught in endowed schools on the one hand and in state schools on the other.