PART I
INTRODUCTION
CHAPTER I
THE WORLD OUTSIDE AND THE PICTURES
IN OUR HEADS
PUBLIC OPINION
CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION
THE WORLD OUTSIDE AND THE PICTURES
IN OUR HEADS
1
THERE is an island in the ocean where in 1914 a
few Englishmen, Frenchmen, and Germans lived.
No cable reaches that island, and the British mail
steamer comes but once in sixty days. In September
it had not yet come, and the islanders were still
talking about the latest newspaper which told about
the approaching trial of Madame Caillaux for the
shooting of Gaston Calmette. It was, therefore, with
more than usual eagerness that the whole colony
assembled at the quay on a day in mid-September to
hear from the captain what the verdict had been.
They learned that for over six weeks now those of
them who were English and those of them who were
French had been fighting in behalf of the sanctity
of treaties against those of them who were Germans.
For six strange weeks they had acted as if they were
friends, when in fact they were enemies.
But their plight was not so different from that of
most of the population of Europe. They had been
mistaken for six weeks, on the continen t the interval
may have been only six days or six hours. There was
3
PUBLIC OPINION
CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION
THE WORLD OUTSIDE AND THE PICTURES
IN OUR HEADS
1
THERE is an island in the ocean where in 1914 a
few Englishmen, Frenchmen, and Germans lived.
No cable reaches that island, and the British mail
steamer comes but once in sixty days. In September
it had not yet come, and the islanders were still
talking about the latest newspaper which told about
the approaching trial of Madame Caillaux for the
shooting of Gaston Calmette. It was, therefore, with
more than usual eagerness that the whole colony
assembled at the quay on a day in mid-September to
hear from the captain what the verdict had been.
They learned that for over six weeks now those of
them who were English and those of them who were
French had been fighting in behalf of the sanctity
of treaties against those of them who were Germans.
For six strange weeks they had acted as if they were
friends, when in fact they were enemies.
But their plight was not so different from that of
most of the population of Europe. They had been
mistaken for six weeks, on the continent the interval
may have been only six days or six hours. There was
3
PUBLIC OPINION THE PICTURES IN OUR HEADS 5
an interval. There was a moment when the picture
of Europe on which men were conducting their
business as usual, did not in any way correspond to
the Europe which was about to make a jumble of
their lives. There was a time for each man when he
was still adjusted to an environment that no longer
existed. All over the world as late as July 25th men
were making goods that they would not be able to
ship, buying goods they would not be able to import,
careers were being planned, enterprises contemplated,
hopes and expectations entertained, all in the belief
that the world as known was the world as it was.
M~11.~~!~_wrl!ing..~Q9Qk~..d~§t;rihi.Dgth~t.lY.Qr19. They
trusted ..~,~!::"J~L~!!!.!:~..jD."!.h.~i.~,,..~.~.~~:l~. And then over
four years later, on a Thursday morning, came the
news of an armistice, and people gave vent to their
unutterable relief that the slaughter was over. Yet
in the five days before the real armistice carne.though
the end of the war had been celebrated, several thousand
young men died on the battlefields.
Looking back we can see ~.?~_i!l:q~~"~S~!Y__~_~_,_ kl.1?w
!h~.J:~.l}vjt:211rnen t _in ~~ic~ _P:~Y:~It.hele.ss:\Y~",HY.e~ ...We
can see that the news'~f it comes to us now fast, now
slowly; but that wh'!t~Y~r~~Jteliey_~tobe,a true
e.~~.!~E~~.~~.~~._!~~,~~~__.__as.. if._Lt.~~!'~=!h.~..~g_yi!:Qnm-'~~i~rf.
It is harder to remember that about the beliefs upon
which we are now acting, but in respect to other
peoples and other ages we flatter ourselves that it is
easy to see when they were in deadly earnest about
1:t!9:icrous pictures of the world. We insist, because of
our superior hindsight, that the world as they needed
to know it, and the world as they did know it, were
often two quite contradictory things. We can see,
too, that while they governed and fought, traded and
reformed in the world as they imagined it to be,
they produced results, or failed to produce any, in the
world as it was. They started for the Indies and
found America. They diagnosed evil and hanged
old women. They thought they could grow rich by
always selling and never buying. A caliph, obeying
what he conceived to be the Will of Allah, burned the
library at Alexandria.
Writing about the year 389, St. Ambrose stated
the case for the prisoner in Plato's cave who resolutely
declines to turn his head. " To discuss the nature
and position of the earth does not help us in our hope
of the life to come. It is enough to know what
Scripture states. 'That He hung up the earth upon
nothing' (Job xxvi. 7). Why then argue whether He
hung it up in air or upon the water, and raise a
controversy as to how the thin air could sustain the
earth; or why, ifupon the waters, the earth does not
go crashing down to the bottom? . . . Not because
the earth is in the middle, as if suspended on even
balance, but because the majesty of God constrains
it by the law of His will, does it endure stable upon
the unstable and the void." 1
It does not help us' in our hope of the life to
come. It is enough to know what Scripture states.
Why then argue? But a century and a half after
St. Ambrose, opinion was still troubled, on this
occasion by the problem of the antipodes. A monk
1 Hexaemeron, i. cap 6, quoted in The Mediaval Mind, by Henry
Osborn Taylor, Vol. I, p, 73.
6 PUBLIC OPINION THE PICTURES IN OUR HEADS 7
named Cosmas, famous for his scientific attainments,
was therefore deputed to write a Christian Topography,
or (( Christian Opinion concerning the
World." 1 It is clear that he knew exactly what was
expected of him, for he based all his conclusions on
the Scriptures as he read them. It appears, then,
that the world is a flat parallelogram, twice as broad
from east to west as it is long from north to south.
In the center is the earth surrounded by ocean,
which is in turn surrounded by another earth, where
men lived before the deluge. This other earth was
Noah's port of embarkation. In the north is a high
conical mountain around which revolve the sun and
moon. When the sun is behind the mountain it is
night. The sky is glued to the edges of the outer
earth. It consists of four high walls which meet in a
concave roof, so that the earth is the floor of the
universe. There is an ocean on the other side of the
sky, constituting the "waters that are above the
firmament. " The space between the celestial ocean
and the ultimate roof of the universe belongs to the
blest. The space between the earth and sky is
inhabited by the angels. Finally, since St. Paul said
that all men are made to live upon the" face of the
earth" how could they live on the back where the
Antipodes are supposed to be? "With such a passage
before his eyes, a Christian, we are told, should not
'even speak of the Antipodes." 2
Far less should he go to the Antipodes; nor should
any Christian prince give him a ship to try; nor
1 Lecky, Rationalismi» Europe, Vol. I, pp. 2:76-8.
2Id.
would any pious mariner wish to try. For Cosmas
there was nothing in the least absurd about his map.
Only by remembering his absolute conviction that
this was the map of the universe can we begin to
understand how he would have dreaded Magellan
or Peary or the aviator who risked a collision with the
angels and the vault of heaven by flying seven miles
up in the air. In.the same way we can best understand
the furies of war and politics by remembering
that almost the whole of each party believes absolutely
in its picture of the opposition, that it takes as
fact, not what is, but what it supposes to be the fact.
And that therefore, like Hamlety.it will stab Pelonius
behind the rustling curtain, thinking him the king,
and perhaps like Hamlet add:
"Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewell!
I took thee for thy better; take thy fortune."
2
Great men, even during their lifetime, are usually
known to the public only through a fictitious personality.
Hence the modicum of truth in the old saying
that no man is a hero to his valet. There IS only
a modicum of truth, for the valet, and the private
secretary, are often immersed in the fiction themselves.
RQY3Lp~l:~.2E~!g~~.,,~;~L~,L,~2gr§,~,,"~Ql1S.ttllCJ:d.,,"
12ersonalities. Whether they themselves believe In
~h~i~'>~"';'"~;1~11c'""'character:"'o'r""'wfietll'e:r_C'th.~i·•.merely..per,.. ,if
-:k~~*~¥~~~~~~:~U$~~;(l?i~~~:!~,:~ii~f"h,R!lj~~.,"".".Ihe biogr'aphies of great people
.fan'more or~less' readily i~to the histories of these two
8 PUBLIC OPINION THE PICTURES IN OUR HEADS 9
selves. The official biographer reproduces the public
life, the revealing memoir the other. The Charnwood
Lincoln, for example, is a noble portrait, not of an actual
human being, but of an epic figure, replete with
significance, who moves on much the same level of
reality as Aeneas or St. George. Oliver's Hamilton
is a rnajestic abstraction, the sculpture of an idea,
(C an essay" as Mr. Oliver himself calls it, "on American
union." I t is a formal monument to the statecraft
of federalism, hardly the biography of a person.
So.metimes people create their own facade when they
think they are revealing the interior scene. The
Repington diaries and Margot Asquith's are a species
of self-portraiture in which the intimate detail is
most revealing as an index of how the authors like
to think about themselves.
But the~~!!lC?,~,ti~;!~r~;§~tillg,;~i!!.g,gLR2£;!I~,itll~eis.. t~at
~~.~.~.~_,~r!~.~~,,§l?gD..t,!!?:~g!t§1,y ...Irl.;B~.9I?!,~~,§~~!Ej,~~~~':""'WEen
VIctoria came to the throne, says Mr. Strachey,t
"among the outside public there was a great wave
of enthusiasm. Sentiment and romance were coming
into fashion; and the spectacle of the Iittle
girl-queen, innocent, modest, with fair hair and pink
cheeks, driving through her capital, filled the hearts
of the beholders with raptures of affectionate loyalty.
What, above all, struck everybody with overwhelming
force was the contrast between Queen Victoria
and her uncles. The nasty old men, debauched and
selfish, pigheaded and ridiculous, with their perpe~~a.l
burden of debt.s, confusions, and disreputabIlItIes-they
had vanished like the snows of winter
1 Lytton Strachey, Queen Fictoria, p, 72.
and here at last, crowned and radiant, was the
. "sprIng.
M. Jean de Pierrefeu 1 saw hero-worship at first
hand, for he was an officer on Joffre's staff at the
moment of that soldier's greatest fame:
" For two years, the entire world paid an almost divine
homage to the victor of the Marne. The baggage-master
literally bent under the weight of the boxes, of the packages
and letters which unknown people sent him with a
frantic testimonial of their admiration. I think that
outside of General Joffre, no commander in the war has
been able to realize a comparable idea of what glory is.
They sent him boxes of candy from all the great confectioners
of the world, boxes of champagne, fine wines of
every vintage, fruits, game, ornaments and utensils,
clothes, smoking materials, inkstands, paperweights.
Every territory sent its speciality. The painter sent his
picture, the sculptor his statuette, the dear old lady a
comforter or socks, the shepherd in his hut carved a pipe
for his sake. All the manufacturers of the world who were
hostile to Germany shipped their products, Havana its
cigars, Portugal its port wine. I have known a hairdresser
who had nothing better to do than to make a portrait of
the General out of hair belonging to persons who were
dear to him; a professional penman had the same idea,
but the features were composed of thousands of little
phrases in tiny characters which sang the praise of the
General. As to letters, he had them in all scripts, from
all countries, written in every dialect, affectionate letters,
grateful, overflowing with love, filled with adoration.
They called him Savior of the World, Father of his Country,
Agent of God, Benefactor of Humanity, etc....
1 Jean de Pierrefeu, G. Q. G. Trois ans au Grand Quartier General,
PP·94"-95·
~o PUBLIC OPINION THE PICfURES IN OUR HEADS II
And not only Frenchmen, but Americans, Argentinians,
Australians, etc. etc. . .. Thousands of little children,
without their parents' knowledge, took pen in hand and
wrote to tell him their love: most of them called him Our
Father. And there was poignancy about their effusions,
their adoration, these sighs of deliverance that escaped
from thousands of hearts at the defeat of barbarism. To all
these naif little souls, Joffre seemed like St. George crush..
ing the dragon. Certainly he incarnated for the conscience
of mankind the victory of good over evil, of light over dark-
ness.
Lunatics, simpletons, the half-crazy and the crazy
turned their darkened brains toward him as toward
reason itself. I have read the letter of a person living in
Sydney, who begged the General to save him from his
enemies; another, a New Zealander, requested him to send
some soldiers to the house of a gentleman who owed him
ten pounds and would not pay.
Finally, some hundreds of young girls, overcoming the
timidity of their sex, asked for engagements, their families
not to know about it; others wished only to serve him."
This ideal Joffre was compounded out of the victory
won by him, his staff and his troops, the despair
of the war, the personal sorrows, and the hope of
future victory. But beside hero-worship there is
the exorcism of devils. ~,y .'the. same mechanism
throu h which heroes are incarnate(f'-aeviTs'''are'made.--~g~~-~-","~~""~~-",---,~"=,,,,,,,,,,,,,,-,,,,,,,,,,--,=,,,---;;:';),,,,,,,,,,,,,-,,,,,,,~,,,,~,~'""''''=-"'-essa'"'''''
If everything good was to co~e from Joffre, Foch,
Wilson, or Roosevelt, everything evil originated in
the Kaiser Wilhelm, Lenin and Trotsky. They were
as Qmg.iE~!,£!1tJQX~.~yiL~.~,.!h~J!~tQ.~§"lY,~~t~J2m!lip.Q"t.e!lt
!2E--g2£Q: To many simple and frightened minds
there was no political reverse, no strike, no obstruction,
no mysterious death or mysterious conflagration
anywhere in the world of which the causes did not
wind back to these personal sources of evil.
3
Worldwide concentration of this kind on a symbolic
personality is rare enough to be clearly remarkable,
and every author has a weakness for the
striking and irrefutable example. The vivisection of
war reveals such examples, but it does not make them
outofnothing. In a more normal public life, symbolic
pictures are no less governant of behavior, but each
symbol is far less inclusive because there are so many
competing ones. Not only is each symbol charged i
with less feeling because at most it represents only a f:
part of the population, but even within that part J
there is infinitely less suppression of individual dif-]
ference, The symbols of public opinion, in times on
moderate security, are subject to check and com-~.
parison and argument. They come and go, coalesce ~
and are forgotten, never organizing perfectIy the I
emotion of the whole group. There is, after all, ;
just one human activity left in which whole popula- '1
tions accomplish the union sacree. It occurs in those (
middle phases of a war when fear, pugnacity, and
hatred have secured complete dominion of the spirit,
either to crush every other instinct or to enlist it,
and before weariness is felt.
At almost all other times, and even in war when it
is deadlocked, a sufficiently greater range of feelings is
aroused to establish conflict, choice, hesitation, and
compromise. !E_~,....~Imbolism of public opinion
12 PUBLIC OPINION THE PICTURES IN OUR HEADS 13
usually bears, as we shall see," the .~~!~~b,,2L,,!~!~
'l)al'an'cing~~2rji!!~r:~§I~~~="'Tliiii,K~:Iill:~_~:i'imple,of 'how
.rai~[<!I~~i~_~L...the ...~~~!.~,!.~£~,_!h~_l?!_~f.~!i~.!:!'~N.~_nd by.~_
means successf~HY.......~.§1eJ21i§h~~_,_ ..~_Y!2:_~,?L_.~0" All~d
'um!:Y~~~ill~R~gi~d" how it was followed ~lm~st immediately
by the breakdown of each natron s symbolic
picture of the other: Britain the Defender of
Public Law, France watching at the Frontier of
Freedom, America the Crusader. And think then
of how within each nation the symbolic picture of
itself frayed out, as party and class conflict and
personal ambition began to stir postponed issues.
And then of how the symbolic pictures of the leaders
gave way, as one by one, Wilson, Clemenceau, Lloyd
George, ceased to be the incarnation of human hope,
and became mere!y the negotiators and administrators
for a disillusioned world.
Whether we regret this as one of the soft evils of
peace or applaud it as a return to sanity is obviously
no matter here. Our first concern with fictions and
symbols is to forget their value to the existing social
order, and to think of them simply as an important
part of the machinery of human communication.
Now in any society that is not completely selfcontained
in its interests and so small that everyone
can know all about everything that happens,
ideas deal with events that are out of sight and hard
to grasp. Miss Sherwin of Gopher Prairie." is aware
that a war is raging in France and tries to conceive
it. She has never been to France, and certainly she
has never been along what is now the battlefront.
1 Part v. 2 See Sinclair Lewis, Main Street.
Pictures of French and German soldiers she has seen,
but it is impossible for her to imagine three million
men. No one, in fact, can imagine them, and the
professionals do not try. They think of them as, say,
two hundred divisions. But Miss Sherwin has no
access to the order of battle maps, and so if she is
to think about the war, she fastens upon Joffre and
the Kaiser ,as if they were_._~ng~.Ked ill a ~"§Qne1
duel. Perhaps"lfyo"il""could see what she sees with her
"'minCfs eye, the image in its composition might be
not unlike an Eighteenth Century engraving of a
great soldier. He stands there boldly unruffled and
more than life size, with a shadowy army of tiny
little figures winding off into the landscape behind.
Nor it seems are great men oblivious to these expectations.
M. de Pierrefeu tells of a photographer's
visit to Joffre. The General was in his "middle class
office, before the worktable without papers, where he
sat down to write his signature. Suddenly it was
noticed that there were no maps on the walls. But
since according to popular ideas it is not possible to
think of a general without maps, a few were placed
in position for the picture, and removed soon afterwards."
1
The only feeling that anyone can have about an
ey~-neaoes-'·~C?r~xl?"~fi·t~iic~l·s·-tfieTeeEng··arous'ecr5'y""
'h'is m~;tar"l~~g~ ~f '1:hat·"··evenI:~M··Tl;:"at~·ls·-w]iy-uIittt-- ..·
"·;"-;:~~"k~~o'\7"·wfiaf·otners'~"'tnin'lr't·ney know, we cannot
truly understand their acts. I have seen a young
girl, brought up in a Pennsylvania mining town,
plunged suddenly from entire cheerfulness into a
1 Op. cit., p. 99.
PUBLIC OPINION
paroxysm of grief when a gust of wind cracked
the kitchen window-pane. For hours she was inconsolable,
and to me incomprehensible. But when
she was able to talk, it transpired that if a windowpane
broke it meant that a close relative had died.
She was, therefore, mourning for her father, who
had frightened her into running away from home.
The father was, of course, quite thoroughly alive as a
telegraphic inquiry soon proved. But until the
telegram came, the cracked glass was an authentic
message to that girl. Why it was authentic only a
prolonged investigation by a skilled psychiatrist could
show. But even the most casual observer could see
that the girl, enormously upset by her family troubles,
had hallucinated a complete fiction out of one external
fact, a remembered superstition, and a turmoil
of remorse, and fear and love for her father.
Abnormality in these instances is only a matter of
degree. When an Attorney-General, who has been
frigh~ened ?y a bomb explod~d on his doorstep,
~onvInces himself by t~e reading of revolutionary
lIterature that a revolution is to happen on the first
of May 1920 , we recognize that much the same
mechanism is at work. The war, of course, furnished
many examples of this pattern: the casual fact, the
creative imagination, the will to believe, and out of
these three elements, a counterfeit of reality to which
there was a violent instinctive response. For it is
clear enough that under certain conditions men respond
as rowerfully to fictions as they do to realities,
and that In many cases they help to create the very
fictions to which they respond. Let him cast the
THE PICTURES IN OUR HEADS
first stone who did not believe in the Russian army
that passed through England in August, 1914, did
not accept any tale of atrocities without direct proof,
and never saw a plot, a traitor, or a spy where there
was none. Let him cast a stone who never passed on
as the real inside truth what he had heard someone
say who knew no more than he did.
In all these instances we must note particularly
one common factor. It is th.~jnset.tiQ.n,J~.~~weS!1.JmU1
and his environment of a~<p~~_do~Evironment) To
ffia1~~eucl~yI?iimiirliiIJieliaiior:is:~e:But
because it is behavior, the consequences, if
they are acts, operate not in the pseudo-environment
where the behavior is stimulated, but in the real
environment where action eventuates. If the behavior
is not a practical act, but what we call roughly
thought and emotion, it may be a long time before
there is any noticeable break in the texture of the
fictitious world. But when the stimulus of the
pseudo-fact results in action on things or other people,
contradiction soon develops. Then comes the sensation
of butting one's head against a stone wall,
of learning by experience, and witnessing Herbert
Spencer's tragedy of the murder of a Beautiful
Theory by a Gang of Brutal Facts, the discomfort
in short of a maladjustment. For certainly, at the
level of social life, what is called the adjustment of
man to his environment takes place through the medium
of fictions.
By fictions I do not mean lies. I mean a represen-
tatlon"'offne"'"e'ii':Vi'ronmen"f'wfiicn"'is'iii'Ies'ser'or"""reater__~"-"'~-~~~'._"~_~"_'__~_'_."_""'''.''''''''~'~'__'~"_''''_''''"'"'''.'''''''''''-''''''''''''''"~'''''''''''_'~='.fg"",""".w,.,,,,,,,.,,·..w.,,,,·,,.~.•
'degree made by man himself. The range of fiction_ _. ,'-.." ,_,;;;;""'i~"~,·c:.:;:n..,.,,..::.,,;,:'·J:~f:.:;;·.'~:~t·i;"·:"'~:_>~!.,', ,.•,,~ ",.,,,.~ -,,::I""'-""""'"""i "."':",.- '.·'"r.",·"" r,'~. '--."'-,; -; '::' ,'._ ·'·-',./i,/·_-,;.;,-,,,~.,·-,;~;,.. ~,., ."'/(,',"c':' ; ,..--...,::.~ >;-",.~. ,',r,,-:;-;,-i,;;.l:...:;i:;"'''.~ '''>'}'''''c.,,:.~.,''::~ :." ,",'},."j •
16 PUBLIC OPINION THE PICTURES IN OUR HEADS 17
extends all the way from complete hallucination to
the scientists' perfectly self-conscious use of a schematic
model, or his decision that for his particular
problem accuracy beyond a certain number of decimal
places is not important. /l~lYQll~"","QfJi;.~!iQ.n~m-ty
,"~.a:y~..e!m.Q§lJU1~" ..d~gr~~..~Q£.fi~:l~.n.tY~.c~,~S!.,!.~gJ,9.,ng",~§"w!.~:~
4~€l~~'2f ,~~~.!.i.!Y,,_S.e.~.. _~,~_~.~~~n.}?t? ..~C~?~?t,. ~~~i~n. is
·~?(~}0~,!.~,~~E.~~,:_:..r_".I~n....~f~~.!.?~....-h~.1i:.~g:",«:'~~}f~~~:.,I~..",~i~tY
1.a.:rg,~lx,,,tb~...,>:i~le,ctio.n:)-,~the, .....te9:,rrg.ngS:!n,~Qtl~!"~~~"J!!,e£!~.~
9:.t.J~~~,tt~,r}1§"...y.I?gll".~_~E~.,.!~~ ..,.~.!xE?ing"g£,:.,.~h'.!.t"WjUiaJ11
Ja~~s. ~_~ll:~ "...!~.~....r~l1?()~/iEt'-t~ia!iol1~ ....a.:Bg"r~.~..~t!lemenis"..···
ot"our '. ideas.'''''(''- The "aJternatlve·.. ·t~-·· the"'
~";~""'§rfl~t1,o~s:iroa;;re~t"e~p~~~t~-'t~~·~~~"":~~d
fu>w"""or·sensatio'n,:··thit'is" not a"re-ar~nternative, for-'
however"'''reTre's'l11ng it is to see at times with a perfectly
innocent eye, innocence itself is not wisdom,
though a source and corrective of wisdom.
\ For ,thereal environment is altogether too big, too
\ c(),~J21e~::••·.·~.~.~•••.....t?() ~·~~'t~~&·:·{?'~··'9-~'~~~I"··a'csu·.~ln.!·~!l:e.
\····~!_4~ii~,JJ~§!.,~~~IEi?,iw~.~..,!Q~d~'~I:':iI!h':~~2:,.T'~,S~ ~~~f!.~~it..
\gi~~~~t~~~~;!~~;l~~~i~~~~~~l:~~=-'.m9:sl~lQ~f8r~~~s~n,ll:~n~~~.~ith it.:...!9.~.iiY~,r,s~,ihe"
~'~~iahL<!I!.~1l"ymu~£"Jhg"x~:,-.!n~"~~_:,,~.2I~:tiie,~~,}£.Qrht~"_, Their
persistent difficulty is to secure maps on which their
own need, or someone else's need, has not sketched in
the coast of Bohemia.
4
·.~,Ih.~,_.~!1~Iy~t,Q.LpJlhlic...g,I?iniQ,!1.J!U1S~Lhegil1-theJl, ..,,_~.r.,
,1:~,~Qgnizillg._"th€--tr4angulaL"relati.Ql1ship_he.t~.~n ,__the
1 James, Principles of Psychology, Vol. II, p. 638.
scene of action, theh..~!!!a~..J2i£.tgX,~",2L1h~.t~§,E~.n~'?l.",e.~,~,,",
!K~]ijiQl~_~§~Qii§~,·iQ,JJi~1..11lst~r~""~2!~i!1g,,it~:~!f gJl,t;e~'K
upon 'the. sc~ne of acti~!l. I t is like a play suggested
to---the--actofs"~Dy"-fheir-'ownexperience, in which the
plot is transacted in the real lives of the actors, and
not merely in their stage parts. The moving picture
often emphasizes with great skill this double drama
of interior motive and external behavior. Two men
are quarreling, ostensibly about some money, but
their passion is inexplicable. Then the picture fades
out and what one or the other of the two men sees
with his mind's eye is reenacted. Across the table
they were quarreling about money. In memory
they are back in their youth when the girl jilted
him for the other man. The exterior drama is
explained: the hero is not greedy; the hero is in
love.
A scene not so different was played in theUnited
States Senate. At breakfast on the morning of
September 29, 19I 9, some of the Senators read a news
dispatch in the Washington Post about the landing
of American marines on the Dalmatian coast. The
newspaper said:
FACTS NOW ESTABLISHED
"The following important facts appear already established.
The orders to Rear Admiral Andrews commanding
the American naval forces in the Adriatic, came from
the British Admiralty via the War Council and Rear
Admiral Knapps in London. The approval or disapproval
of the American Navy Department was not
asked....
18 PUBLIC OPINION THE PICTURES IN OUR HEADS
acted (( under orders of ~fumr~ill-~_.~~_2E...~il sitting
somewhere," but he cannot recal1.~~~~I~£!.~~~!!.!.~_!~~~_
Unitecl.States__Q1L th~!J.lQdY_~_M.The Supreme Council
~nknown to the Constitution of the United States.
Therefore Mr. New of Indiana submits a resolution
calling for the facts.
So far the Senators still recognize vaguely that I) ~,c(
they are discussing a rumor. Being lawyers they still
remember some of the forms of evidence. But as
red-blooded men they already experience all the'
indignation which is appropriate to the fact that
American marines have been ordered into war by a
foreign government and \Y_~!.h~:g,!.,,!h~_.~Q!lSJ~Jlt.QLC.Qn=...gress.
,Emotionally they want to believe it, because
"iJiey"~a're Republicans fighting the League of Nations.
This arouses the Democratic leader, Mr. Hitchcock
of Nebraska. He defends the Supreme Council:
it was acting under the war powers. Pea..cehasnot
.y~.!._.g~~n <;_Qn£~lfd~d.-b.~<;'!tl~t;,_". the :R~PyQli~gn§.gre,-_
d~laril1git~!herefore the action was necessary and
'legal. Both sides now assume that the report is true,
and the conclusions they draw are the conclusions of
their partisanship. Yet this extraordinary assumption
is in a debate over a resolution to investigate the
truth of the assumption. It reveals how difficult it
is, even for trained lawyers, to suspend response until
the returns are in. The response is instantaneous.
The fiction is taken for truth because the fiction is
l)a~Iy'-'ii~~aca:"""""'---- .---'- """',',,'W_', " , .
A few days later an official report showed tha~ ~he
marines were not landed by order of the British
Government or of the Supreme Council. They had
WITHOUT DANIELS' KNOWLEDGE
"Mr. Daniels was admittedly placed in a peculiar position
when cables reached here stating that the forces over
which he is presumed to have exclusive control were carrying
on what amounted to naval warfare without his knowledge.
It was fully realized that the British Admiralty
might desire to issue orders to Rear Admiral Andrews to
act on behalf of Great Britain and her Allies, because the
~" situation required sacrifice on the part of some nation if
D'Annunzio's followers were to be held in check.
" It was further realized that under the new league of
nations plan foreigners would be in a position to direct
American Naval forces in emergencies with or without the
consent of the American Navy Department...." etc.
(Italics mine).
The first Senator to comment is Mr. Knox of
Pennsylvania. Indignantly he demands investigation.
In Mr. Brandegee of Connecticut, who spoke
next, indignation has already stimulated credulity.
Where Mr. Knox indignantly wishes to know if the
report is true, Mr. Brandegee, a half a minute later,
would like to know what would have happened if
marines had been killed. Mr. Knox, interested in the
question, forgets that he asked for an inquiry, and replies.
If American marines had been killed, it would
be war. The mood of the debate is still conditional.
Debate proceeds. Mr. McCormick of Illinois reminds
the Senate that the Wilson administration is prone to
the waging of small unauthorized wars. He repeats
Theodore Roosevelt's quip about "waging peace."
More debate. Mr. Brandegee notes that the marines
20 PUBLIC OPINION THE PICTURES IN OUR HEADS 21
It is to these special worlds, it is to these private
or group, or class, or provincial, or occupational, or
national, or sectarian artifacts, that the political
adjustment of mankind in the Great Society takes
place. Their variety and complication are impossible
to describe. Yet these fictions determine a very
great part of men's political behavior. We must
think of perhaps fifty sovereign parliaments consisting
of at least a hundred legislative bodies. With
them belong at least fifty hierarchies of provincial and
municipal assemblies, which with their executive, administrative
and legislative organs, constitute formal
authority on earth. But that does not begin to
reveal the complexity of political life. For in each of
these innumerable centers of authority there are
parties, and these parties are themselves hierarchies
with their roots in classes, sections, cliques and clans;
and within these are the individual politicians, each
the personal center of a web of connection and memory
and fear and hope.
Somehow or other, for reasons often necessarily
obscure, as the result of domination or compromise or
a logroll, there emerge from these poEtical bodies
commands, which set armies in motion or make
peace, conscript life, tax, exile, imprison, protect
property or confiscate it, encourage one kind of
enterprise and discourage another, facilitate immigration
or obstruct it, improve communication or
censor it, establish schools, build navies, proclaim
(( policies," and "destiny," raise economic barriers,
make property or unmake it, bring one people under
the rule of another, or favor one class as against
5
Whether in this particular case the Senate was
above or below its normal standard, it is not necessary
to decide. Nor whether the Senate compares
favorably with the House, or with other parliaments.
At the moment, I should like to think only
about the wor~d~~~~.~~~~E~.S!,~s!~.".gfnl~lt"c;!.~ling.UPQ.D
._!h~}E..,.,~§t2.!1!i~q:t~,",.JJ1,o.ved ..."h¥"..~...s.ti.mJJli...~..£tQm.,....their
p~el.l~()~e~v~:?~~~..~!§.~ For when full allowance has
E'een""nl'aae"''f6r' deliberate fraud, political science
has still to account for such facts as two nations
attacking one another, each convinced that it is acting
in self-defense, or two classes at war each certain that
it speaks for the common interest. They live, we are
likely to say, in different worlds. More accurately,
they live in the same world, but they think and feel in
differentones.
not been fighting the Italians. They had been landed
at the request of the Italian Government to protect
I talians, and the American commander had been
officially thanked by the Italian authorities. The
,,,,,,,,.,",,.,,',-wv,.tlmarines were not at war with Italy. They had acted
according to an established international practice
which had nothing to do with the League of Nations.
tJ.\.;I' The scene of action was the Adriatic. The picture
> ".',:)of that scene in the Senators' heads at Washington
':Tl''f.:;~,tp,t~·}was furnished, in this case probably with intent to
deceive, by a man who cared nothing about the
Adriatic, but much about defeating the League.
To this picture the Senate responded by a strengthening
of its partisan differences over the League.
22 PUBLIC OPINION THE PICTURES IN OUR HEADS
another. For each of these decisions some view of
the facts is taken to be conclusive, some view of the
circumstances is accepted as the basis of inference
and as the stimulus of feeling. What view of the
facts, and why that one?
And yet even this does not begin to exhaust the real
complexity. Thef~rmalpolitical~~r':lct.l1r~~:xi~t~in a
so~ial ...envi~<?~~~:~"~:~'''~)l~:re~'"~~h~"i·~.~ ....,~E~,~".i~~~ni~iiQli
rarge~ana"·sm-alrc~rpora:tions and institutions, volun-(IlWKt;:40/ftt,"f'"'<n\>t-""~"'4~,'!"'(>l« '''"''~'~~'i';-"~~>,,,,••v;,~:,,~,:~'",,~:(;~j'· ",' ~:::::_,·.i_.,-,-,;::.' ,." .:, -~,,, -"-_-:""~~~-":~'-.', '" / ... ,:;-~·t;;'~N?;;,r'f.!':1'~;'f.l).jj:;·mi;.d-;1.'~.;~,-,,~;..:,,"\\j""r'''hi';;.'-iJ''''''~Y''·'':'!'\'','j.;'I',:~~
""ta~.r,",,~~,g,,~~~~,,~,:;YS21Rnt~lry.....~§.spc;tf!,rtlQ,ns.;),.",u.flt1:.Qn.fJ;1~,~J2£2:.,.
"~Yi!2£~:l,,~~~a~ ...". ~.~,~.... neighbor~oo~c.~,~.~.~Bi~g.~~.,~,,~hi£.h
$£ften.a~':i1.·~·~'i1'l~~§~t,~~.decisi?l1.thatt.~~,P(?g!,!£~LQ,2S1y
.regIs'ters'~-'"""On what are these decisions based'?,l\:ltffi'~l'!l~H~"'ll.~'h'~'fSj;W..tmr;ll\\!<J'\«~1,
"M d . " M Ch CC· •
o ern society, says r. esterton, 1S 1ntrinsically
insecure because it is based on the notion
that all men will do the same thing for different
reasons .... And as within the head of any convict
may be the hell of a quite solitary crime, so in the
house or under the hat of any suburban clerk may
be the limbo of a quite separate philosophy. The
first man may be a complete Materialist and feel his
own body as a horrible machine manufacturing his
own mind. He may listen to his thoughts as to the
dull ticking of a clock. The man next door may be a
Christian Scientist and regard his own body as somehow
rather less substantial than his own shadow.
He may come almost to regard his own arms and legs
as delusions like moving serpents in the dream of
delirium tremens. The third man in the street may
not be a Christian Scientist but, on the contrary, a
Christian. He may live in a fairy tale as his neighbors
would say; a secret but solid fairy tale full of the
faces and presences of unearthly friends. The
fourth man may be a theosophist, and only too
probably a vegetarian; and I do not see why I should
not gratify myself with the fancy that the fifth man is
a devil worshiper. . . . Now whether or not this sort
of variety is valuable, this sort of unity is shaky.
To expect that all men for all time will go on thinking
different things, and yet doing the same things, is a
doubtful speculation. I t is not founding society on a
communion, or even on a convention, but rather on a
coincidence. Four men may meet under the same
lamp post; one to paint it pea green as part of a great
municipal reform; one to read his breviary in the
light of it; one to embrace it with accidental ardour
in a fit of alcoholic enthusiasm; and the last merely
because the pea green post is a conspicuous point of
rendezvous with his young lady. But to expect this
to happen night after night is unwise. . . ." 1
For the four men at the lamp post substitute the
governments, the parties, the corporations, the societies,
the social sets, the trades and professions, universities,
sects, and nationalities of the world. Think
of the legislator voting a statute that will affect
distant peoples, a statesman coming to a decision.
Think of ~he.Peace, .. G0l1fereQ,~.~~"J:~.c.Qn.s.til11.ting.cJhet
f[Qn!!,~r_~c",cQ[:=~~:i:~E~)~~~~~~"'~~~'bassador in a foreign
country trying to discern the intentions of his own
government and of the foreign government, a promoter
working a concession in a backward country,
an editor demanding a war, a clergyman calling on
1 G. K. Chesterton, "The Mad Hatter and the Sane Householder,"
J7anity Fair, January, 192 1, p. 54-·
PUBLIC OPINION
the police to regulate amusement, a club loungingroom
making up its mind about a strike, a sewing
circle preparing to regulate the schools, nine judges
deciding whether a legislature in Oregon may fix the
working hours of women, a cabinet meeting to decide
on the recognition of a government, a party convention
choosing a candidate and writing apIatform,
twenty-seven million voters casting their ballots, an
Irishman in Cork thinking about an Irishman in
Belfast, a Third International planning to reconstruct
the whole of human society, a board of
directors confronted with a set of their employees'
demands, a boy choosing a career, a merchant estimating
supply and demand for the coming season,
a speculator predicting the course of the market, a
banker deciding whether to put credit behind a new
enterprise, the advertiser, the reader of advertisments....Think
of the different sorts of Americans
thinking about their notions of" The British Empire"
or "France" or "Russia" or "Mexico." It is not
so different from Mr. Chesterton's four men at the
pea green lamp post.
6
And so before we involve ourselves in the jungle
of obscurities about the innate differences of men, we
shall do well to fix our attention upon the extraordinary
differences in what men know of the world. 1
I do not doubt that there are important biological
differences. Since man is an animal it would be
strange if there were not. But as rational beings it
1 Cf. 'Vallas, Our Social Heritage, pp. 77 et seq.
THE PICTURES IN OUR HEADS
is worse than shallow to generalize at all about
comparative behavior until there is a measurable
similarity between the environments to which behavior
is a response.
The pragmatic value of this idea is that it introduces
a much needed refinement into the ancient controversy
about nature and nurture, innate quality
and environment. For the pseudo-environment
is a hybrid compounded of "human nature" and
"conditions." To my mind it shows the uselessness
of pontificating about what man is and always will
be from what we observe man to be doing, or about
what are the necessary conditions of society. EQ.!".
~~_~Q_nQ.t,kn~q)£J1Q,}y'JIJ~!LWQ.uld""heha:v:e.inJ:espQnse ..to,
th~Jfi!~l$"..QL.th~.,Gr~.~! ,§gEA~,~y ~ AIJ that..W~..I~.a.UX''''N
know is how thev behave in response to what can
f~T;ry·"·'·b'~'·-~'~II~d·····~"·';;·~~t· Inaa~~'~~t~ ·······p······i~·t~·~-~······~·{·"·t·h;''"
...r;;;":~;"";,:",,,,:,.,.~j..;~~"'~..-:';j~:','>:."i',-\..~"J'~~\""":\':~.;;".:.,.>,~.:.1-:!;c'""'.z~;,.,"""'."-'-..r"'~,_""~.:.,,,i."it=.i#.tihH."'~-MW,t'l:,?H.:.\''('"W~'~~':'~~~'>;"':"-'''''~''\j'''P..",.>.:<.;tWtJ'~N::~-;'''''''''~~··"'"":".""',',''.''','-.'"':.'.'. -'"-','~'..c ".. -",," ,.", .. ,- .... ,.. .' '- ',.;.~ •. - .,. -,--.:"-"', ,.,•.'-c'.·'"""'.<'
Gr~g,t",,~(),<;i~Jy:.. No conclusion about man or the
Great Society can honestly be made on evidence like
that.
This then will be the clue to our inquiry. We,'. .. '.. .,~-~--,.................... -....... ..."........ .. ,
sna1ras·Sli'iU~-that .what "each man does is based not
~2~..~:"~~Ir~~~~~t~:·:.~;:~.~~~~'ri~ig:'~.~·~~g"9;!~~g~~:' ..~::k~·~::.:£n.::'riI~::ty.t~;:"
made bv himself or ziven to him. If his atlas tells
hlmM·th~tth~..L;;;fd=T;fl;·~" ..h~"··:;·ilr~ot sail near what he
believes to be the edge of our planet for fear of falling
off. If his maps include a fountain of eternal youth,
a Ponce de Leon will go in quest of it. If someone
digs up yellow dirt that looks like gold, he will for a
time act exactly as if he had found gold. Thewayi..!!..
which the world is '.. irnagiP:.~g.d~te.rmines.a.t ...an¥~..
particular moment what men will do. It does not
26 PUBLIC OPINION THE PICTURES IN OUR HEADS
determine what they will achieve. It determines
their effort, their feelings, their hopes, not their
accomplishments and results. The very men who
most loudly proclaim their cc materialism" and their
contempt for cc ideologues," the Marxian communists,
place their entire hope on what? On the formation
by propaganda of a class-conscious group. But
what is propaganda, if not the effort to alter ~tne
pic'ture···~·to·'"'·wliich'·'inen"·'res~p61ia;·····to··"s'ub'stii:ute~
sociar'''''attern'Tor''ano'tIie'f?'~'''WFiatis''classcon'scrous::'.,•._.""=~~""",~",J2",,,,,w"""""">"" •.,,,,n'., ",.' ..... " .• '•...",•.••., ',., ' . , ' .. ""'.'. ",,'" .•.,.•r-a-: .. " ,.,," ' . " '•. ' ." •••• . , " ' ' ' ' ' ' ' .,g~~§..~"Q.!tt"ft,W~Y,9f
l:~~F~f~g'..~~::~?rld ? National
consciousness but another' way'? . Arid'Professor Giddings'
consciousness of kind, but a process of believing
that we recognize among the multitude certain
ones marked as our kind?
Try to explain social life as the pursuit of pleasure
and the avoidance of pain. You will soon be saying
that the hedonist begs the question, for even supposing
that man does pursue these ends, the crucial
problem of why he thinks one course rather than
another likely to produce pleasure, is untouched.
Does the guidance ofman's conscience explain? How
then does he happen to have the particular conscience
which he has? The theory of economic selfinterest?
But how do men come to conceive their
interest in one way rather than another? The desire
for security, or prestige, or domination, or what is
vaguely called self-realization? How do men conceive
their security, what do they consider prestige,
how do they figure out the means of domination, or
what is the notion of self which they wish to realize?
Pleasure, pain, conscience, acquisition, protection,
enhancement, mastery, are undoubtedly names for
some of the ways people act. There may be instinctive
dispositions which work toward such ends. But
no statement of the end, or any description of the
tendencies to seek it, can explain the behavior which
results. The very fact that men theor,i~~at all is
proof that. th~iLll§£Y_~9;en'Vrronm'~'n'is'~---dleii="i~'~eri6"r'-~~... ." ,·""",_·,;,'!;·~.;;....,.".,·.d,':i~-';';':'·_'·""""·"""M'("'MI,,"n'~""'·";'''.'''''~l:':'.~'''-","WI'tr~_\~lI.1'',\_'j:;l'1;H.~~'''.!·''<lf·;t<')<_''~_(''''O·'''.''•. '~'~i~"",·r"'·".·;.'-,,-,l"""
E~2!""~enj:atiQns-,.Qf."~",the","",~QJ::ld",,",,,,,,~lt,e,,<","a,--",d,e"t~tminigg,,,,_
~ll!~ntill.~th~ught.""b£e,eling:~<"au.d~,"~~JiQ,n~,,,".¥9~. ift~~
~E~S.t1.Q!tl?~~tw:ken"reality:"and,hlHxu+.tl..r~sp;~se"w'e're"""
direct..~~~., ~111111~4~.~tc;,.r'!~her,than indire,ct and if1'~
r~l:r~sE:'.I~.4'~S!§i211~Jla,~£aJl~r~~~,~Q.uld...beunknown,.and",
(if each of us fitted as snugly into the world as the
child in the womb), M;!.~"J~c~J:n'!rg,~JJ'!W"",:WQ\Jlg"J1Qt
have. ~e~~,~91c;.t()~ay!hat exceptfor the first nine
-moiiEns-o{'itsexistencenohuman being.manages its,
-~ffair's'·.~~s...~~,11..e1:.~,,'lpl'l~,~'
u'-"Tfie'diief d1fficufty
C
Tii-'adapting the psychoanalytic
scheme to political thought arises in this connection.
The Freudians are concerned with the maladjustment
of distinct individuals to other individuals
and to concrete circumstances, They have assumed
that if internal derangements could be straightened
out, there would be little or no confusion about what
is the obviously normal relationship. But public
opinion deals with indirect, unseen, and puzzling
facts, and there is nothing obvious about them.
The situations to which public opinions refer are
known only as opinions. The psychoanalyst, on the
other hand, almost always assumes that the environment
is knowable, and if not knowable then at least
bearable, to any unclouded intelligence. This assump-
28 PUBLIC OPINION THE PICTURES IN OUR HEADS
tion of his is the problem of public opinion. Instead
of taking for granted an environment that is readily
known, the social analyst is most concerned in studying
how the larger political environment is conceived,
and how it can be conceived more successfully. The
psychoanalyst examines the adj ustment to an X,
called by him the environment; the social analyst
examines the X, called by him the pseudo-environ-
ment.
He is, of course, permanently and constantly in
debt to the new psychology, not only because when
rightly applied it so greatly helps people to stand on
their own feet, come what may, but because the
study of dreams, fantasy and rationalization has
thrown ligh t on how the pseudo-environment is put
together. But he cannot assume as his criterion
either what is called a "normal biological career" 1
within the existing social order, or a career" freed
from religious suppression and dogmatic conventions"
outside." What for a sociologist is a normal
social career? Or one freed from suppressions and
conven tions ? Conservative critics do, to be sure,
assume the first, and romantic ones the second.
But in assuming them they are taking the whole
world for granted. They are saying in effect either
that society is the sort of thing which corresponds to
their idea ofwhat is normal, or the sort of thing which
corresponds to their idea of what is free. Both ideas
are merely public opinions, and while the psychoanalyst
as physician may perhaps assume them, the
sociologist may not take the products of existing
1 Edward J. Kempf, Psychopathology, p. 116. 2 Id., p. 151.
public opinion as criteria by which to study public
opInIon.
7 I
Tbe ~orld that we h~y~_~£-g~aL}Yj,!h_p.Q!iti~illly.J"~,)(
ou!.~~,LE,~.~£E~..,2gf~I:~~!,gh!~'~A9,gL2f,,,!!.li!lfi~$"'~ItJ:Hl~¢"'tQ~.he.~
~~~~~i~~"~~~~tl;~~~~irfir~l~fen~f;t!§~~;~~:;~~
Jl~" ~~,.....th·~'······~r~·~tiir·~···.·· .·oJ.······~ij'·· ·~y91~:'tiQn:'···'\vJ1Q'"'···c'a:il'·:j·~st·.····
..,~1:::.•.,.'" , ffi .. t ti f r ality to manag'e'":''!vQnt...sp.a.o""a.sll ..Clenp-QX, lonH···Q..···..·~ ..,.... ,.,v, ..•• ....'C •.
his survival and snatch what on the scale of tiiiie"., ,......•" , ". ,' , " .
"·~.~~pl,lt.a fe-w ..moments of. insigh~ an4h~ppiness..
'!:.t."~~i~d~~tl1~ '.cr~'!t.uE~h'!§.i nvented .,:,~!s~f.. ~e~ing
'~'~~.~•.'~~·11~~~4J~X~cQ~ld;see: of'hearing'what rro ear
"cou1Cf hea~: of weighing immense masses and infin'iteslm'ar"ones;
of counting and separating more Items
than he'can' ifiarviaua1ty""reTu'em5er:"""He"'l's"Tearniii'g"'
..··io..see.·.W'it·~· .•.~i~.·.'~·~~d.·.••v..~st··'.por.tiotj.~ •.·.9f.•Jh.~.•·wq'rld·:·'th·af····'··~
~"'tre"~o~ngjieYer .see"t9JJ.,~h,.sm.ell, .h~.~r.,Qr...r.~m~~!?:~~
'··'<?~~4l.J.~11y:,he,makes"fQr"himselLa ..,trnst:WQrthy...pi<:.tllre
··i'r:~,~4~.hishead.oLthe,.W:Qrld,.heyq.ndhisreach.
,." Jfh~se features of the world outside which have to
do with the behavior of other human beings, in so far
as that behavior crosses ours, is dependent upon us,
or is interesting to us, we call roughly public affairs.
The.. pi~tlJres .il1.s~.~~",!~,"~,J~~i:2,~,;.2f;,,!h£~,~,"1\Ym,~~ ...,~,~.~Eg~.~ .
'~~~-'E'!~I~~fe§~'gT"Ifiyn)§~1Y~.§".()rg.~h~~,~}""gf...th~.!x,ny~qs,
"ii';!rH()§~:s" and..relati.Q.n§hiI?".,fr.r~,; ..!h,~ir"PJl,Qli~.,Qpini,QJ1§ .
Those. pictures.....'N~i~<~"'~E~''''~,<;;t~~~",llt1:gn."by"grQJdR,§ ...,£~f.,.."
~I~,,~::2r..;,RY"'~·inqiY:id!J~ls ...aGting~,,,in;.<the .....name.:,.,of.,
g~~1!.H~,jtr~ J>1191i~OpiniQn ~i!h.s~P!!~Jl~st~E§'~ And
''8(; 'in the chapters which follow we shall inquire
3° PUBLIC OPINION THE PICTURES IN OUR HEADS 31
first into some of the reasons why the pi~.t!lt~j11..sige
so.....oft~n misleads:<ii1~~'""··i'["~OIF"eIr"::··~·eaIIng§::·",}Yj.tlLthe
~()rr~?utside. Under' this heading we shall consider
:first the. ch:~~f fact()r~j£hiGhJimitth~ir..'!.Gc;.~~~ the
~.fact~ rh~X are the ar~~~~.i,,~li.S;,~D.~2tships~,.~h~Jit!ilfu~
ti~nes"" or~social cant~ct,....t~~. ~?J:llpara tivelX1l1eager
time available in eact(·:g~i..J9.r·..:.l?,~X!pg."~tte9tF?:~~:i9
public affairs, the dis~.or.!}()p.'}-ri~~.ng8eG9-U.s~,",,~X~~
have to be <:ompressedintQy.~r.~",§hQxt.me$~~g.~§,.".ili~
.difficulty of making ..Cl.".~,~.~!,! .._.~.~.~Cl?~lar¥.~~l',r~ss. a
\;C>l'llplicatedworId,a~~~nallyt~~,[~ClE()rf~Ging~lliJj$
facts which would seem" to'''inreaten the established"~ ..' "".' ',". co. .. ',. : . -,-' ." ..' -: ," ,,"_'._',',_,' .. ,'. ,'_' __, """",~:",,,,_, '~\'.." :_~_' """,:"";_'-':'.':~';_"""'.,."" .." _':'.,.,.,, __,i'.>;;"_"!!"'~"'__, c_< ,','-' , ,"f -' ' .. ,,' ",c '. _, ,'. __. -"'.' c', .. ' _:,c "c +:";"'-":'-"''''-':''':''.~'.l''7~iIJq~,~
routine of tne~ 's Jive§',.<r, -~.,
The analysis then t~;~s,; from these more or less
external limitations to~~~ .. ClYe.stiQn.ofI1(),v"this
t:i~~~e..ofmessages from-. t~~:911t§ig~ i§.8:!fecte~:bY:l~~"·"
sto're'a::"up Images, t1J.~"PX~~Ol1~~1?tiOl1§'Cll1cl pr~judic~s
which interpret, fill ..Jh~m" -,"Q,u,t"Q,,,,~and,,,,jn+Jh,e.ir turn.
powerfully direct the play of our attent;9~'-+.c~tl},g..'<?~E
'v.·.··.·.:i...s.. ion itself. Fromtnis"'Tt~"+p""'roceecrs't'o"'~x~rnine' ho'.i!...•.......... ~1,.w~.
in..the. individual person...theIirnitedll1e§sClg~§,~f!:.~~
"Q,YJ§ige, f9rmec.L into .. a J?~~~.~:l1 ?~st~reotypes,,~re
identified with his own""iiiterests as he 'feels and con:'
'~~~y~~"t~e0':""'I~ th'~"s~'~~e'eaing sections it examines'
""'h~~'-'opin"ions4re,crY-§l~lli~~cQ"jrnSRJyhat .. is c~g~,~
Public Opinion, .ho:y~".N:e,ti9P-.al. Will, a.. ···· .Gr,Ql!.1?
Mind,....a Social''Pli'rp'Q§~"gt..:'YhateverYQ1!.,.wsh~~~_e
!() ~al1 it, isformed.
The first "tiv~'"parts constitute the descriptive section
of the book. There follows an analysis of the
traditional democratic theory of public opinion. The_..
~~'~~~~'~'~~'JgL.,~h.~,_~~~~~~~_~!.,.,,!.§,._.thit.l~cl~m.Q~r.e.£y,.j.!~L1t~
=~!~~g!D:.~Lf~E!1: ..,~~,y~t,~,~.!!g.~S.! X.fe,~,~ElSh~,E!:2~J~,m",~.hi9"h ..."
a~is~~b~~~~s~...~h~,.1?ict.~Fe'~'f~~~i.4~.J?~~~E!~~<h~~q~ c:l,e>,,<
~"no't""~y,f9ip~ti'£"~tly .~orr~~§H2n,g .,F.1,.th..tb.~...~9rtg..9Jlt.;§i,d~,~....""~
And' .th~~~ because the democratic theory is under
cri ticism by socialist thinkers, there follows an
examination of the most advanced and coherent of
these criticisms, as made by the English Guild Socialists.
My purpose here is to find out whether these reformers
take into account the main difficulties of public
opinion. My conclusion is that they ignore the
difficulties, as completely as did the original democrats
because they, too, assume, and in a much more
com~licated civilization, that somehow mysteriously
there exists in the hearts of men a knowledge of the
world beyond their reach.
I argue tha,t rep~~se,nt:tiye,~~~~~~~~~t,~ither in
"~_"""".'~...•'.'.'".'..,'..'~.'.'.'.'.\l'..'.'."'.'.'_.'.•..'.•"..~'.....•..•~."..'.'..•...'..'.'..••,',••.•••..•..·.'1·',··,..·'.' '..c.. " 1..le'::J' no..·..·..lit.·..i·c. 's... ..0r i.if.·.i.nd·..u.'.str.-v.WHat IS orulnan y cau: ,,;&:.,. " , . < •.'. . " •••••",c/."
call11()tl>~~':·;~·~~~d ..succe~sfuUy, nQmgt!~.r.)Yhgtthe
b~~i~- of election, unless .... there.dsian...ind~_p~,nQ,t:;_~,!t~
~~p~~t~~g~niza!ionfor making the unse~~"[~~!~..!!?::",..
,~~lliglble""i:()those who have to make the d~clsl?~S~
~~~ternpt, therefore, to argue that the ~ertC>,Y§ e;t~ceptance
of the principle that. personal rc:prese!ltation
must be supplemented by representation of~he
Ul1S~~tlf~cts :Y?tll~.. alone permit a satisfactory ·d~-:.
c~~'tr"~li~ation . and allow us. to escape Jrom the,.,.," .,. . . ' . " ' i~t~r~;~bie
and unworkable fiction that. each of us
tl'ltlst a~qllire a competent opinion about anpubl~c'
affairs. lti§,,:~gtled~h'}-! the problem ofthe press IS
confused because the cd'tics and the apologists expect
the press to realize this fiction, expect it to make up
for all that was not foreseen in the theory of democ-
32 PUBLIC OPINION
CHAPTER 2.
PART II
APPROACHES TO THE WORLD OUTSIDE
racy, and that the readers expect this miracle to be
performed at no cost or trouble to themselves. The
newspapers are regarded by democrats as a panacea for
their own defects, whereas _analysis of the nature of
!l~~"~Ud-,9f,dl~S:£Qn.Qm!£",Q,.C!§!§,gfj,,~nlt);lali§m,.§i.~m~~_!~
§hQW"""thftt ,th,~n~~,$11~lR~,r.§",1!'~'£~d§"§~rilY:"i~ng,,i,n~vi~~?ly
r.~.~~<;h.,e-n<;l",th~r~f8t~'.)E-.,,~~~e.!er ','()rJ~c§~,~rj"W~~~'~:f~,
intensify, the defectiv~ organiz'ation-~f'Jf,ublicop'ln=
"i.Qn,~,~:,:.'~,~~M y"'~~~'~(~;r~~~""""'i~""""tha t"'p~bI'~~"',~~pi~i'~'~~""'~'~s t""'"be
_?!~,~~!I§=t~E:~t~~~:'Jiri§i::'It"'iney'~~re~tQ::'l?~"'§91J:tj,a':~:fi:<?[
.'JY~~~~~~~:~r~I~i;rsi:ak~~;~~!r*~
,ii2n:~I£i[::§£I~n£i.:',!ih~i,"~E~~~,~'ioll itsproper .pl~'~:~.~,~s
fQnnl1J~,~,Qr",?,iQ_" '1q~~J:1Ee" '(),[ .real ""cl~~,!§i()11).,",ins!~,~~ of
;f'" apologist, ,.cxiti~~',~:,QX",'t,iHQ:riJ~~x~""~t[t~.r',,,,.th~":dec,:i~'-1o~~, -nas
:!\~ ~~Snm,~g~." I" ~~y,;;,~~"j~ciicat~!ha~' 't~~~j;'eXE1~,~i~ies
'\, (){,;,,~~Y~~~Te~~r-~Ild....ind~~..~ry .,~.r~.. £qiiittr'ti!ig,=!g:grfe
" :,~~litic~r'sci~~'C'~)this enormous opportunity to enrich
.~,ts.~,lf,a?d to··s~~~::he~~~l~~..,.. ,Atlcl' ()f course, I hope
that these pages'willrfelp'it'rew""p"~~pfe--t~ realize that
opportunity more vividly, and therefore to pursue it
more consciouslyr
"
"
"
CENSORSHIP AND PRIVACY
3. CONTACT AND OPPORTUNITY
4. TIME AND ATTENTION
5. SPEED, WORDS, AND CLEARNESS