H. L. Mencken

1880–1956 · American journalist, satirist and cultural critic

Henry Louis Mencken was born in Baltimore on 12 September 1880 and spent essentially his whole career there, joining the city's newspapers in 1899 and writing for The Sun, The Evening Sun and The Sunday Sun until a stroke ended his writing life in 1948. He co-founded The American Mercury in 1924, produced the landmark study The American Language, and made his name nationally with his savage coverage of the 1925 Scopes trial — the “Monkey Trial,” a phrase he popularised. A lifelong sceptic of mass democracy, he opposed the New Deal at real cost to his popularity, and the compressed, contemptuous style of that opposition is exactly why so many unsourced cynicisms get pinned on him — and why this one, for once, turns out to be real.

Traced to source

10 quotes we’ve traced to H. L. Mencken

“Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard”

Verified

“Every election is a sort of advance auction sale of stolen goods”

Verified

“Puritanism: The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy”

Verified

“The dry martini is the only American invention as perfect as a sonnet”

Attributed

“As democracy is perfected, the office of the President represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day, the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last, and the White House will be occupied by a downright fool and a complete narcissistic moron”

Disputed

“For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong”

Disputed

“No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public”

Disputed

“There is always a well-known solution to every human problem—neat, plausible, and wrong”

Disputed

“When I hear artists or authors making fun of business men, I think of a regiment in which the band makes fun of the cooks”

Disputed

“When the water reaches the upper deck, follow the rats”

Disputed

Not actually H. L. Mencken

Often misattributed to H. L. Mencken

Famous lines widely pinned on H. L. Mencken that we’ve traced to someone else.

“Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one”

actually A. J. Liebling

“I never vote for anybody. I always vote against”

actually W. C. Fields

“When I hear artists or authors making fun of business men, I think of a regiment in which the band makes fun of the cooks”

actually Author unidentified

“When somebody says it's not about the money, it's about the money”

actually Kin Hubbard

“When the water reaches the upper deck, follow the rats”

actually Unknown — an American political maxim

On the research bench

Commonly pinned on H. L. Mencken — under review

1 line flagged as pinned on H. L. Mencken and queued for a full source trace — not yet verified.

“Melancholy Is the Pleasure of Being Sad”

Likely misattributed

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Thought H. L. Mencken said something else?

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