Page:The Brass Check (Sinclair 1919).djvu/409

 It happens, while I am preparing this book for the printer, that I visit a friend, and mention what I am doing; he says: "There was one newspaper story which almost caused me to despise you. I wonder how much truth there was in it." He explains that he was in Chicago in the early days of the war, attending a conference of the People's Council, and in a Chicago newspaper he read that I had denounced Emma Goldman to the government, and had turned over some of her private letters to the government.

I tell my friend what happened. An insane man had threatened my life, and I had applied to the Los Angeles police department for permission to carry a revolver. They promised to keep secret my application, but within half an hour there were two newspaper reporters after me. I refused to talk about the matter; so, as usual, they made up a story. It happened that I had given to the chief of detectives what information I had as to the insane man's past conduct; among other things, that he had caused a disturbance at a meeting of Emma Goldman's. That was the way her name came in, and the only way. I barely know Emma Goldman, having met her twice at public meetings; I knew nothing whatever about her activities at this time, and had no letters from her in my possession. I now have one, for immediately I wrote to her to say that the published story was false, and she replied that I need not have worried; she had known it was false.

Now, I sent a denial of that story to every newspaper in Los Angeles, and also to the Associated Press; but my denial went into the waste-basket. And why? At this time the capitalist press was engaged in hounding Emma Goldman to prison; the lie was useful to the hounders, so it stood, in spite of all my protests.

Obviously enough, here is a gross injustice. Common sense dictates a law that any newspaper which prints a false statement shall be required to give equal prominence to a correction. The law should provide that upon publication of any false report, and failure to correct it immediately upon receipt of notice, the injured party should have the right to collect a fixed sum from the newspaper—five or ten thousand dollars at least. At present, you understand, the sum has to be fixed by the jury, and the damages have to be proven. If the "Los Angeles Times" calls Upton Sinclair an "Anarchist writer," if the "Chicago Tribune" calls Henry Ford an "Anarchist," it is