The Daily Paper War: How Seattle’s Press Attacked Its Peers

The paragraph quoted below appeared in the Seattle Chronicle of that evening. It is the paraphrase of a course which that paper had recently adopted toward the Post-Intelligencer, and which is as contemptible as it is dishonest. The Chronicle makes a practice of distorting the opinions of the Post-Intelligencer, of attributing to it opinions which it does not hold, and proceeding to attack it for these opinions. The Post-Intelligencer is perfectly willing to be attacked for its opinions, but it does not expect to be attacked in a way that is not gentlemanly, manly or honest, for the opinions of other people. The paragraph quoted will give you an idea of those despicable tactics. One would naturally infer from it that the Post-Intelligencer had referred to the execution of the Chicago anarchists in the spirit of the article made by the New York Tribune. It has done nothing of the kind. It believes nothing that could possibly hear such a construction. On the contrary, it spoke of the articles of that day as likely to be productive of much good, as being the beginning of a reform movement that will revolutionize the British political and social system. It did, however, insist most strongly that American newspapers should stop republishing column after column of the vile extracts from those English articles. We have yet to learn that 'the Lord Bishop of London, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and Cardinal Manning have publicly endorsed' the republication of those articles in America. Such republication can be caused by no possible motive that is other than evil. The republication of these articles must be accompanied by all the evil effects that attended their original publication, but can be productive of none of the good.