Chapter XVII: Editorials--Destructive

"O great corrector of enormous times,
Shaker of o'er-rank states, thou grand decider
Of dusty and old titles, that healest with blood
The earth when it is sick, and curest the world
O' the pleurisy of people!"
BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.

I. Introduction

In Chapter XVI constructive editorials were discussed. The object of this chapter is to present a few exercises on destructive editorials. Their object, of course, is not really to create ruin; it is merely to clear away rubbish in order to prepare the ground for the edifice of truth.

II. Assignment

Write an editorial in reply to an editorial in which a false position is assumed by the writer.

III. Model I

Vice-President Marshall's declaration, made some time ago at
Wabash College, that the old man is being shoved off the stage
everywhere, needs revision, as does the opinion of another
statesman that men over fifty are atrophied.

In the last great war between France and Germany the campaign
was planned and led by elderly men. The Emperor William, then
King of Prussia, was in his seventy-fourth year; Von Moltke, the
master strategist of the war, was seventy-one years old; General
von Roon was sixty-eight; and Bismarck, the master mind in the
larger field, was in his fifty-sixth year.

In the next great war in which high military efficiency was
displayed, Admiral Togo was approaching his sixtieth year when
he took the field; Prince Oyama, the commander-in-chief of the
Japanese forces in Manchuria, had passed his sixtieth year;
Field Marshal Nodzu was sixty-three; Field Marshal Yamagata was
sixty-six; General Kuroki was sixty; and General Nogi, who took
Port Arthur after a series of desperate conflicts, carried on
with unflinching energy and almost breathless rapidity, was
nearly sixty years of age.

In the present war Lord Kitchener, the organizing genius of the
English army, is sixty-four; and Sir John French, commanding the
English forces in the field, is sixty-two. When Lord Roberts was
sent to South Africa to snatch victory out of defeat, he was
sixty-eight years of age.

On the French side, General Joffre is sixty-two; General Pau is
sixty-six; General Castelnau, the third in command, is well
advanced in the sixties; and General Gallieni, who is in command
of the defenses of Paris, is seventy.

The German armies are also led by a group of elderly men. Count
von Huelsenberg has reached the mature age of seventy-eight;
Field Marshal von der Goltz is seventy-one; General von Kluck
has reached his sixty-eighth year; General von Emmich was
sixty-six; and General von Hindenberg is sixty-seven.

These figures suggest that, while fifty may be the deadline
among Democratic statesmen, it appears to be a kind of life-line
among great leaders abroad.--Adapted from _The Outlook_,
November 11, 1914.[13]

[13] Reprinted by permission of _The Outlook_.

IV. Analysis

Observe the framework. Paragraph 1 states the point to be proved. Paragraphs 2-5 are composed of examples, arranged thus:

1. The War of 1871.
2. The War of 1905.
3. The Present War.
(a) France.
(b) England.
(c) Germany.

The order, in other words, is at once the order of chronology and that of climax, which combine to make the facts easy to remember. Paragraph 6 summarizes the argument and clinches it by a sharp antithesis.

V. Exercises

1. Using a similar framework, write an editorial disproving by
examples the point made by the writer of the model.

2. Write an editorial proving by examples any proposition which you
believe to be true and in which you are deeply interested.

3. Prove or disprove by example any one of the following
propositions:

(a) Left-hand batters are better than right-hand batters.

(b) Germans are better ball-players than Irishmen.

(c) Frenchmen cannot play ball.

(d) Men write better than women.

(e) Asphalt pavements are more durable than brick pavements.

(f) Germany has contributed more to the world's culture than
England.

(g) College graduates are more successful as statesmen than are
self-made men.

(h) Very tall men have ever very empty heads.

(i) Athletes usually succeed well in after life.

(j) Dr. Samuel Johnson was a great wit. (For Johnson, substitute,
if you wish, Geoffrey Chaucer, William Shakespeare, Francis
Bacon, Samuel Butler, Alexander Pope, Charles Lamb, Sidney
Smith, Oliver Wendell Holmes, James Russell Lowell, or Mark
Twain.)

In the model there are twenty-two examples. In your composition there must be at least ten.

VI. Model II

WHAT DOES A MAN PRODUCE?

Among the banners of the unemployed in New York when they came
in collision with the police was one reading, "We Want All We
Produce."

There is a common impression among Socialistic workmen,
encouraged by some of the new-fangled college professors, that
the weaver produces all the cloth that comes off the loom he
tends, and he is robbed if his wages are only a part of the
value of the cloth. But he is only one of a long line of
producers, each of whom has to get some of the money for which
that cloth is sold.

There was a farmer who grew the raw fiber. There was a railroad
that transported the fiber. There was a long list of workmen who
did various things in the preparation of that fiber. It took
several classes of men to convert that fiber into yarn. Some men
dug the coal and a railroad hauled it. It took a good many men a
considerable time to build the loom and the engine and the mill,
and all of them have got to be paid. The men who have paid all
these previous classes of workers may reimburse themselves out
of a part of the proceeds of the bolt of cloth without
committing any robbery. What are the dividends but the
reimbursement of the people that have paid the miners and
mechanics and builders for their work before the cloth was sold?

The report of the Comptroller of the Currency shows that the
average return on all the shares and bonds of all the
corporations in the United States is 4.3 per cent. That doesn't
look unreasonable. It isn't very much more than savings-bank
interest. Of course, some corporations make very much more, but
many must make nothing in order to bring the average down to
4.3 per cent. Besides, there are a few bonds that do not pay
4.5 per cent or more, so that the average return on the shares,
which represent the ownership of the mills and factories, would
be less than 4.3 per cent.

What does a man produce? Well, put a man with only his bare
hands upon a spot of earth, or in a mine hole, or by the side of
a stream and how much will he produce? What are the chances that
he will not starve to death before he can produce anything? If
you give him tools, and "grub-stake" him, in mining lingo, or
support him until he has produced something and it has been
marketed, the produce of other men has been given him. They have
got to be paid for their produce in some way. The man in
question can't have all he produces without defrauding the men
who produced the tools and food which he used during the time
he was getting his product made or extracted.[14]--_Philadelphia
Record._

[14] Reprinted by permission of the _Philadelphia Record_.

VII. Analysis

1. What is proved by this editorial?

2. The method of Model I consists of overwhelming the enemy with an
avalanche of examples. The method of Model II is to define the
words used by an opponent and, by analyzing the meaning of what
he asserts, to prove that he does not see his way through the
question.

3. Note the framework: (Par. 1) "Four W's"; (Par. 2) Statement of
Positions of Opponent and Writer; (Par. 3) Exposition of
Writer's Position; (Par. 4) Refutation of Opponent's Idea;
(Par. 5) Conclusion.

VIII. Exercises

1. Define and discuss the etymology of "collision," "transported,"
"convert," "considerable," "reimburse," "dividend,"
"corporations," "factories," "starve," "lingo," "support,"
"extract," "percentage," "average."

2. Subject for short expository speeches: "Socialism," "Shares,"
"Bonds," "Corporations," "Savings Banks," "Interest."

3. Write an answer to the model.

4. Write an editorial refuting some current fallacy or what you
deem such. Use the analytic method of the model.

5. Examine the editorials in some current paper to determine
whether they are expository or argumentative, constructive or
destructive, if their frameworks are as good as those of the
models, if their matter is as convincing, if their style is as
good, and if their total effect is better or worse.

IX. Suggested Reading

Thomas Gray's _Elegy in a Country Churchyard_.

X. Memorize

OLD IRONSIDES[15]

Ay, tear her tattered ensign down!
Long has it waved on high,
And many an eye has danced to see
That banner in the sky;
Beneath it rung the battle shout,
And burst the cannon's roar;--
The meteor of the ocean air
Shall sweep the clouds no more.

Her deck, once red with heroes' blood,
Where knelt the vanquished foe,
When winds were hurrying o'er the flood
And waves were white below,
No more shall feel the victor's tread,
Or know the conquered knee;--
The harpies of the shore shall pluck
The eagle of the sea!

Oh, better that her shattered hulk
Should sink beneath the wave;
Her thunders shook the mighty deep,
And there should be her grave;
Nail to the mast her holy flag,
Set every threadbare sail,
And give her to the god of storms,
The lightning and the gale.
OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES.

[15] Built about 1800, the frigate _Constitution_ had a career that aroused popular fancy. She was at the bombardment of Tripoli in 1804; captured the British frigate _Guerrière_ August 2, 1812; captured the British frigate _Java_ December 29, 1812; and on February 20, 1815, captured the British ships _Cyane_ and _Levant_. In 1830, when it was proposed to break her up, Holmes wrote this poem by way of protest. The result was that the ship was preserved. She now lies at the Boston Navy Yard, an object of great historic and patriotic interest. The poem is a kind of poetic editorial.