It would be an exaggeration to say that I hope some day to see an anonymous article counted as dishonourable as an anonymous letter.  For some time to come, the idea of the leading article, expressing the policy of the whole paper, must necessarily remain legitimate; at any rate, we have all written such leading articles, and should never think the worse of any one for writing one.  But I should certainly say that writing anonymously ought to have some definite excuse, such as that of the leading article.  Writing anonymously ought to be the exception; writing a signed article ought to be the rule.  And anonymity ought to be not only an exception, but an accidental exception; a man ought always to be ready to say what anonymous article he had written.  The journalistic habit of counting it something sacred to keep secret the origin of an article is simply part of the conspiracy which seeks to put us who are journalists in the position of a much worse sort of Jesuits or Freemasons.

As has often been said, anonymity would be all very well if one could for a moment imagine that it was established from good motives.  Suppose, for instance, that we were all quite certain that the men on the Thunderer newspaper were a band of brave young idealists who were so eager to overthrow Socialism, Municipal and National, that they did not care to which of them especially was given the glory of striking it down.  Unfortunately, however, we do not believe this.  What we believe, or, rather, what we know, is that the attack on Socialism in the Thunderer arises from a chaos of inconsistent and mostly evil motives, any one of which would lose simply by being named.  A jerry-builder whose houses have been condemned writes anonymously and becomes the Thunderer.  A Socialist who has quarrelled with the other Socialists writes anonymously, and he becomes the Thunderer.  A monopolist who has lost his monopoly, and a demagogue who has lost his mob, can both write anonymously and become the same newspaper.  It is quite true that there is a young and beautiful fanaticism in which men do not care to reveal their names.  But there is a more elderly and a much more common excitement in which men do not dare to reveal them.

Then there is another rule for making journalism honest on which I should like to insist absolutely.  I should like it to be a fixed thing that the name of the proprietor as well as the editor should be printed upon every paper.  If the paper is owned by shareholders, let there be a list of shareholders.  If (as is far more common in this singularly undemocratic age) it is owned by one man, let that one man’s name be printed on the paper, if possible in large red letters.  Then, if there are any obvious interests being served, we shall know that they are being served.  My friends in Manchester are in a terrible state of excitement about the power of brewers and the dangers of admitting them to public office.  But at least,