Page:History of Journalism in the United States.djvu/404

378 that they control. A more complete circle of delegation of power and return has never existed, and it is not easy to conceive of making it more responsive writhout producing a chaos that would negative all human effort. As our problems have arisen, the elasticity of the self-devised checks has been proved; imperfections, so-called, have really been the results that are inevitable in a country growing and developing in unprecedented ways. Dangers and failures have been found and will be found, as must be expected under any government into which the human element enters to so great an extent. But it is in this particular regard that the American democracy has achieved its greatest triumph—there has never been in high office a man, with the exception of Aaron Burr, who has shown a vicious intent toward the people, nor have there been, among the thousands of unfettered editors, any conspicuous examples of men who have not had their country's interest first at heart, wrong though some of them have been in their methods.

There is no profession, unless it is medicine, that calls for a higher regard for the simple truth than does journalism. "A good reporter is one who is never deceived by a lie." There have been men, there are men, into whose consciousness this fact never penetrates, but for the vast majority of the men who have achieved distinction in journalism it has been an actuating and primal principle.

From the very humble beginning of journalism in America to this day, there has been a devotion to duty that shows how fundamental is this ethical principle, in those who are drawn into this profession, where success is not measured by fame or by money. Those who, like Bucher, see but the commercial side, or, like Boynton, recognize only a shadowing and imitation of literature,