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organization from the standpoint of the historian. He is not immediately concerned with the questions as to whether the Associated Press is a monopoly ; whether " the United Press

scored an epochal scoop ” in announcing the death of Pius X in advance of its rivals, how far it was responsible for the false

dispatch sent November 7, 1918, prematurely announcing the signing of the armistice, and whether " it has revolutionized

journalism ;" whether the International News Service should be coerced into giving up the field ; or whether the Sun Printing and

Publishing Association was justified in protesting against the course of action taken by other associations. But he is deeply

concerned to know whether news-gathering associations furnish reliable news, whether they suppress such information as they

do not wish to have circulated, whether the news reported is biased, distorted , juggled, falsified, or misrepresented, or whether it is fair and truthful. The historian is indebted to news-collect

ing organizations more than to any other single source for the information published in the press, — what guarantees do they

afford that this information can be accepted without question and that important news is not suppressed ? The Associated Press, as the oldest, largest, and most far

reaching of these agencies in America, has been most in the public eye and the greatest number of criticisms have been directed against it. These charges have been that it is a monop

oly, that it caters to a capitalistic press, that it suppresses the news, and that its reports are biased or unfair. The charge that the Associated Press is a monopoly is a con

fusing one since it may imply that it is a commercial monopoly in the sense of making excessive profits through controlling the news, or it may imply that it is a monopoly through controlling

the market for news and preventing the formation of other news collecting organizations. That the Association is not a com mercial monopoly must be self-evident since it makes no profits

whatsoever and they can not therefore be " excessive.”

The

contention that the Associated Press has been a violator of the Federal Anti- Trust Act was held to be unwarranted by Attorney General Gregory in an opinion given March 12, 1915, after a careful and exhaustive scrutiny of the object and scope of