UNDISCIPLINED MEDIA THREATEN FREEDOM

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91-00561R000100100060-4
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 24, 2012
• Sequence Number: 60
• Publication Date: May 22, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/02/24: CIA-RDP91-00561 R000100100060-4
I/
ARTICU
USA TODAY
OM.F . J[` Id 22 May 1986
~j JOHN D. LAWLOR
Opposing view
Undisciplined media
threaten freedom
WINNETKA, Ill. - Famed
f investigative reporter Seymour
Hersch says, "In all my stories,
I violate national security."
A Journalism class at Colum-
bia University overwhelmingly
agrees that military secrets
should be published without re-
gard for troop safety.
During Vietnam, then-Secre-
tary of State Dean Rusk asks a
US- reporter, "Whose side are
you on, anyhow?"
In Lebanon, the press identi-
Iles the exact location of Ma-
rine artillery positions: Within
24 hours, the positions come
under fire.
Ben Bradlee of The Wash-
ington Post, answerable to no
elected official, claims he can
interpret demands of national
security better than an assis-
tant secretary of defense "who
might have been selling used
cars in Omaha two years ago."
Is this what the citizens who
send their sons and daughters
off to serve their country really
want? Probably not.
In The Federalist, No. 75, Al-
exander Hamilton sagely
wrote that the meaning of free-
dom of the press was indeter-
minate; it must depend on the
ebb and flow of public opinion.
Today, our press probably
has greater freedom than in
any other country. But still, the
press does not "own" the First
Amendment; it belongs to all of
us. There is no mandate that
sets the press above the people.
They both have a right to
rs
know, and they both have a Amendment. Therein lies the
right "not to know" under con- threat to the optimum function-
ditions established by elected lag of our great experiment in
representatives and tempered democracy.
John D. Lawlor, a retired
Army brigadier general and
World War II combat com-
mander, teaches U.S. govern-
ment at a community college.
by the courts.
In the long run, the real
threat to the First Amendment
comes not so much from its
misuse by certain members of
government who are con-
strained to operate under a
wisely conceived system of
checks and balances; it comes
66
The press does not
`own' the First
Amendment; it be-
longs to all of us.
99
from an undisciplined press,
which largely operates in a
power vacuum.
So long as the press refuses
to discipline itself, as do most
other professions, and so long
as the plethora of codes and
standards designed to sponsor
true professionalism remain
largely unobserved, the peo.
pie's confidence in the press as
a privileged Institution will
erode.
Most certainly, this will be
reflected in the meaning we as
a people give to the Fi
t
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/02/24: CIA-RDP91-00561 R000100100060-4