SOURCE: "Pulitzer: Past-Master," in Newspaper Crusaders: A Neglected Story, Whittlesey House, 1939, pp. 20-42.

In the following essay, Bent focuses on the crusades against government and big business corruption undertaken by Pulitzer's newspapers the New York World and St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Premier among the journalistic crusaders of this country was the elder Joseph Pulitzer. He was convinced that a newspaper should "never be satisfied with merely printing news." He stood for political independence, fearless attacks upon demagoguery, injustice, corruption, and "predatory plutocracy." If told fully, his achievements in that field alone might well fill a volume; I shall attempt no more here than to indicate their scope and the methods he employed, disregarding chronological sequence.

Two of the earlier campaigns of the New York World, which serve to illustrate its methods, its courage, and its power, were completed within less than a month, one upon the heels of the...