, "quite regardless of their effect,
beneficial or the reverse, upon the real public interests of their own
country, regardless of truth and justice," is not at all true of the
class of papers read by the majority of intelligent Americans. I am not
sufficiently familiar with a large number of German newspapers to make
assertions as to their standards; but, in spite of the smaller amount
of freedom allowed to the press in your country, I can scarcely imagine
that conditions are bad enough to justify your sweeping condemnation of
all newspapers.

If you had stopped to consider the radically different relations
existing between the press and the Government in Germany and in America,
you would scarcely have fallen into the error of asserting that a
considerable proportion of our papers, in common with those of other
nations, have "laboured in the employ or at the instigation of" the
Government, "with all the implements of mendacity and defamation, to
spread hatred and contempt for Germany." Unlike your own, our press is
wholly free from Government control. Any attempt on the part of our
Government to dictate the policy of any newspaper would be hotly
resented, and would be doomed to certain failure. Americans do not
believe in the German doctrine that the press must be "so far controlled
as is requisite for the welfare of the community," and hold that
absolute freedom of speech is essential to true liberty. There is no
censorship of the American press. You have a censorship which all the
outside world knows has been wonderfully effective in keeping some
important facts from the knowledge of the German people. No American
paper can be suppressed because of what it prints. You are, of course,
well aware that, on more than one occasion, German papers have been
suppressed for certain periods because your Government did not believe
that what they said was for the good of the country. I enclose a message
received by wireless under German control which is only one of the many
announcements telling of suppression of your papers. It does not alter
the situation to say that censorship and suppression are necessary for
the good of the Fatherland, and that the papers in question deserved to
be suppressed. The vital fact remains that your newspapers are not free
to publish anything they like. Ours are thus free. Every issue of your
papers must be submitted to your police, so that your rulers may control
what you write and read. Not a pa