VERSE
Hanley, John C.
If every citizen were not to be the sole judge of whether or not he had been attacked, at what length and how prominently, then some public institution would have to act as arbiter. Its power...
...Political partisans can and do resort to ridicule, invective and exhortation as well as to reason...
...But in the age of media giants like Time-Lile, CBS, the New York Times and the Washington Post, when starting a newspaper is beyond all but centi-millionaires, it is easy to see freedom of the press as little more than an institutional prerogative...
...A man who would believe that, as the Duke of Wellington said in another context, would believe anything...
...Would a "right to reply" board be less instinctively sympathetic to the President in its rulings than the Internal Revenue Service officials who praised him for the neatness of his tax returns...
...Almost every story in every publication would be the potential focus of a legal struggle as bitter as a custody fight...
...And yet . . . it might...
...Nixon was not being fair in 1952 when he attacked the Democrats as the party of "Communism, corruption and Korea...
...Any attempt to do so, they felt, would inevitably favor one faction over another, with the most likely beneficiary the faction in power...
...Seeing me, she flees The nest...
...This ignores the importance of small papers and magazines, many of which have an influence greater than their circulation, but it is an opinion widely held all the same...
...Its power would be very great indeed...
...Barry Goldwater was unfair in 1964 when he called Lyndon Johnson "the biggest faker in the United States" and Bobby Kennedy was unfair in 1968 when he said Johnson was "calling upon the darker impulses in the American spirit...
...Fairness" is not the object of political struggle, after all, but only a means, an intellectual style, a tone intended to persuade...
...The lack of "fairness" may work for or against an advocate...
...It is unfortunate that the press must be the chief defender of the press in these matters...
...In the meantime we must protect the independence of the newspapers that survive, even as we criticize their performance, because if they cannot publish without let or hindrance, who can...
...Commonweal: 2.$7...
...that is a tactical question...
...citizens then were jealous of their right to publish unimpeded because it was a right they might reasonably expect to exercise...
...But how are we to start more newspapers, when the necessary investment is in the tens of millions and the chances of financial success are problematic at best...
...The men who wrote the Constitution were hardly indifferent to such matters, but they concluded that fairness, like moderation and wisdom, could not be imposed upon political debate...
...If there were no appeal of its decisions its power would be totalitarian, and if there were appeal there would be no end to them...
...She implicates herself in leaves, Reaches an altitude and, taking flight, Vents overpowering fear in small-scale swoops And darts that counterfeit attack on me...
...That, as they say, is another subject altogether...
...Right to reply" advocates misunderstand--unless they understand only too well--the purpose of the First Amendment, which is to protect the freedom of citizens to publish their views, not to guarantee their fairness...
...Arrogance is the least congenial of human failings...
...Perhaps in strict fact he always wore his helmet...
...It is hardly fair to say of Gerald Ford that he has played too much football without his helmet...
...Attacks on freedom of the press get as far as they do, which is farther all the time, because a lot of people would like to see the Times taken down a peg or two and either do not see or do not care that their own freedom would inevitably be compromised as well...
...But if his freedom to speak and publish is to have substance, the choice of words must be his alone...
...The legal arguments in favor of "right to reply" statutes are so strained, and the consequences of their acceptance so clear, that it is hard to see how the Supreme Court could accept them...
...My pity out of touch with signals, I Act out the part of guilt and back away...
...Let a hundred flowers bloom...
...I see The setting mother...
...It is not hard to see who would benefit...
...The best cure for the ills of democracy, it is said, is more democracy, and the best cure for the failings of newspapers would be more newspapers...
...The Times may argue that it is defending the people's freedom in defending its own but this has a specious ring to it, like Charlie Wilson's assurance in the 1950s that what's good for General Motors is good for the country...
...Unfair attack is the common coin of politics...
...Things were different in the 18th century when starting a newspaper was a week's work for a handful of men...
...There is a lot of hostility toward the press in this country, for the same reason there is a lot of hostility toward city hall, General Motors and the Internal Revenue Service, because they are huge, indifferent and inaccessible...
...I pull my mower toward me, thinking now Of others who could not read past Disguises circumstances forced upon Starts of contrition, longing, love...
...it makes freedom of the press seem somehow self-serving...
...0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 JOHN C. HANLEY CONFRONTATION Easing my mower underneath the bough Too slender to support a cat, I have Within my reach a robin's nest...
...The purpose of "right to reply" statutes might be to guarantee a forum for the voiceless, but their effect would be to establish a degree--and inevitably a growing degree---of public control over the press...
Vol. 100 • May 1974 • No. 11
