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Liberal by Moonlight. Though clearly one of U.S. journalism's loudest thunderers on the right, Maury is soft-spoken and amiable away from a typewriter. He never discusses his views outside his office, he says, because "it's so easy to work up ill feelings arguing about politics, religion or the war." In fact, he spends only about 15 minutes a day discussing proposed editorials with his News colleagues, most notably Executive Editor Floyd Barger. Then Maury takes less than two hours to write the three to five editorials settled upon. Generally, the only News editorials he does not write are those that run on Mondays or when he is away. For his virtually one-man show, Maury earns more than $40,000 a year.
Maury's moods in print reflect the influence of the late Joseph Patterson, the News' irascible founder. Patterson hired Maury in 1926 out of Butte, Mont., where Maury had been mixing freelance writing with a law practice. Maury won a Pulitzer Prize for editorials in 1940. At the same time he was moonlighting, writing Collier's editorials that often took an opposite, liberal point of view. Maury's explanation: "An editorial writer is like a lawyer or a public relations man: his job is to make the best possible case for his client."
Maury claims that today he happens to agree with 98% of the News editorials and "doesn't care" about the rest. He also claims not to care about reader reaction. "I don't give much of a damn about what people think of our position," he says easily, "as long as they read us." Millions do; the News' daily circulation of 2,129,689 is the biggest in the U.S.