The Geringer Press-which publishes eight papers for Bohemians in Chicago, Cedar Rapids, Iowa; Prague, Oklahoma; Baltimore, Maryland; and East Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania-refuses all advertisements offering medical treatment by mail, but does accept patent-medicine advertisements.

Amerikansky Russky Viestnik, Homestead, Pennsylvania (Russian and Slavic editions), writes that medical advertisements "must be devoid of reference to private diseases."

The fact that four of these publishers are in Chicago suggests that the antiquack campaign carried on by the Tribune, the American Medical Association, Doctor Krasnow, and others is showing positive results.

Nevertheless, among more than a hundred foreignlanguage newspapers examined, a very small proportion refuse medical advertisements. A few more accept them with limitations. Apparently most papers accept anything that will bring in money. We must conclude that the majority of the foreign-language newspapers share the profits of quackery. Some papers draw more than half their incomes from improper, illegitimate, or fraudulent medical advertising.

The foreign-language newspapers are an inevitable and necessary feature in American journalism as long as we have thousands of residents and citizens who, whether or not they read English, also read their mother tongue. While legal restrictions upon certain types of advertisement are urgently needed, one of the most effective and immediate means of diminishing the medical advertising in the foreign-language

newspapers is to provide other sources of income. Obviously, newspapers that depend upon a certain class of advertisements for from 20 to 60 per cent of their total receipts from advertising cannot suddenly surrender it and live.

The American Association of Foreign Language Newspapers, recently reorganized under the leadership of well-known business men, has begun to call to the attention of American advertisers the opportunities offered by the foreign-language press. In the summer of 1919 a full-page advertisement was printed prominently in leading American papers throughout the country under the heading:

THE FOREIGN MARKET IN THE UNITED STATES

WHY IT PAYS THE BUSINESS MAN TO USE THE FOREIGNLANGUAGE PRESS

"Here is a new, large, and fertile field in which to sell your goods," says the American Association of Foreign Language Newspapers to the American advertiser. "You can make money by using the foreign-language newspapers. At the same time you will be helping to Americanize the foreign born. The American standard of living is developed through the use of American products, such as toothbrushes, graphophones, sewing machines, cash registers, candy, seed, harness, furniture, books, banking, etc. Good Americanism is good business."

Since the foreign-language newspapers are (and must be) a factor in the transition of the foreign born from immigrant to American citizen, let us see to it that these newspapers introduce the best of America,

not the worst, to their readers. Let us encourage American business men and women who have creditable goods to sell to advertise their wares in the foreign-language press. The readers will be benefited by having an opportunity to buy American products, and they will become familiar with American habits and tastes in a perfectly natural way. Then the publishers who are now struggling to keep their papers going will be able to say to medical quacks and all other frauds: "We don't want your ads; we have something better to put before our people. Thank you, but we do not need your money; our business is already very good."

The foreign-language press can be helpful in another direction. Announcement of the worthy medical resources of the community may well be made through its columns. For instance, there may be published the names and addresses of dispensaries and hospitals, of nursing associations, health departments, the headquarters for the public school's work in hygiene. Some responsible board, local or state, ought to furnish suitable material for such a list. Many papers would find their readers interested in a health department; many communities or societies would find their members interested in a health circle, with lectures from doctors who speak their own language. The foreignlanguage newspapers could encourage such circles by announcing meetings, reporting lectures and papers read, and recommending desirable books.

FEDERAL LEGISLATION

As a weapon to deal with this situation public opinion is an effective but a slow one. More immediate re

sults can be obtained through the operation of certain state and Federal laws. One of the most powerful of these is the Federal law commonly called the Fraud Order law. This gives the Post Office Department the authority to close the mails to anyone using them in schemes to defraud. Before issuing a Fraud Order the Post Office authorities collect enough evidence to be sure that the man or concern is really defrauding through the mails. There is no public trial, but a hearing before the Postmaster-General or his deputy. The quack has a right to appeal to the courts, but in few cases has he done so, and in no case has the decision of the Post Office Department been reversed. Fraudulent business involving thousands of dollars has been wiped out by this means.

The Post Office Department began the active use of this power about 1914, but up to 1919 had hardly touched the foreign-language advertisers. The report of the Solicitor-General of the Post Office Department to the Postmaster-General (1916) announces that the use of the Fraud Order is becoming generally known and appreciated and that the movement among publishers for truthful advertising is growing.2

The activity of the department in prohibiting the use of the mails for the conduct of fraudulent schemes has become generally known to the public, with the result that this office is flooded with complaints against the alleged fraudulent schemes from all sections of the country. It is difficult to handle all of these in an efficient way with the present force. . . . This campaign for truthful ad

1 United States Criminal Code, sec. 215.

2 Report of the Solicitor for the Post Office Department to the Postmaster-General, for the year ending June 30, 1916, p. 5.

vertising is resulting in a great change in the nature of advertisements carried by many newspapers and periodicals, and in the conservative tone which is becoming more and more characteristic of the advertising of legitimate business. Its effect is also to be seen in the fraudulent advertising laws which have recently been passed by many state legislatures and by Congress in legislating for the District of Columbia.

The Fraud Order is a powerful instrument, the use of which in a democratic society should be carefully safeguarded. It should, however, be applied much more aggressively to the suppression of quacks. The number of cases that the Post Office Department can investigate and prosecute depends, of course, on the appropriations available. Every dollar devoted to this work saves thousands of dollars wrung from the poor and unfortunate. Translations of foreign-language advertising are as necessary as were translators in search of disloyalty. Public health organizations, medical and civic bodies should urge the appropriation of sufficient funds to institute a systematic weeding out from the foreign-language press of all advertisers which can be reached by this law.

There is now pending before Congress a bill "to prevent transmission through the mails of advertisements relating to the treatment of venereal diseases and certain sexual disorders." Should this bill become a law it would interfere with the business of a great number of prospering quacks. A number of states already have such laws relating to posters and circulars. This provision cannot be urged too strongly, and it should be followed as rapidly as public opinion permits by similar restraint of the