Official proceedings of the annual meeting: 1923

474

PUBLIC OPINION

Here again was the human touch to which The World could not be indifferent. We
said that all we needed to know was whether the facts in the case were true as they were
alleged; if they were, we could and would help. The evidence came on in the next mail.
We examined it, and found it convincing in its essentials. Within ten days of the
receipt of that first telegram The World began the publication of the story of Martin
Tabert, and a staff correspondent was on his way to Florida. Within another ten days
the country was literally ringing with the story. Newspapers in thirty-eight cities took
it up; Florida itself seized eagerly on the opportunity to wipe out a system that an
actual majority had protested against for years, but which had been maintained by a
political minority serving its own material ends and those of benefiting corporations,
too many of these being northern-owned, as was the Putnam Lumber Company, in
whose veritable slavery Martin Tabert died. In forty-seven days from the first publication in The World, Florida had abolished the leasing of convicts, and the lash as a
means of discipline; the judge who sentenced Martin Tabert and the sheriff who
pocketed the fee for turning him over had been removed from office; and the "whipping
boss" who lashed him had been brought to trial for first degree murder.
Can you ask a more vivid illustration of the power of public opinion, or of the
effectiveness of the newspaper in awakening it? Can you ask a better rule for seeking
and gaining the support you need than the simplicity and sincerity of the appeal of
Martin Tabert?
PUBLIC OPINION AND THE CHIEF EXECUTIVE
Hon. William E. Sweet, Governor of Colorado
There are three aspects of public opinion which the chief executive may accept.
He may, in the first place, ignore public opinion. He may be satisfied with his own
judgment. He may have his own sweet will and his own opinions and, in an independent attitude, care little or nothing for what the public thinks. This is not the attitude
often taken by a chief executive, although now and then we find it is assumed. In the
second place a chief executive may listen to public opinion, he may be anxious to know
what public opinion is, and he may analyze public opinion, desirous of knowing that
source from which it comes and whither it leads. He may be conscious of the fact that
he does not know all the truth, but with an open mind he is anxious to know what the
public thinks. He will be openminded, he will be tolerant, he will invite opinions from
those who do not agree with him, and thus he will seek to know what the public think
about the measures which he is advocating or which are before the legislature.
But there is another attitude which the chief executive may take, and I think I
would go a little further than the last speaker in saying that the chief executive might
well consider whether he will not undertake to create public opinion, conscious of the
fact that after examining a question thoroughly and carefully he believes that the public
is not properly informed or if it is it has not drawn the proper conclusions. Therefore,
while he is tolerant of other people's views and is openminded, he realizes that if he is
to be true to his own conscience and to his own convictions, he must undertake to persuade people away from what he believes to be the wrong opinion to the opinion which
he believes to be right and just. The name of Theodore Roosevelt has been mentioned
tonight, and the Progressive party. I read an incident of this great leader some time