Page:The Brass Check (Sinclair 1919).djvu/386

 percentage basis; and the balance for lecturing at the school, at a rate approximating ten cents per week for each student!

They lie about the pacifists and those whom they call Bolsheviks; they lie equally about a man like myself, who supported the war, and is opposing Bolshevism. In the accounts of the proceedings of the Senate Committee investigating "Bolshevism in America," there was submitted, according to newspaper accounts, a long list of writings "urging the overthrow of the United States government by violence"; among the writers named being Upton Sinclair. I at once wrote to Solicitor Lamar of the postoffice department, to Major Humes, and to Senator Overman—these being the parties who had compiled the writings in question. I explained to these gentlemen that for twenty years I had been writing for the precise purpose of avoiding "the overthrow of the United States government by violence," and I requested to know what writings of mine could have justified their charge. I have letters from all three of these parties, stating that nothing of mine was included, or had been included in the list; the published report of the Overman Committee reveals that this statement is correct; yet the dispatch including my name was sent broadcast over the country by the Associated Press—and I am without redress!

The listing of anecdotes of this sort is merely a question of the amount of space one is willing to give. The United States government is deporting Hindu revolutionists to be executed by the British government when they reach India. Prof. Richard Gottheil of Columbia University writes to the "New York Times" denying that this is so. Robert Morse Lovett, editor of the "Dial," writes to the "Times," citing case after case, upon British official authority. And the "Times" refuses to print Mr. Lovett's letter! A friend of mine writes to Prof. Gottheil about it, and he answers that he wishes the "Times" would print Mr. Lovett's letter, because he believes in fair play. But the "Times" does not believe in fair play!

In the same way, the "Times" attacks "Jimmie Higgins." In the last chapters of this story an American soldier is represented as being tortured in an American military prison. Says the "Times":

Mr. Sinclair should produce the evidence upon which he based his astounding accusations, if he has any. If he has simply written on