It will be found, I think, that there is a very direct relation
between the certainty of news and the system of record. If you call to
mind the topics which form the principal indictment by reformers
against the press, you find they are subjects in which the newspaper
occupies the position of the umpire in the unscored baseball game. All
news about states of mind is of this character: so are all
descriptions of personalities, of sincerity, aspiration, motive,
intention, of mass feeling, of national feeling, of public opinion,
the policies of foreign governments. So is much news about what is
going to happen. So are questions turning on private profit, private
income, wages, working conditions, the efficiency of labor,
educational opportunity, unemployment, [Footnote: Think of what guess
work went into the Reports of Unemployment in 1921.] monotony, health,
discrimination, unfairness, restraint of trade, waste, "backward
peoples," conservatism, imperialism, radicalism, liberty, honor,
righteousness. All involve data that are at best spasmodically
recorded. The data may be hidden because of a censorship or a
tradition of privacy, they may not exist because nobody thinks record
important, because he thinks it red tape, or because nobody has yet
invented an objective system of measurement. Then the news on these
subjects is bound to be debatable, when it is not wholly neglected.
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