DOCUMENT RESUME ED 370 122 CS 214 333 TITLE Proceedings of the Conference of the American Journalism Historians Association (Lawrence, Kansas, October 1-3, 1992). Part II: Journalism History in the Twentieth Century. INSTITUTION American Journalism Historians' Association. PUB DATE Oct 92 NOTE 457p.; For Part I of this Proceedings, see CS 214 332. PUB TYPE Collected Works Conference Proceedings (021) Historical Materials (060) EDRS PRICE MF01/PC19 Plus Posi:age. DESCRIPTORS Characterization; Ethics; *Journalism; *Journalism History; Media Research; Newspapers; Photography; Television IDENTIFIERS Carter (Jimmy); Cooke (Alistair); Eisenhower (Dwight D); Gulf War; McCarthy (Joseph); Media Coverage; Media Government Relationship; New York Times; Nixon (Richard M); Progressivism; Time Magazine ABSTRACT This proceeding.; contain 16 papers on American journalism history in the 20th century. Papers in the proceedings are: "News Suppression & Press Intimidation During the Nixon Administration" (Egbe Enonnchong); "The Persian Gulf War: Revolution in News Transmission" (Robert L. Spellman); "South Dakota's W. R. Ronald: Prairie Editor and an AAA Exponent" (Elizabeth Evenson Williams); "William H. Mason: How a Journalist's Murder Influenced Media Coverage" (Mary K. Sparks); "A Paper for Those Who Toil: The Chicago Labor Press in Transition" (Jon Bekken); "A Southern Demagogue as Portrayed through Florida Newspapers" (John Galey); "Ohio Newspaper Coverage of the 1920 Presidential Campaign" (Douglass K. Daniel); "Truth and Jimmy Carter: The 1976 Presidential Campaign" (Sonya Forte Duhe); "The Carter Presidency and the National Press: Grappling with the Process of Truth" (Kyle Cole); "Ambassador of American Journalism: Alistair Cooke" (Michael D. Murray); "Photographs, Image Manipulation, and False Light Invasicn of Privacy" (Steve Buhman); "'Lou Grant': Creating Characters for a Newspaper Drama" (Douglass K. Daniel); "Eisenhower, McCarthy, and News Conferences That Fought Back: A Turning Point in White House Press Relations, 1953-1954" (Craig Allen); "Reaching for Professionalism and Respectability: State Press Assoclation Ethics Codes in the 1920s' (Mary M. Cronin and James B. McPherson); "Penitents Brought into the Fold: Tales of Conversion, Heresy, and Contrition in 'Time' Magazine" (Richard Lentz); and "Was the Mainstream Press a Promoter of the Progressive Ideology? The 'New York Times' and the 'New York World', 1900-1917" (Elizabeth Burt). (RS) *********************************************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. *********************************************************************** PROCEEDINGS OF THE 1992 CONFERENCE OF THE AMERICAN JOURNALISM HISTORIANS ASSOCIATION (Lawrence, Kansas, October 1-3, 1992) Part II: Journalism History in the Twentieth Century U.S DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION "PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS Office of Educahonat Research aro improvement MATERIAL HAS BEEN GRANTED BY EDUIC ATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER IERI..'A . This document has bet n reProduced as received from the perran Or Orgaruzatton originatIng It :- Minor changes have been made to improve reproduction Quality Points al view or opinions stated in this docu . TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES ment do not neCesSaffly represent official OEM pOs.tOn Or 1301.cy INFORMATION CENTER (ERICI.- BEST COPY AVAILABLE 2 "News Suppression & Press Intimidation During the Nixon Administration" By Egbe Enonnchong University of Missouri-Columbia Presented at the (Panel: First Amendment and Presidency) American Journalism Historians Association Annual Convention Lawrence, Kansas September 30 through October 3, 1992 3 i "News Suppression & Press Intimidation During the Nixon Administration" By Egbe Enonnchong University of Missouri-Columbia Presented at the (Panel: First Amendment and Presidency) American Journalism Historians Association Annual Convention Lawrence, Kansas September 30 through October 3, 1992 4 A bst ract During the first two years of Richard Nixon's tenure in the White House (1969-71),the animosity between the press and the president hadnever been so intense. Members of the Nixon administration often blamed the negative coverage the presidentgot from the media on the adversarial relations between the executive branch and thepress. Never had an administration been so determined to conceal information from the press as the Nixon era has come to be remembered for. And never, too, had reporters been so relentless in their effortsto go after information reserved strictly to members of the president's "inner circle." The administration issuedthreats and pursued court litigations in its scheme to scare reporters from gettingaccess to information the president wished to conceal from the media. Call this censorship; thatwas precisely what many in the media thought the administration was doing. By blurring the boundarybetween prior restraint and seditious libel A e administration, in subtle ways, blended the two concepts as a means of punishing the media. 5 It is truethat of all the Presidents in this century, it is probably true, that I have less, as somebody has said, supporters in the press thanany President.--Richard Nixoni Introduction The focus of this analysis will 'le to examine how Richard M. Nixon obscurelyblended seditious libel with prior restraint in his effort to limit mediaaccess to information as a form of punishment. The time period is from 1969 through 1971, Mr. Nixon's firsttwo years in office and before the 1972 Watergate brealdn.If this sounds like a blueprint to undermine the First Amendment, Nixon's action coursed many to thinkso. Nixon's return to national politics in 1968 surprisedmany who had written his political orbitary following his defeat in the 1962 race forgovernor in California. His defiant statement to reporters then: 'You won't have Dick Nixon to kick around any more,' only confirmed 'his masochism and paranoia toward thepress in blaming it for his defeat,"2 according to media scholars John Tebbel and Sarah Miles Watts. Nixon's obsession with keeping information out of reach from journalistsstemmed from a long standing distrust the president had developedover the years toward the media. Long before he was elected president, Nixon had been involved in several confrontationswith the press which brought his image and reputation into question. The 1962 Californiagubernatorial race, for example, marked the climax of Nixon's frustrations with thepress prior to his election as president in 1968.3 Background When Nixon resurfaced on the national political stageas president-elect in 1968, it could 1 The New Republic "PoorRichard's Bad Press," VolA65, No. 23, December 4, 1971. 2John Tebbe! & SarahMiles Watts The Press and the Presidency (New York: Oxford University Press, 1985), p. 501. 3 U.S. News & World Repnrt, "Will thePress Be Out To Get Nixon," December 2, 1968,p. 40. 1 6 have been easily predicted that his feud with the press would be resurrected because of his protracted problems with the news media. After all, the president and "certain elements of the press have been adversaries ... dating back to the time when Mr. Nixon as a young Congressman, helped exposed Alger Hiss Communist case in 1948.'1 Several years earlier, "newsmen had named him 'Tricky Dick' and to them he attributed part of the blame for his 1960 defeat."5 Nixon's personal style and inability to relax in front of the media made the resumption of hostilities between himself and the press inevitable. Nixon was somehow naive when it came to dealing with the media, an aspect of his personality that constmtly put him on a collision course with reporters. One reporter remarked that "the real tragedy of Richard Nixon is that he has regularly demonstrated an ability to cut his own political throat, and to do it with a deftness that newsmen and civil servants have come to admire."6 Nixon returned to the national scene in 1968, obviously with a personal pledge not to be victimized again by the press. As the president-elect, Mr. Nixon unfortunately began histour de servicein the White House by setting the stage for confrontation with the rric..dia by December 1968. In describing White House press relations to members of his cabinet and their wives, barely one month after he had been elected president, Nixon seemed to be sounding the battle cry: Always remember, the men and women of the news media approach this [interaction with the White House] as an adversarial relationship. The time will come when they will run lies about you, when the columnists and editorial writers will make you seem to be scoundrels or fools, or both and the cartoonists will depict you as ogres. Some of your wives will get up in the morning and look at the papers and start to cry. Now don't let this get you downdon't let it defeat you. And don't try to adjust your actions to do what you think would please them.7 The preceding statement by Mr. Nixon seemed to have defined, in clear terms, the rift between his 4lbid., U.S. News and World Report,1968, p. 39. 6Congressional Quarterly, "Nixon Administration and the News Media,"January 1, 1972, p.4. 6The New Leader, "Nixon, the Press and Vietnam," January 24, 1972,p. 5. 7New York Magazine, "How Nixon Outwits the Press," Vol. 5, October9, 1972, p. 54. 2 7 administration and the media. The media, on their part, also, seemed preparedto take on the Nixon administration as indicated in a released statement by a segment of the Washington Press Corps in which it proclaimed