THE WAY THE PRESS SAW IT

...The Progressive case should spur the Government to come up with new procedures to give the public the nuclear information it needs, while denying our enemies the information they want...

...We would not argue that there are no secrets the press should not publish...

...St...

...If you believe the Government's contention — not yet decisively rebutted by the magazine or its apologists — that certain of Morland's disclosures might accelerate the proliferation of H-bombs, then you must accept that the public's safety, security, and tranquility were also at issue...

...Chicago Tribune An outdated act The information needed to build an atomic bomb — less potent than a hydrogen bomb but still immensely powerful — has long been, for all practical purposes, a matter of public record...

...is far from clear that we need extensive technical information on H-bombs to debate policies involving their possible use...

...In a world dominated both by the arms race and by the growing attachment to nuclear power, the threat to our freedom is as great, or greater, than the threat to our security...

...And lest this reading of the law fall, it then proclaimed that "technical" informaton — allegedly distinguishable from political ideas — was never entitled to the free speech and press guarantees of the First Amendment...

...There should be some room for editorial responsibility in the offices of the news media as well...

...Wisconsin State Journal, Madison A point well made The real issue is not the need for censorship but the need to get rid of annihilative weapons...

...The Capital Times, Madison, Wisconsin The world will not crumble Now that the "secret" is out, the Government says it will drop its suit against The Progressive...

...The specter of prior restraint of the media, which is what the First Amendment is all about, remains intact...

...this is the political and criminal reality of today, we return to the basic question of the propriety of the publication of thermonuclear how-to-do-it manuals...

...The Portland (Oregon) Observer...

...Have the people no vital interest apart from idle curiosity about how thermonuclear bombs are made...

...If it is left unchallenged it will remain as a dangerous precedent for future assaults on our constitutional freedoms...

...Good...

...The suit should never have been filed...

...Proliferation of the information in question has been under way for a generation____The responsibility of governments in possession of nuclear weapons is to negotiate and implement serious steps toward getting rid of them...

...Our national security is vital...

...By publishing the Hansen letter, The Press Connection helped to make that point and to uphold freedom of the press...

...there are still far too many of his ilk...

...Once they get out, they tend to spread quickly—just as this one was...

...The Seattle Times Escaping a terrible setback We see the outcome as mainly an avoidance of a terrible precedent that would enlarge the Government's power to engage in secrecy (both justified and unjustified), impair the ability of the press to disseminate information and reduce the public's defense against government by deceit of the governed____Thus, the Government's abandonment of its case against The Progressive is no occasion for crowing about a great new breakthrough for freedom of the press, but it is cause for journalists and other citizens alike to breathe a sigh of relief that a dangerous restriction on freedom has been avoided...

...is that of terrorists armed with small nuclear weapons holding entire communities hostage on threat of catastrophe...

...Chicago Sun- Times The Government should prosecute The only truly effective way the Government can keep secrets is to keep them...

...Pretending that this requirement, the most essential one the world is confronting, can be partially satisfied by censorship is an evasion of that responsibility...

...Our form of government rests on freedom of information protected by the First Amendment...

...and that may be the most important lesson The Progressive has forced on us...

...The San Francisco Chronicle The real question The real question is Government secrecy and whether the people have the right to know not only about the bomb but about the technology and economy that support it and the dangers thereof...

...By the dismissal, bad press law has been avoided...

...We would have liked for a court to have said so...

...weaponry which could seriously harm this country...

...The only real protections then available against publication of such secrets are the moral constraints felt by those into whose hands they have fallen or the deterring effect of the criminal provisions of the Atomic Energy Act____In this case, neither was sufficient to prevent publication — the former because too many people thought the Government was carrying secrecy too far and the latter because some people, apparently including the editors of The Press Connection, believe the Government lacks either the will or the ability to prosecute____While a prosecution of those editors could jeopardize the current classification system and, perhaps, portions of the Atomic Energy Act itself, a decision by the Department of Justice not to prosecute could well turn that act's deterring provisions into a sham...

...If the courts now avoid ruling on them, these doctrines would lie around, in Justice Jackson's phrase, like loaded pistols...

...The Government...

...Kenosha (Wisconsin) News Celebration is premature Victory celebrations on the most important issue in the case — prior restraint of the press — are premature...

...The Washington Post Unload the pistols We congratulate The Progressive and the American Civil Liberties Union for resisting, against the advice even of some customary defenders of a free press...

...Lacking evidence that anyone had stolen H-bomb secrets, it claimed the right to suppress all nuclear weapons information on the grounds that it is "born classified" — even if born in the minds of free men...

...The right to publish does not necessarily extend to everything that is not specifically prohibited by the Government...

...Our congratulations to The Press Connection and The Progressive...

...It hangs over the Bill of Rights like a dark cloud...

...Los Angeles Times Dispel the cloud The Government's decision to drop its Federal court action against The Progressive leaves unsullied the Warren decision...

...The story is scheduled to be printed in the November Progressive...

...Toledo Blade Censorship is not the answer If governments built nuclear weapons simply because they know how, nations with those weapons would include Canada, West Germany, Japan, Sweden, and almost certainly others, in addition to nations that have built them for motives involving security and prestige...

...Louis Post-Dispatch A threat to our freedom The threat of proliferation, this assault on the First Amendment reminds us, lies not just in the physical destruction that may someday occur from the spread of weapons technology, but in the police state psychology that develops as Government strives to "protect" us from accidents, disasters, or terrorism...

...Only through the bold action of a few will the constitutional rights of all Americans be protected...

...In that event, the Government would be tempted to ignore what it should have learned from this affair about protecting its own secrets and to rely even more on a dangerous system of ineffective prior restraints — which it should in fact abandon...

...This kind of situation places those with the authority to invoke secrecy without justification in possession of power that is potentially more dangerous than a hydrogen bomb____Unless the press challenges the Government under present conditions, censorship can be invoked under the flimsiest pretenses and for purposes that have little or nothing to do with national security or the dissemination of secrets...

...The possibility...

...The New York Times The specter remains intact If the news media are to assert that freedom of the press is absolute, then The Progressive's case was a poor set of facts...

...Warren's drastic ruling was taken without requiring the Government to prove an overriding danger to the nation was involved in an article that was put together from material in the public domain...

...The act has been used to keep Americans from making informed decisions about nuclear power and weaponry...

...But] before suffering a technical knockout, the Government had created some pernicious legal theory...

...The missing ingredient in the dispute was a lack of wisdom and responsibility in invoking these claims...

...Detroit Free Press Precious little justification There is precious little justification for publishing data concerning U.S...

...The Ann Arbor News A dangerous option still open We'd have preferred to win this case on the basis of a thorough airing in court and a judicial determination that the Government has no business trying to prohibit publication of material it had allowed to slip into the public domain over the years...

...has not given up its claim of the right to invoke censorship of the publication of supposedly classified information which might violate laws such as the Atomic Energy Act____The fact is that Government attorneys, in this case at least, insisted that supporting information for their arguments had to be kept secret...

...Milwaukee Sentinel The act should be rewritten The Atomic Energy Act, which tries to make information about nuclear power the exclusive possession of a priesthood of bureaucrats and scientists, should be rewritten, not invoked...

...The time to have protected these H-bomb "secrets" was long ago, by keeping a tighter rein on what the Government itself and its scientists made public...

...but the abuse of the security argument does not render it invariably unsound...

...By backing down now without a trial, the Government can leave open its option to try again at a time when the facts don't interfere so much with its effort...

...Articles about nuclear secrets tend to shift the judicial burden from the Government to prove irreparable harm — where the burden should lie under the Pentagon Papers decision — to the media to justify its publication...

...The Washington Star Too many Idi Amins While Idi Amin has been removed from the roster of terrorist effectives...

...It can be argued that once a country has acquired the A-bomb, the damage is done...

...The Government's case simply collapsed when other publications began to print similar H-bomb information, found by other amateur students in public sources...

...THE WAY THE PRESS SAW IT Here is a sampling of editorial opinion on the Government's abandonment of its First Amendment suit againstThe Progressive: We need no more such victories We are deeply concerned by the issue of prior restraint raised by The Progressive case, yet we are left with the disturbing conclusion that, if this was a victory for the First Amendment, we need no more such victories...

...The public and the press are now left with the Warren ruling...

...National "security" can be a slippery justification...

...The world will not crumble...

...But perhaps some bureaucrats should...

...But the Atomic Energy Act, which actually labels some information "classified at birth," may be outdated and in need of amendment...

...Because...

...Milwaukee Journal Far from clear Was the outcome indeed a "clear-cut victory" for the American public...

...It would be wiser to unload them while they lie within reach...