AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A PENNSYLVANIAN
impromptu squib in his album. Thereupon Smith worked up an editorial upon it in an effort at ridicule. He did worse. In my library is a bound volume labeled Newspaper Ethics, put away for the enlightenment of posterity as to current manners. In it are preserved:
1. A column dispatch; printed in The Press, June 26, 1903, saying that Governor A. B. Cummins of Iowa, in an address at Waynesburg College, had denounced the Pennypacker press muzzling law and said it would “forever stigmatize its author.”
2. Smith's editorial of June 27th, saying that “Governor Pennypacker and his libel law have had no more stinging rebuke than was administered by another governor, Albert B. Cummins of Iowa.”
3. Letter of July 17, 1903, from Albert B. Cummins to John W. Campbell, saying:
“I cannot say how the absurd story got abroad. . . . I did not say one word upon the subject nor did I in any manner refer to Governor Pennypacker.”
4. Letter of Charles Emory Smith, August 11, 1903, saying:
“While he did not make the statements imputed to him in a public address at Waynesburg , College, he did make them in a public interview. . . . Publication awaits a full ascertainment of the facts.”
The publication of the facts was never made.
5. Letter of Albert B. Cummins, August 22, 1903, saying:
“I repeat that I did not say anything about the libel law or Governor Pennypacker to anybody in Waynesburg or in Greene County. Indeed, I may make it stronger; I did not think about the libel law or of Governor Pennypacker while there. No matter who is responsible for it, it is pure fabrication.”
6. Letter of Edward W. Hacker, a correspondent of the Press, April 1, 1907, saying:
“I am not responsible for the ridiculous stuff that
