SIR EDWARD FRY AND THE CADBURY AND ROWNTREE NEWSPAPERS.

IT has been said by certain thick-and-thin supporters of the members of the Cadbury and Rowntree families concerned that the Spectator has been grossly unfair and grossly prejudiced in pointing out that it is organized hypocrisy for men who believe betting to be deeply injurious to the interests of the people of this country to own papers which not merely give betting news but publish the fiercest incitements to betting, and try to induce their readers to believe that if they follow the "tips" of the newspapers in question they will make their fortunes. We have been told that we have only stated certain facts and drawn certain inferences because the papers in question and their proprietors are Liberals, and that our action was due solely to party rancour, and to our wish to destroy, if we oonld, the good political influence exercised by organs like the Star and the Morning Leader. Those who have drugged their con- sciences with this type of argument and instead of protesting against the action of those members of the Cadbury and Rowntree families who are responsible have supported them and vilified the Spectator should read in full the letter ad- d! eased to members of the Society of Friends by Sir Edward Fry, to which we alluded in our last week's issue. On the present occasion we do not mean to make farther comment, but merely desire by quotation to show that we do not stand alone in feeling that honest men must condemn the action of those who, detesting gambling, yet draw profits from what is in effect a public gaming house. Before we proceed to give quotations from the letter in question we may remind our readers, in case there should be any who do not know it, that Sir Edward Fry was for a long time one of the ablest and most upright of our judges, and as Lord Justice Fry was held in the highest esteem by the whole legal profession. Since his retirement from the Bench Sir Edward Fry has done good work for his country in numberless directions. We may add that Sir Edward Fry's views about peace and many other public questions are probably at variance with the views of the Spectator, and that he is in no way concerned to speak in our support. The Spectator is, indeed, only mentioned once, and nothing is said in support of its action. Further, the copy of the letter to the Society was not sent to us by Sir Edward Fry, or with his knowledge, but reached us from an independent source. Here. is Sir Edward Fry's statement of the facts :— In this matter four papers are concerned, the Northern Echo, the Sheffield Indepeadent, the Morning Leader, and the Star. The facts with regard to these papers appear to be shortly as follows. The Northern Echo is a daily newspaper published in Dar- lington. At present the share capital of this paper consists of .210,350, of which £5,510 is held by members of the Rowntree family : the directors are four in number, of whom two are members of the same family. This state of things appears to have continued about eight years, and during this time the paper has continuously published betting news, not merely the record of past events, but anticipations of the future, in other words, betting tips. It circulates chiefly amongst the working classes of Darlington and Newcastle-on-Tyne, and is known popularly as " Roventree's paper." In 1905 a friendly remonstrance was addressed to Arnold Rowntree in respect of the betting character of the paper, but without result. For a time, we are informed that the editors of this paper discontinued their betting tips, but finding

th that it seriously affected the circulation of e paper they r

to the practice, and now not only publish one set of tips, but have the tips of the London papers sent over the private wire from the Morning Leader office, and publish the whole set. These facts afford clear evidence that the paper is one which owes its success to its betting news. The Manager of the Northern Echo is stated to be also the Manager of the Sheffield Independent. The Northern Echo of the 12th of July, 1911 (a day taken at random), besides other racing information, the style of which may be gathered from one of the headings " Lom a good 'un " gives "To-day's Selections from Newmarket" from the Morning Leader, with Observer's sugges- tions for the races of the morrow.

The Sheffield Daily Independent has a capital of -4320,000 ordinary and deferred and £5,000 preference, which is held by seven share- holders, of whom two are members of the Rowntree family and two are the editors of the Star and the Northern Echo. I am informed that this paper was purchased by its present proprietors in the course of the last year or two.

The issue for the 12th July, in addition to snuck racing news, gives " Buccephalus' Selections for Newmarket of To-day," and "Observer's Selections for the morrow."

The Star is a daily evening paper published in London. It is owned by the Star and Morning Leader Company, the ordinary awes in which were in March, 1911, owned as follows:— Mr. E. Parke, the Editor of the paper

£8,250 The "Daily News," Ltd. Henry Tylor Cadbury 9,3755 B. E. Crosfield 2,000 Arnold S. Rowntree 2,001 J. B. Morrell, Cocoa Manufacturer, York 2,000 The Joseph Rowntree Social Service Trust, Ltd. 9,375

The Daily News is almost exclusively held by the members of the Cadbury family and the Rowntree Trust. This list of owners is significant. It is strange that the Daily News, which has been lauded for its exclusion of betting news, should nevertheless be a large owner in a betting paper, and it would be ludicrous if it were not melancholy to find that a Trust which professes to be for the service and good of mankind should be a large investor in such a degrading paper as the Star.

It is, moreover, strange to find that Mr. H. T. Cadbury, who is a director of the Daily News, is also a director of the Star and Morning Leader Company, and that Mr. Crosfield, who is the secretary of the Daily News, should also be a large shareholder in the same company.

The Star retains the services of two tipsters, who write under the names of "Captain Coe" and "Old Joe," and are, I believe, persons of much notoriety in the betting world. I have in my hands a copy of the Star of the 12th July, 1911. It contains "Sporting Chat,' "Newmarket Programme for To.. day," "Newmarket Runners," "Naps at a Glance," "To-day's form Horses," "Advice from Captain Coe" as to the seven horses which he selects as likely to win in the Newmarket races, and lastly, "Selections from all to-day's papers, Newmarket." The last item is, I believe, a speciality of the Star, and enables the reader to see the forecasts by no less than twenty-seven papers of the probable winners of the six Newmarket races to-morrow. It is obvious, therefore, that the Star affords the reader not only the benefit of Captain's Coe's advice, but the advice tendered by all the sporting papers. Unless I am misinformed, the Star is the most successful of all the London sporting papers, and the more honest and skilful its forecasts may be, the wider no doubt will be the circulation.

The Morning Leader is a London daily morning paper, and is owned by the same company as the Star. The paper of the 12th July contains not only many paragraphs of racecourse news, but selections for the forthcoming races, signed by "Uno "

There can be no question that betting is a great evil ; that the publication of cheap newspapers containing betting news, and especially betting forecasts, has very largely contributed to its increase, especially amongst the working classes, and has brought the habit of betting to the homes of women who would never frequent the racecourse or the gaming house; that poverty, fraud, embezzlement, and kindred crimes are the immediate results of this habit; and that it is thus the direct cause of the moral and spiritual ruin of thousands of our fellow men and women. I may mention that since this matter has been mooted I have noticed that the Recorder of London has stated that betting is in his judgment the cause of more than half the crime that comes before him; that two convicted criminals have openly attributed their crimes to the influence of the Star newspaper, and that the Northumberland train murder has been referred with high prob- ability to the pressure of betting debts.

The Chief Constable of Liverpool in a recent report has stated that, "apart from poverty, the two great causes of crime are drink and betting. Which of the latter," he writes, "is the more fruitful cause is a question in dispute, but it is probably beyond dispute that while crime due to drink has been, and is, decreasing, crime due to gambling in all forms has been, and is, increasing."

We will next quote from Sir E. Fry's letter some general observations on the situation in which the members of the Rowntree and Cadbury families find themselves.

The National Anti-Gambling League, which is largely supported by some members of the Rowntree and Cadbury families has published a leaflet entitled the "Betting Curse," according to which, during 15 years, 178 suicides, 827 embezzlements or similar crimes, 541 bankruptcies, have been proved to be attributable to betting, and the number falls very far short of the reality. Furthermore, the same leaflet states that the bookmakers have during the century ended in 1910 increased from 20 to 30,000; that the wage-earning classes are spending five millions annually in gambling ; that the rates for the poor and for prisons and lunatic asylums are from one- third to one-quarter more than they need be owing to professional betting ; that the evil is spreading alarmingly amongst women and children; that the Post Office distributes annually scores of millions of betting circulars and coupons ; that horse-racing, owing to professional betting, is a veiled sink of iniquity ; that most of the organs of the sporting Press now live from profes- ional betting and its advertisements. Yet the men who put out

this leaflet are themselves amongst the principal owners of the sporting Press.

"Like a cancer the evil thing has spread its poisonous roots throughout the length and breadth of the land, carrying with them where they strike misery, poverty, weakened character, and crime." So wrote Mr. B. Seebohm Rowntree in the preface to his excellent book, "Betting and Gambling, a National Evil." The proprietors of these papers have not succeeded to the possession of them as an hereditary property, or been entangled in difficulties by the action of their predecessors. They know, above most men, the misery and crime produced by betting. They must hear in the ears of their mind the cries and the groans of their victims, and they must with difficulty assuage their feelings by the hope that they are sound politicians. They must know that morals are higher than politics, they must know that neither party has any monopoly of honesty or virtue, they must know that no future conversion from the one party to the other can atone for the misery and the crime which is the direct result of the action.

In the work on betting and gambling above referred to is con- tained an article by an old bookmaker in which amongst other things he says, "Often and often am I troubled with thoughts of the past—memory will assert itself—and the question arises : Have I led a fair and upright life? Have I got my money and living in an upright, honourable manner? Have I not helped to ruin hundreds of good, silly fellows ? Visions of them crop up from time to time; I think of them with any but pleasant feel- ings. How many poor foolish backers whose money I have taken —taken as a business of course—have lost homes, business, and all; whose wives and children have been turned out into the streets through the father's passion for betting ? How many of them have found their way to gaol through betting, and how many have sought self-destruction ?" (Pp. 97-98, Rowntree's "Betting and Gambling.") Do similar feelings and thoughts ever trouble the repose of the proprietors of the Star ?

The next passage is that in which Sir Edward Fry deals with some suggested arguments in defence of the action of the members of the Cadbury and Rowntree families concerned :-

It is, I understand, further suggested that by continuing the publication of betting news, the proprietors are placing themselves in a better position to advocate the legislative prohibition of the publication of such news. I am not aware that they have taken any steps to bring the matter before the Legislature, and it is difficult to conceive a body of reasonable men coming forward and affirming that their practices are so immoral that they ought to be prohibited by statute. Perhaps they promote legislation in the same ways as a drunkard promotes temperance in his character of a shooking example.

It is an alarming feature connected with this matter of betting that the newspapers which chiefly purport to represent the interests and views of the Quaker body and the Society which has been formed for the purpose of diminishing the evil of betting are either apologetic of the action of the accused members of the Society or close their columns to a discussion of the matter. In 1903, and again in 1910, the Friend refused admission to its columns of letters dealing with the subject. In the latter year the British Friend, which proclaims itself as "written from the stand- point of the Society of Friends," published an article in defence of the conduct impugned, and persisted in declining to allow any criticism of the position it assumed. Again, the Bulletin of the National Anti-Gambling League for August, 1910, contains an article severely animadverting on the action of the Spectator in this matter, and upholding the action of Messrs. Cadbury and Rowntree.

To what are we to attribute these apologies and this silence of papers whose duty should have led them to denounce the Star and its sister betting papers?

Sir Edward Fry next goes on to point out that he has a right to appeal to the Society of Friends in general to do their best to stop the action which he has described. He shows how .earnestly, and in the end how successfully, the Society of Friends condemned the part which was at one time taken by certain members of the Society in the slave trade. Very impressive are the words with which Sir Edward Fry concludes his letter :— The precedent thus afforded of the definite, persistent but patient action of the Society is worthy of careful consideration. And now another evil has sprung up within our borders, and if the Society be worthy of its antecedents it will openly and courageously condemn that evil, whatever excuses may be made by those who practise it. If our Society has not a high moral standard to put before the world, the sooner it perishes the better. It is in the hope of contributing towards the maintenance of this standard that I perform the painful—the very painful—duty of issuing this appeal.

We shall make no eomment exoppt to ask the members of the Rowntree and Cadbury families who are concerned whether, though they will not listen to the voice of the Spectator—singe they hold that to be the voice of a worldly and prejudiced Unionist and militarist organ—they will listen to that of a meruber of their own Society. They cannot possibly shut their ears to the voipe of Elir Edward Pry on the ground that he is, as ap.dottbt thpy oguii4er the 4slitor oft the Spectator, a malevolent political $rtiaii, a man of blood, and an Enemy of the People.'