Vagabond Editorials

By Jack Dionne

As this is written, the newspaper editors and publishers pf the United States have been meeting for several days in Washington. In defense of free speech and freedom of the press they have fairly taken the shirt off of many men and things in official Washington.

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First, the American Society of Newspaper Editors met. Their President deeply deplored the fact that our present administration "is less concerned with the freedom of the press than an American government should be." He likewise charged the Black Committee with infringing on the freedom of the press, and also with invading .,the ordinary rights of American citizens, long guaranteed by the Constitution," which, he said, are being .,ignored by the indefensible, dictatorial methods of the committee."

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A day or so later I read reports of the meeting of the American Newspaper Publishers' Association, in Washing- ton. The publishers endorsed what the editor had said, and added much fire. A report dubbed the Black Committee of the Senate as "the Black Inquisition" and urged all "victims of illegal acts" of the Senate Committee to demand criminal prosecution of "all involved in the odious affair."

"Ifnder the specious pretext of investigating lobbying,', said the report of the publishers, the committee has undertaken "a campaign of persecution and harassment against individuals, organizations, and newspapers" which have been critical of their doings.

I must thank an old n"rd-rn", Southern Democratic newspaper for handing me the finest piece of reading I had seen in a decade. Of course, no mention was made of the thing editorially, but all over its editorial page was printed