[From the National Printer-Journalist, Milwaukee, Wisconsin]

National Editorial Association Code of Ethics, adopted at the 1925 convention: We believe in the newspaper profession, that every newspaper is a public service institution deriving its power and usefulness from those who read it, that those who enter this calling should be trained men and women, prepared to devote their lives to the best interests of the people in unselfish service. We believe that every newspaper should be a loyal supporter of the Constitution of the United States and an advocate of the enforcement of law. We believe that nothing should be printed in a newspaper which may not be read in the home. We believe that truth should be set as the standard for every newspaper in news, editorial, advertisement, and circulation. We believe that only such newspapers as strive to maintain the highest ideals of truth, justice, honesty, fairness, and decency in all departments deserve the support of the people, and we pledge ourselves to maintain as best we may these standards.

[From the Christian Century, Chicago, Illinois]

"The newspaper is said to be the mirror of everyday life," said Mr. John H. Stewart, recently. "There may be times when people would be better off by not looking into the mirror. ... Finding so many destructive things to publish, we have not room left in our columns to print the constructive, and less incentive to go out and search for them."

[From an editorial in the Tribune, Kingston, Ohio]

Through the courtesy of that splendid international newspaper, The Christian Science Monitor of Boston, which recently devoted several sections of an edition to Ohio and its resources, including its industries, its politics, and its moral reforms, we are permitted to reproduce, in a very modest and brief manner, a few, only, of the matters of interest to which the attention of its thousands of appreciative readers has been called. For a good many years past, a good deal has been said about a "cleaning-up day for the newspapers of the country," the emphasis being laid upon the average metropolitan newspaper. The publication of the details of all sorts of crimes has become a disease. These papers, loaded with filth, morning, noon, and night, find their way into millions of homes, and instead of uplifting, they debauch and debase. It has been said, in refutation to the charge, that the publishers of these newspapers are giving the people what they want and what they demand. But they forget to add that the papers were the first offenders; they have educated the people, through a series of years, to want the salacious and the vicious.

The ... Monitor has demonstrated absolutely that the people, on the other hand, can be educated to desire only that which is fit to print. Their policy is to ignore crime details and salaciousness and yet to furnish every item of news which is essential as information, at the same time maintaining departments of Education, Architecture, Art, a Home Forum, clean Amusements, Book Reviews, and an unsurpassed editorial page, in the columns of which are discussed, by the best writers, current topics of the times. It is true, of course, that the Monitor is the recognized exponent of a church organization; and yet but a few inches in each issue are devoted to a discussion of religious problems and questions. On the other hand, it is essentially a newspaper, devoted almost wholly to the news fit to print, and to the discussion of the national and international issues and problems having a relation to the welfare and happiness of humankind. Beyond a peradventure, the paper has demonstrated the practicability of a new order of newspaper making.

[From the Youth's Companion, Boston, Massachusetts]

It may be true, as many parents assert, that the old-fashioned methods of discipline and education do not produce the results that were once expected from them, and that children do not so much rebel against such methods as good-naturedly ignore them. But that is no reason for abandoning the effort to guide and direct the growth and development of the children. There are ways of gaining the confidence and influencing the minds of these restless and inquisitive young people. Some parents have found them out; and many more could do so if they would apply themselves to the task, instead of lamenting the difficulties of it. We are sure that, among other things, there is need for a much more careful and sympathetic oversight of the reading that children and young people do. They are assailed to-day by a perfectly unprecedented flood of unworthy literature, a part of it merely cheap and flashy, much of it subtly immoral, and some of it flatly nasty. This stuff, conspicuously and often rather attractively displayed on the news stands, transported by express to avoid trouble with the post-office authorities, appealing to the immature mind by its air of sophistication, cannot but debauch the taste and injure the morals of the boys and girls who read it. Are parents as careful as they ought to be to find out whether their children are reading this kind of fiction, and to point out to them frankly its falsity and its poisonous nature? We are inclined to think that many of them are not, if we can believe the reports that come to us from those whose business it is to sell periodical literature to the public.

It will pay parents who desire their children to grow up intelligent and clean-minded, to make very sure that their boys and girls are not in danger of forming a taste for this harmful reading. They should be more careful to protect them against it than to guard them against infectious disease, for the effects of unclean reading are more permanent and injurious than those of bodily illness. And in no way can they do so more surely than by inoculating them, so to speak, with the antitoxin of a familiarity with and a liking for clean and wholesome books. One who knows the taste of good food cannot easily be persuaded that tainted food is good to eat.

[From the World's Work, New York, New York]

Livingston, Montana, has several claims to distinction besides its reputation for neatness, home-owning, and the fact that it is the gateway to the northern entrance of Yellowstone Park. It is probably unique in the percentage of its inhabitants who read the local paper. By exact count a few months ago, Livingston has 1304 homes. The Livingston Enterprise is delivered by carrier direct to 1153 of these homes. It goes by city mail to 74 more, and it sells 52 copies on the news stands, making a total circulation of 1279 copies in a town of 1304 possible buyers. Only 25 homes in the community do not get the paper, and of these several are occupied by families that cannot read English.

This must be nearly the record for saturation circulation of a newspaper. It is not an accident. The editor of the Enterprise is L. E. Flint, and he has created this demand for his paper by following a very simple rule. He has simply refused to print anything in his paper that makes parents uncomfortable when they see it in the hands of their children. He does not print any police court news at all. He prints no news of local criminal trials until a defendant has been pronounced guilty. In these cases, he then prints all the essential facts. In other words, Tom Jones or Jim Smith gets no notoriety for being arrested. But if either of them is convicted, the community is told. Telegraph news of a scandalous nature is boiled down to a bare statement. ... Mr. Flint finds plenty of interesting news to satisfy his readers and to keep them informed of everything worth knowing in the world's events.

[From the News, Adelaide, Australia]

With the object of "supporting and maintaining the status and interests of the advertising profession, to promote the consideration and discussion of all questions affecting members, and generally to establish a good understanding between them for their mutual benefit," the Advertising Institute of South Australia intends to hold a series of monthly luncheons The first one was held in Balfour's Cafe. Mr. E. G. Heal (president), who addressed the members, stated that probably one of the greatest dangers which beset the advertising man to-day was overcommercialization. Advertising has become the handmaid of commerce, he said, and the modern business-man had to invoke the services of the advertising man if success were to crown his efforts. The profession. therefore, had come to occupy an important position in the modern business world. Whether advertising as a profession could maintain its honored status depended upon the character and ability of members of the profession. Probably the first essential in advertising was truth. A false advertisement was an ugly thing. ... The world was coming to see the force of the slogan, "It pays to advertise;" but advertising men would render their services of greater value if they would impress on business-men that it pays to advertise truthfully.

[From the Dispatch, Kokomo, Indiana]

The Southern Newspaper Publishers' Association agrees that a newspaper's firm duty is to print the news honestly and fairly to all, unbiased even by its own editorial policy ...:

Recognizing that honest differences of opinion exist, we may vigorously maintain our own position without denouncing others as dishonest and unfair. Decency should be the guiding star in the printing of news, editorials, advertising, and all feature articles or illustrations. Is it fit to print and to be read by my own mother? should be the test; rather than, Will it sell more papers? Consideration, also, for the unfortunate and for guiltless victims of the faults of others! No story justifies needless damage to a good reputation, nor wanton pain to an innocent. Respect and tolerance for those of different religions, races, and circumstances of life! Honesty in all dealings, whether with readers, advertisers, employees, or competitors! Truth first, last, and always!

The best thing about this code is the large number of newspapers already living up to it. To appreciate this modern journalism, critics should hark back to the "good old days" of personal journalism and bitter partisanship, and observe the amazing growth not only in completeness of news reporting but in the spirit of fairness and tolerance with which the news is handled.

[From Time, New York, New York]

The world will never be redeemed by the voice only. ... In the newspaper the coming generation will find, when Christianity is applied to the newspaper, a great apostle of Christianity. ... The pulpit and the written word—the press—are twins.