Unjust Criticism of Officials. 
229 
may convey an entirely mistaken notion to the reader, even 
when it is not colored by prejudice or interest. So it is seen 
that the chances of the voter who relies upon the newspapers for 
information to get data upon which to base an intelligent opin¬ 
ion, are very small indeed. These smal] chances are still further 
reduced by the voter’s own negligence and indifference. For it 
is safe to say that the accounts of the conduct of municipal 
business are read systematically and regularly by very few 
people. 
From these considerations it seems to appear conclusively 
that very few citizens in a large municipality are able to form 
a just opinion, based on well-considered facts and not on casual 
impressions, about the manner in which some particular official 
conducts his business. If an opinion is nevertheless formed, it 
will be found in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred that such opin¬ 
ion is unreasonable, no matter whether it happens to be right or 
wrong. It may be that our voter happens to disapprove of 
some particular measure adopted by the official. Immediately 
he becomes opposed to him; for that one measure was the only 
thing in the official’s career about which this particular voter 
happened to know anything. Everything else the official has 
ever done this good citizen disregards simply because he is 
ignorant of it. Or it may be that a newspaper criticizes an 
official for some act it disapproves. The voter, who possibly 
has never before read or heard a word about this particular 
office, generalizes the newspaper’s criticism, and while the 
writer merely meant to condemn this particular act, the reader 
disapproves of the official’s entire conduct of office and votes 
against him at the next election. It may be that if this rash 
voter had the necessary information he would find that the 
officer’s administration is of extraordinary excellence. 
When the candidate about whom the voter is asked to form 
an opinion has not been in office before, it is even more difficult 
to obtain the necessary data. In the first place the number of 
people^who have a personal acquaintance with the candidate is 
likely to be still smaller than that of persons who know a for¬ 
mer public official. For the latter has many opportunities of 
making^acquaintances which the man in private station lacks. 
