That is the account of how the patent-medicine man used his club on the newspaper head, told in the patent-medicine man's own words, as he described it to his fellows. Is it pleasant reading for self-respecting newspaper men—the exultant air of those last sentences, and the worldly wisdom: "When you touch a man's pocket you touch him where he lives; that principle is true of the newspaper editor..."?

But the worst of this incident has not yet been told. There remains the account of how the offending newspaper, in the language of the bully, "ate dirt". The Cleveland Press is one of a syndicate of newspapers, all under Mr. McRae's ownership—but I will use Mr. Cooper's own words: "We not only reached the Cleveland Press by the movement taken up in that way, but went further, for the Cleveland Press is one of a syndicate of newspapers known as the Scripps-McRae League, from whom this explanation is self-explanatory:

"'Office Schipps-McRae Press Association.

"'Mr. E. R. Cooper, Cleveland, Ohio:

"'Mr. McRae arrived in New York the latter part of last week after a three months' trip to Egypt. I took up the matter of the recent cut-rate articles which appeared in the Cleveland Press with him, and to-day received the following telegram from him from Cincinnati: 'Scripps-McRae papers will contain no more such as Cleveland Press published concerning the medicine trust—M. A. McRae.'

"'I am sure that in the future nothing will appear in the Cleveland Press detrimental to your interests.

"'Yours truly,

"'F. J. Carlisle.'"

This incident was told, in the exact words above quoted, at the nineteenth annual meeting of the Proprietary Association of America.

I could, if space permitted, quote many other telegrams and letters from the Kilmer's Swamp Root makers, from the Piso's Cure people, from all the large patent-medicine manufacturers. The same thing that happened in Massachusetts happened last year in New Hampshire, in Wisconsin, in Utah, in more than fifteen states. In Wisconsin the response by the newspapers to the command of the patent-medicine people was even more humiliating than in Massachusetts. Not only did individual newspapers work against the formula bill; there is a "Wisconsin Press Association," which includes the owners and editors of most of the newspapers of the state. That association held a meeting and passed resolutions, "that we are opposed to said bill... providing that hereafter all patent medicine sold in this state shall have the formula thereof printed on their labels," and "Resolved, That the association appoint a committee of five publishers to oppose the passage of the measure." And in this same state the larger dailies in the cities took it on themselves to drum up the smaller country papers and get them to write editorials opposed to the formula bill. Nor was even this the measure of their activity in response to the command of the patent medicine association. I am able to give the letter which is here reproduced [see page 86]. It was sent by the publisher of one of the largest daily papers in Wisconsin to the state senator who introduced the bill. In one western state, a board of health officer made a number of analyses of patent medicines, and tried to have the analyses made public, that the people of his state might be warned. "Only one newspaper in the state," he says in a personal letter, "was willing to print results of these analyses, and this paper refused them after two publications in which a list of about ten was published.

In New Hampshire—but space forbids. Happily there Is a little silver in the situation. The legislature of North Dakota last year passed, and the governor signed a bill requiring that patent-medicine bottles shall have printed on their labels the percentage of alcohol or of morphin or various other poisons which the medicine contains. That was the first success in a fight which the public health authorities have waged in twenty states each year for twenty years. In North Dakota the patent-medicine people conducted the fight with their usual weapons, the ones described above. But the newspapers, be it said to their everlasting credit, refused to fall in line to the threats of the patent-medicine association. And I account for that fact in this way: North Dakota is wholly a "country" community.

It has no city of over 20,000, and but one over 5,000. The press of the state, therefore, consists of very small papers, weeklies, in which the ownership and active management all lie with one man. The editorial conscience and the business manager's enterprise lie under one hat. With them the patent-medicine scheme was not so successful as with the more elaborately organized newspapers of older and more populous states.

Just now is the North Dakota editor's time of trial. The law went into effect July 1. The patent-medicine association, at their annual meeting in May, voted to withdraw all their advertising from all the papers in that state. This loss of revenue, they argued self-righteously, would be a warning to the newspapers of other states. Likewise it would be a lesson to the newspapers of North Dakota. At the next session of the legislature they will seek to have the label bill repealed, and they count on the newspapers, chastened by a lean year, to help them. For the independence they have shown in the past, and for the courage they will be called on to show in the future, therefore, let the newspapers of North Dakota know that they have the respect and admiration of all decent people.

"What is to be done about it?" is the question that follows exposure of organized rascality. In few cases is the remedy so plain as here. For the past, the newspapers, in spite of these plain contracts of silence, must be acquitted of any very grave complicity. The very existence of the machine that uses and directs them has been a carefully guarded secret. For the future, be it understood that any newspaper which carries a patent-medicine advertisement knows what it is doing. The obligations of the contract are now public property. And one thing more, when next a member of a state legislature arises and states, as I have so often heard: "Gentlemen, this label bill seems right to me, but I can not support it; the united press of my district is opposed to it"—when that happens, let every one understand the wires that have moved "the united press of my district."

The Following are Extracts and Abstracts from Various Articles in the Ladies Home Journal?

A PECULIAR "ETC."

A great show of frankness was recently made by a certain "patent medicine." The makers advertised that they had concluded to take the public into their confidence, and that thereafter they would print a formula of the medicine on each bottle manufactured.

"There is nothing secretive about our medicine," was the cry. "We have nothing to hide. Here is the formula. Show it to your physician."

Then comes the formula: This herb and that herb, this ingredient and that ingredient, and the formula winds up, "etc." All good, old-fashioned, well recognized drugs were those which were mentioned—all except the "etc."

A certain Board of Pharmacy had never heard of a drug called "etc.," and so made up Its mind to find out.

And the "etc." was found to be 3.76 per cent of cocain!—just the simple, death-dealing cocain!—From The Ladies' Home Journal, February, 1906.

PATENT MEDICINE CONCERNS AND LETTER BROKERS.

One of the most disgusting and disgraceful features of the patent medicine business is the marketing of letters sent by patients to patent medicine firms. Correspondence is solicited by these firms under the seal of sacred confidence. When the concern is unable to do further business with a patient it disposes of the patient's correspondence to a letter-broker, who, in turn, disposes of it to other patent medicine concerns at the rate of half a cent, for each letter.

This Information was made public by Mark Sullivan in the Ladies' Home Journal for January, 1906.

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An advertisement showing how the names to orders sent to "Patent Medicine" concerns are offered for sale or rent to be used by others.

Yet we are told how "Sacredly Confidential" these letters are regarded and held. (The advertisement is from the Mail Order Journal, April, 1905.)

Says Mr. Sullivan: "One of these brokers assured me he could give me 'choice lots' of 'medical female letters'... Let me now give you, from the printed lists of these 'letter brokers' some idea of the way in which these 'sacredly confidential' letters are hawked about the country. Here are a few samples, all that are really printable:

"'55,000 Female Complaint Letters' Is the sum total of one Item, and the list gives the names of the "medicine company" or the "medical institute" to whom they were addressed. Here is a barter, then, in 55,000 letters of a private nature, each one of which, the writer was told, and had a right to expect, would be regarded as sacredly confidential by the "doctor" or concern to whom she had been deluded into telling her private ailments. Yet here they are for half a cent each!

"Another batch of some 47,000 letters addressed to five 'doctors' and 'institutes' is emphasized because they were all written by women! A third batch is:

"'44,000 Bust Developer Letters'—letters which one man in a "patent medicine" concern told me were "the richest sort of reading you could get hold of."

"A still further lot offers: '40,000 Women's Regulator Letters'—letters which in their context any woman can naturally imagine would be of the most delicate nature. Still, the fact remains, here thy are for sale."

Is not this contemptible?

In the same article Mr. Sullivan exposes the inhuman greed of patent medicine concerns that turn into cold cash the letters of patients afflicted with the most vital diseases.

To quote Mr. Sullivan again: "All these are made the subject of public barter. Here are offered for sale, for example: 7,000 Paralysis Letters; 9,000 Narcotic Letters; 52,000 Consumption Letters; 3,000 Cancer Letters, and even 65,000 Deaf Letters. Of diseases of the most private nature one is offered here nearly one hundred thousand letters—letters the very classification of which makes a sensitive person shudder."