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     The assault on the President has been used as a pretext for a violent attack on the so-called “yellow” journals and there is a disposition in some quarters to hold them responsible for the senseless deed of the President’s assailant. We must confess that we cannot see any connection between the “yellow” sheet and the black deed of the murderer. It has not developed that the miscreant who shot President McKinley was a reader of these journals nor is there any evidence that his mind was perverted by reading of any kind. His assault cannot be justified on any rational ground and it may be accounted for only by the natural perversity that mars every one of the enemies of social order of which this fellow is a type. At the same time there is no denying the fact that some of the newspapers have gone entirely too far in their abuse of public characters. A very conspicious [sic] offender in this respect is the New York Journal which has mercilessly lampooned the President and his administration. Its treatment of him and his advisers has been utterly reprehensible. The New York Sun has gone almost to the opposite extreme with those who differ with its peculiar policy as was evident in its treatment of Grant, Hayes, Cleveland and Bryan. In view of these facts it is amusing enough to make a horse laugh to hear each of these newspapers calling the other “yellow.” Both have been needlessly brutal and vulgar.
     But it is hardly fair to these newspapers to hold them entirely responsible for the coarseness that so frequently disfigures their columns. Back of them are the people who crave the sort of literature that the “yellow” journals supply. This type of modern newspaper is published chiefly to make money by satisfying a popular demand. It panders to a vitiated public taste. Let the people insist on having something better, or let them show their disapproval of gutter journalism by refusing to buy any of it and we venture to say that there will soon be an end to the “yellow terror.”
     The blame for “yellow” journalism should be placed where it properly belongs—with the people who encourage it.