PUBLIC OPINION by WALTER LIPPMANN TO FAYE LIPPMANN ...

difficult to obtain, and for that reason its general importance is
often much exaggerated.] which depends on the general condition of
trade, and more peculiarly on a circulation based not on a marriage
contract with their readers, but on free love. The object of every
publisher is, therefore, to turn his circulation from a medley of
catch-as-catch-can news stand buyers into a devoted band of constant
readers. A newspaper that can really depend upon the loyalty of its
readers is as independent as a newspaper can be, given the economics
of modern journalism. [Footnote: "It is an axiom in newspaper
publishing--'more readers, more independence of the influence of
advertisers; fewer readers and more dependence on the advertiser' It
may seem like a contradiction (yet it is the truth) to assert: the
greater the number of advertisers, the less influence they are
individually able to exercise with the publisher." Adolph S. Ochs,
_of. supra._] A body of readers who stay by it through thick and
thin is a power greater than any which the individual advertiser can
wield, and a power great enough to break up a combination of
advertisers. Therefore, whenever you find a newspaper betraying its
readers for the sake of an advertiser, you can be fairly certain
either that the publisher sincerely shares the views of the
advertiser, or that he thinks, perhaps mistakenly, he cannot count
upon the support of his readers if he openly resists dictation. It is
a question of whether the readers, who do not pay in cash for their
news, will pay for it in loyalty.
CHAPTER XXII
THE CONSTANT READER
I
THE loyalty of the buying public to a newspaper is not stipulated in
any bond. In almost every other enterprise the person who expects to
be served enters into an agreement that controls his passing whims. At
least he pays for what he obtains. In the publishing of periodicals
the nearest approach to an agreement for a definite time is the paid
subscription, and that is not, I believe, a great factor in the
economy of a metropolitan daily. The reader is the sole and the daily
judge of his loyalty, and there can be no suit against him for breach
of promise or nonsupport.
Though everything turns on the constancy of the reader, there does not
exist even a vague tradition to call that fact to the reader's mind.
His constancy depends on how he happens to feel, or on his habits. And
these depend not simply on the quality of the news, but more often on