The Press: Forecaster

LANDON TO WIN 33 STATES, NEW FORECAST SHOWS

These New York Herald Tribune headlines last week delighted those readers of that arch-Republican sheet who hope to see Franklin Roosevelt defeated in November. Republicans, Democrats and non-partisans were equally curious about the reasoning which led to the headlines’ conclusion. One Rogers C. Dunn, the Herald Tribune story went on to relate, having investigated the politics of every newspaper in the land (except those in six States which he conceded to the Democrats), had found that in 33 States representing 377 electoral votes (266 needed to win), the bulk of newspaper circulation belongs to Republican sheets. Mr. Dunn’s thesis is that newspapers so accurately reflect and so strongly influence their readers, that the paper a man or woman buys is a declaration of the ticket he or she will vote. Without releasing any local poll and circulation figures to prove his claim, Mr. Dunn pointed to the significant fact that in the 1932 election, 39,000,000 citizens voted. That year, Mr. Dunn estimated, U. S. newspapers had 38,000,000 readers.*

This year, Forecaster Dunn has announced that his checking of readerships against the political bias of their newspapers enabled him correctly to predict the Congressional passage of the Bonus, the passage of the Wheeler-Reyburn Public Utility Bill. A Wall Streeter until his brokerage business folded up in 1931. Forecaster Dunn got his idea of tabulating putative editorial influence two years ago. The Landon prediction is in the nature of a public try-out for a weekly prediction which Mr. Dunn wishes to market as a “commercial protection service.” If Alf M. Landon is elected next month, Rogers C. Dunn expects to be rocketed to the front rank of U. S. business soothsayers, be assured of a respectful and lucrative following. On the other hand, if Governor Landon is not elected, Mr. Dunn himself agrees that it will be best to “forget the whole thing.”

* Editor & Publisher’s estimate of total U. S. newspaper circulation as of Oct. 1, 1932: 36,407,297.