THE WAY THE PRESS SAW IT
THE WAY THE PRESS SAW IT Here is a sampling of editorial opinion on the case of the United States vs. The Progressive et a I: Censors at work What the Government really aims to protect is a...
...However, if the court determines that all the information in The Progressive article is readily available from public sources, then the article should be printed as written...
...Twin Falls (Idaho) Times-News Let the fact decide If, in fact, the article contains secret information on the bomb's triggering device, it should not be published...
...And if it's common knowledge among those with a decent scientific background (or an encyclopedia), let the magazine publish...
...The New York Times Wrong issue, wrong time, wrong place Under the circumstances that are known at present, a continuation of a court battle that already has begun might well end in the imposition of prior restraint on publication for the first time in the history of this country...
...Daily Cardinal, Madison, Wisconsin Relying on Government expertise...
...It would take a more-than-decent scientific background to produce the Plutonium, much less an H-bomb...
...The battle is being fought for all of us...
...Is it too much to expect the courts to see through the scare-talk...
...Minneapolis Tribune The need for self-restraint Some are making this out to be a free press issue...
...We have always thought that the First Amendment is most precious when authority tries to enforce such views...
...In These Times Kill the article The best thing the magazine can do is to kill its H-bomb article and not pursue a lawsuit that will chip away at the First Amendment...
...San Francisco Chronicle The essence of democracy The problem is that if the courts allow the Government to kill the article, none of the rest of us shall ever have the information by which to judge whether the judges were right — and that information is the essence of democratic government...
...Louis Post-Dispatch The Government's real motives The Government's attempt to prohibit publication by The Progressive of a story on "The H-Bomb Secret" has less to do with anxiety over nuclear weapons proliferation than over the proliferation of legitimate information about the nuclear weapons industry among the American people...
...The Barnesville (Ohio) Enterprise Bombs from newstands If a magazine writer can figure out the bomb from interviews and non-classified documents, why cannot physicists and engineers and embassy attaches...
...we suspect that the best way for the courts to consider The Progressive case is simply to stop relying exclusively on Government expertise...
...It is the duty of any publication in this country no...
...Denton (Texas) Record Chronicle A moral sin Even though they may not have sinned constitutionally, they have sinned morally----The magazine has acted irresponsibly — going too far in taking advantage of its First Amendment rights — and, therefore, banning such an article should not be construed as a violation of that amendment...
...Government on the ropes, and all of us would do well to heed The Progressive's point which has infuriated the Feds...
...The Albuquerque Tribune They have a point Seldom do we find ourselves in agreement with arguments of The Progressive, a monthly magazine of the American Left which, however well-meaning, is often ridiculously unrealistic...
...The Brattleboro (Vermont) Reformer A greater danger to the press If The Progressive's arguments are as strong as we think they are, the magazine would have fared much better under the impartial panel proposed by the judge than under the Supreme Court, which has been increasingly reckless with First Amendment freedoms...
...The Charlotte Observer Bad cases make bad law At this juncture, from what we have seen of [the Supreme Court's] attitude toward the First Amendment, it seems inadvisable to pursue such a case to that tribunal...
...In any case, the panel's proposals would not have been binding on The Progressive...
...The Philadelphia Daily News Not a choice of life or freedom The Progressive was right to reject the judge's proposal that a panel of experts mediate between the magazine and the Government over the Government's demand that 1,322 words be deleted...
...Los Angeles Times A panel of physicists If sensitive information is involved, so sensitive that it has to be heard before a judge in secrecy, then let it be heard that way...
...And Judge Warren has become its accomplice — in his reasoning, in his misguided request that the magazine let experts do the censoring and in his overreaching opinion that The Progressive had no reason to publish such an article...
...Its refusal could invite greater danger to the press in general — and, of course, to the public's right to know...
...This month, though, The Progressive has the U.S...
...Editor & Publisher A publisher's duty The Progressive's determination not to negotiate away First Amendment rights and to appeal the dangerous precedent-setting decision to the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals is commendable, bul hardly surprising...
...The Progressive is seeking to sustain the First Amendment's unequivocal guarantee of a press free from Government restraint...
...It had nothing to lose by accepting the judge's offer...
...Let's put together a panel of physicists to testify about just how important all this information is that everybody in Government seems so frightened about...
...The only way to reduce the nuclear danger is with workable international controls...
...Five countries have the bomb already...
...Does the Government imagine that other nations will begin to wish for bombs of their own, and then get the know-how, simply by browsing at American newsstands...
...The nuclear threat doesn't come from magazines but from governments, including ours...
...Press freedom is hardly an issue, like a wage dispute, to be settled by splitting a difference...
...There is an old lawyer's adage that "bad cases make bad law" and we feel this is one of those...
...Nor is the issue, as Judge Warren suggested, a choice between freedom and death by the H-bomb...
...Chicago Sun- Times Not alone The Progressive is not alone in this battle...
...The Capital Times, Madison, Wisconsin Magazines are not the threat The day when safety was guaranteed by secrecy is long past...
...They should then find that the only "direct, immediate, and irreparable damage" in this case is not the remote possibility that an Idi Amin will build an H-bomb but, rather, the damage done to freedom of speech by prior restraint...
...The Nation...
...But doesn't it come down to this, that a handy guide to building your own H-bomb is just too dangerous to allow to be passed out to every kid on the block, especially to heads of state like Idi Amin and his booster, Yasser Arafat...
...No matter how right the author and his editors are in asserting all the information in the article is in the public domain, we believe the highest court probably supported by public opinion will sustain the Atomic Energy Act and we feel the press and the public will be the losers...
...Although the danger from H-bombs is real enough, it will not be met by stifling a free press but by striving for disarmament...
...Acting in a way to favor nuclear proliferation and to limit press freedom is most strange in a publication that professes the liberal creed...
...That seems to be a fair application of the court's "immediate threat" doctrine...
...to barter with the Government on censorship and to appeal repressive court decisions up to the Supreme Court...
...It is the wrong issue, at the wrong time, in the wrong place...
...The Progressive et a I: Censors at work What the Government really aims to protect is a system of secrecy, which it seeks now to extend to the thought and discussion of scientists and writers outside Government...
...Seattle Post-Intelligencer John Mitchell's dream case As a press-versus-Government First Amendment contest, this, as far as we can tell, is John Mitchell's dream case — the one the Nixon administration was never lucky enough to get: a real First Amendment loser...
...But let both sides be heard without an automatic assumption that the Government's contention is true...
...The Washington Post A chilling thought If a relatively non-scientific reporter for a small magazine, working on a limited budget, can learn what this country claims to be one of its most highly "secret" secrets, it's a chilling thought to contemplate what secrets foreign countries with motivation and money have obtained...
...That part of the press which is lamenting the notion of a court's daring to exercise "prior restraint" to stop this H-bomb article should ask itself whether there are not some interests and subjects calling for a publisher's own prior self-restraint...
Vol. 43 • May 1979 • No. 5
