That is, in short, we catch the reader's interest with a striking statement from the speech and then delay the rest of the report while we tell who said it, when, where, etc. The necessity of this is obvious.

In accordance with the foregoing there are several possible ways in which to begin the lead of the report of any speech. It would be wrong to say that any one is more common or better than the others; the choice of the beginning must rest with the reporter. And yet there are various things to be noted in connection with each of these beginnings.

=1. Direct Quotation Beginning.--Sentence.=--The quotation that is to have the first line must of course be the most striking or the most interesting statement in the speech. If it consists of a single sentence--and it cannot be less than a sentence--the report may begin thus:

"Partic.i.p.ation in government is not

only the privilege, but the right, of

every American citizen and should be

considered a duty," said the Rev.

Frederick W. Hamilton, president of Tufts

College, who spoke on "The Political

Duties of the American Citizen" at the

monthly men's neighborhood meeting in the

Roxbury Neighborhood House last

night.--_Boston Herald._

Here the reporter has given us a sentence that is practically a summary of the speech, has told us who said it, when and where, and has completed the paragraph with the t.i.tle of the speech. Sometimes the t.i.tle of the speech is not of great importance and its place in the lead may be given to a little summary as in the following:

"The modern man isn't afraid of h.e.l.l,"

was the concise explanation which W.

Lathrop Meaker gave in Franklin Union

Hall yesterday afternoon and evening of

the fact that the churches are losing

their grip on the average man.--_New York

Sun._

A question which embodies the content of a speech may often be quoted at the beginning; thus:

"Will the Baptist church continue to

maintain an att.i.tude of timidity when

John D. Rockefeller of Standard Oil is

mentioned?" asked the Rev. R. A. Bateman,

from East Jaffrey, N. H., of the

ministers a.s.sembled in Ford Hall last

evening at the New England Baptist

conference.--_Boston Herald._

The opening quotation may sometimes be made an excuse for a brief description of the speaker or his gestures as in the following. This is good at times but it may easily be overworked or become "yellow" in tone.

"There is no fire escape," remarked

Gypsy Smith, the famous English

evangelist, yesterday before the

fashionable audience of the Fifth Avenue

Baptist Church. He held aloft a Bible as

he made this declaration during an

eloquent sermon on the possibility of

losing faith and wandering from the

narrow way.--_New York World._

=2. Direct Quotation Beginning.--Paragraph.=--You notice that in each of the foregoing the quoted sentence is incorporated grammatically into the first sentence of the lead. It is followed by a comma and the words "said Mr. ----," "was the statement of ----," "declared Mr. ----," etc.

This construction is possible only when the quoted sentence is short and simple. When it is long or complex, it is well to paragraph it separately and to put the explanations in a separate paragraph, thus:

"If the United States had possessed in

1898 a single dirigible balloon, even of

the size of the one now at Fort Myer,

Virginia, which cost less than $10,000,

the American army and navy would not have

long remained in doubt of the presence of

Cervera's fleet in Santiago harbor."

This statement was made today by Major

G. O. Squier, a.s.sistant chief signal

officer of the army, in an address on

aeronautics delivered before the American

Society of Mechanical Engineers at 29

West Thirty-ninth street.--_New York

Mail._

This same construction must _always_ be used when the statement quoted in the lead consists of more than one sentence, as in the following:

"The climate of Wisconsin is as good

for recovery from tuberculosis as that of

any state in the union. It is not the

climate, but the out-of-doors air that

works the cure."

So said Harvey Dee Brown in his

tuberculosis crusade lecture in Kilbourn

park last night.--_Milwaukee Free Press._

It is to be noted that the statement quoted in the lead is never split into two parts, separated by explanation. The quotation is always gathered together at the beginning and followed by the explanation.

=3. Indirect Quotation Beginning.=--This method is best adapted to the playing up of a brief resume of the content of the speech. It is sometimes called the "_that_-clause beginning" because it always begins with a _that_-clause which is the subject of the princ.i.p.al verb of the sentence--"was the statement of," "was the declaration of," etc. The _that_-clause may contain a resume of the entire speech or only the most striking statement in it. Here is one of the latter:

That the cruise of the battleship fleet

around the world has taught the citizens

of the United States that a powerful

fleet is needed in the Pacific was the

statement of Rear Admiral R. C. Hollyday,

chief of the bureau of yards and docks of

the navy, at a luncheon given to him by

the board of trustees of the Chamber of

Commerce at the Fairmont Hotel

yesterday.--_San Francisco Examiner._

It is not always necessary to use the phrase "was the statement of." A variation from it is often very good:

That it is the urgent mission of the

white people of America, through their

churches and Sunday-schools, to educate

the American negro morally and

religiously, was the sentiment of the

twelfth session of the International

Sunday-school Convention last night,

voiced with special power and eloquence

by Dr. Booker T. Washington, the chief

speaker of the evening.--_Louisville

Courier-Journal._

That the Irish race has a great destiny

to fulfill, one greater than it has

achieved in its glorious past, was the

prophecy of Prof. Charles Johnston of

Dublin university in his lecture at the

city library Sunday

afternoon.--_Wisconsin State Journal._

It is perfectly good usage to begin such a lead with two _that_-clauses or even with three. The two clauses in this case are of course treated as a singular subject and take a singular verb. It is usually best not to have more than three clauses at the beginning and even three must be handled with great care. Three clauses at the beginning, if at all long, bury the speaker's name too deeply and may become too complicated.

Unless the clauses are very closely related in idea, it is usually better not to use more than two. Naturally when more than one _that_-clause is used in the lead, all of the clauses must be gathered together at the beginning; never should one precede and one follow the princ.i.p.al verb. Here is an example of good usage:

NEW YORK, Feb. 25.--That America is

entering upon a new era of civic and

business rect.i.tude and that this is due

to the awakening of the moral conscience

of the whole people was the prophecy made

here tonight by Governor Joseph W. Folk

of Missouri.--_Chicago Record-Herald._

=4. Summary Beginning.=--This is a less formal way of treating the indirect quotation beginning. It is simply a different grammatical construction. Whereas in the _that_-clause beginning the princ.i.p.al verb of the sentence is outside the summary (e. g., "That ... was the statement of"), in the summary beginning the princ.i.p.al verb of the sentence is the verb of the summary and the speaker is brought in by means of a modifying phrase; thus:

MINNEAPOLIS, Oct. 1.--Both the free

trader and the stand-patter are back

numbers, according to Senator Albert J.

Beveridge of Indiana, who delivered a

tariff speech here tonight.--_Milwaukee

Free Press._

Federal control of the capitalization

of railroads is the solution of the

railroad problem suggested by E. L.

Phillipp, the well-known Milwaukee

railroad expert, in the course of a

speech at the third annual banquet of,

etc.--_Milwaukee Free Press._

The summary beginning may be handled in many different ways and allows perhaps more grammatical liberty than any other beginning. The summary may even be given a sentence by itself as in the following. This kind of treatment may easily be overdone and should be handled with great caution:

If you have acute mania, it is the

proper thing to take the music cure. Miss

Jessie A. Fowler says so, and she knows.

Miss Fowler discussed "Music

Hygienically" before the "Rainy Daisies"

at the Hotel Astor yesterday and

prescribed musical treatment for various

brands of mania.--_New York World._

=5. Keynote Beginning.=--Very closely related to the summary beginning is the keynote beginning, in which the subject of the main verb is an indirect presentation of the content of the speech. Whereas the summary beginning displays its resume in a complete sentence, the keynote beginning puts the content of the speech in a single noun and its modifiers. Thus:

The ideal state university was the

theme of a speech delivered by, etc.

The mission of the newspaper to tell

the truth, to stand for high ideals, and

to strive to have those ideals adopted by

the public was the keynote of an address

delivered by, etc.

=6. Participial Beginning.=--This is less common than the other kinds of indirect quotation beginnings but it is often very effective. The summary of the speech or the most striking statement is put into a participial phrase at the beginning and is made to modify the subject of the sentence (the speaker). It must of course be remembered that such a participial phrase can be used only to modify a noun, as an adjective modifies a noun, and can never be made the subject of a verb. Here is an example of good use of this beginning:

Upholding the right of public criticism

of the courts on the theory that there

can be no impropriety in investigating

any act of a public official, Judge

Kennesaw M. Landis last night addressed

the students of Marquette College of Law

and many members of the Milwaukee

bar.--_Milwaukee Free Press._

Just as it is perfectly possible to begin an indirect quotation lead with two _that_-clauses instead of one, it is also possible to use two participial phrases in the participial beginning; as:

Pleading for justice and human

affection in dealing with the delinquent

child, and urging the vital need of

legislation which shall enforce parental

responsibility, Mrs. Nellie Duncan made

an address yesterday which stirred the

sympathies of an attentive audience in

the First Presbyterian Church.--_San

Francisco Examiner._

Although the participial phrase usually gives the summary of the speech, not infrequently the participial construction is used to play up the name of the speech or some other fact and the summary comes after the princ.i.p.al verb of the lead; thus:

Paying tribute to the memory of

President William McKinley last night at

the Metropolitan Temple, where exercises

were held to dedicate the McKinley

memorial organ, Judge Taft told in detail

of his commission to the Philippine

service and his subsequent intimate

connection with the President.--_New York

Tribune._

=7. t.i.tle Beginning.=--There are two reasons for beginning the report of a public utterance with the speaker's subject or t.i.tle. The t.i.tle itself may be so broad that it makes a good summary of the speech, or it may be so striking in itself that it attracts interest at once. In the following examples the t.i.tle is really a summary of the speech:

NEW YORK, Dec. 15.--"The Compensation

of Employes for Injuries Received While

at Work" was taken by J. D. Beck,

commissioner of labor of Wisconsin, as

the theme of his address before the

National Civic Federation here

today.--_Milwaukee Free Press._

"The Emmanuel Movement" was the subject

of an address by Rabbi Stephen S. Wise of

the Free Synagogue yesterday

morning.--_New York Evening Post._

In the following stories the reporter began with the t.i.tle evidently because it was so strikingly unusual and also because it was the t.i.tle of a strikingly unusual speech by an unusual man. This kind of t.i.tle beginning is always very effective:

"Booze, or Get on the Water Wagon," was

the subject on which Rev. Billy Sunday,

the baseball evangelist, addressed an

audience of over 4,000 persons at the

Midland Chautauqua yesterday afternoon.

For two hours Sunday fired volley after

volley at the liquor traffic.--_Des

Moines Capital._

"If Christ Came to Milwaukee" was the

subject of the Rev. Paul B. Jenkin's

Sunday night in Immanuel Presbyterian

Church.--_Milwaukee Sentinel._

=8. Speaker Beginning.=--It is obvious that this is the easiest beginning that may be used in the report of a speech. But just as obviously it is the beginning that should be least used. Just as in writing news stories a green reporter always attempts to begin every lead with the name of some person involved, in reporting a public discourse he has a strong desire to put the name of the speaker before what the speaker said. But the same tests may be applied to both cases.

Are our readers more interested in what a man does than in the man himself; do our readers go to hear a given speaker because they wish to hear what he has to say or because they wish to hear _him_? Whenever the public is so interested in a man that it does not care what he says, then you may feel safe in beginning the report of what he says with his name. This test may be altered, especially in smaller cities, by previous interest in the speech; if the speech has been expected and looked forward to with interest, then, no matter if the speaker is the President himself, his name is not as good news as what he has to say.

Even if the lead does begin with the speaker's name, the reporter usually tries to bring a summary of the speech or the most striking statement into the first sentence after the name. For example:

Speaker Joseph G. Cannon placed himself

on record last night in favor of a

revision of the tariff in accordance with

the promise of the Republican party

platform and declared that so far as his

vote was concerned he would see to it

that the announced policy of revision

would be written in the national laws as

soon as possible. The words of the

speaker came at a luncheon given to six

rear admirals of the United States navy

by Alexander H. Revell of Chicago in the

Union League Club, at which the need of

more battleships and increased efficiency

of the fighting forces of the republic

were the princ.i.p.al themes of discussion.