Then again there were plenty of
libel suits for the young editor-publisher, setting out to be a
reformer, and the ruling powers in the city strongly disapproved
his methods, but the militant editor brought readers and the
readers brought advertisers, and the venture became a success.
Five years from his first venture he bought the Springfield
Press Republic and the Springfield Democrat, combining the two
in the Evening News. Each is now housed in its own modern
newspaper building and each is highly prosperous as a business
institution, although the owner's supervision has been of a
general character.
His associates always speak of the "Cox luck" in politics, but
upon analysis it seems that it consists either of seizing or
making the opportunity. In 1908 his Congressional district,
originally Democratic, had become Republican, but a factional
quarrel breaking out in the opposition camps, the Governor took
the Democratic nomination and won out, again riding to victory
in the great landslide of 1910. In Congress his career afforded
him no opportunity to attain to high distinction, but he became
a member of the appropriations committee and there became most
deeply impressed with the waste in public funds and the
unbusinesslike methods of arriving at appropriations. One of his
services was the disclosure that the care of Civil War veterans
in the National Soldiers' Home at Dayton was shattered, and he
won the contest for increased allowances.
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