High Hearstling

Somewhat battered by financial adversity, the far-flung empire of William Randolph Hearst remains the greatest conglomeration of publishing enterprises in the U. S. Hearst's 21 daily and 16 Sunday newspapers may not be able to start a war or elect a President, as they used to, but their circulation of 4,453,579 daily and 6,856,793 Sunday still stands supreme.* The highest law in this empire has always been what followed the electrifying phrase: "The Chief says--." Today, the potency of this phrase is a subject of much discussion in the newspaper world. "The Chief" is 75 years old. When a potentate ages, his princelings become more important.

Last week it seemed that the principal Hearst princeling would be Joseph Vincent Connolly, who fortnight ago displaced Harry Murray Bitner as general manager of the Hearst Newspapers. Grey-haired, 43-year-old Joe Connolly became a Hearstling 18 years ago to organize promotion for King Features Syndicate. Within eight years he was general manager; in 1934, he became its president. By liberal use of Hearst money, he made King Features the best-known collection of cartoonists, funnymen, columnists, political experts and love advisers in the U. S. Today, it is one of the most profitable, most admired of Hearst enterprises.

President also of International News Service, International News Photos, Central Press Association and chairman of the board of Hearst Radio, Inc., smiling Joe Connolly is now regarded as his master's favorite. Mr. Connolly shares the editorial motto of all Hearstlings, high and low: "The Chief says--." Last month Hearst editors and writers found themselves with a new editorial attitude when the entire Hearst chain editorially chided the Saturday Evening Post for cartooning President Roosevelt's spending program as an attempt to buy a third term : "It is true that Mr. Roosevelt wants and needs prosperity, and is trying earnestly to bring it about. . . . Why put obstacles in his way when he is going in the direction we all desire? "Who, after all, is qualified to criticize him?" In 1936, when Candidate Roosevelt presumably desired prosperity as earnestly as he does today, Hearstpapers were as loud in their opposition to Roosevelt as they were in support of him in 1932.* Behind this softening attitude toward the New Deal's spending policy is a Hearstian conviction that Recovery will be the big story of the coming months. Having muffed the big story of 1936 and suffered immeasurable lowering of prestige, Hearst now seems determined to get back on the side of the People.

*Second highest is the Scripps-Howard chain, 22 daily and eight Sunday newspapers, with a circulation of 1,992,129 daily and 701,841 Sunday. *Shortly after the 1929 crash, Hearst began advocating a $5,000,000,000 spending program to bring back prosperity.

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