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University Daily Kansan
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Friday, Jan. 22, 1965
In Reply...
Dear Sir:
THIS LETTER RELATES to your editorial "A Responsible Kansan," which appeared in the January 21 issue of the University Daily Kansan. In the editorial you said that students in schools of journalism, including that at KU, are taught that they have an ethical responsibility to their readers which transends all private motives of their own. You are correct. You are so taught. You then say (and you lay some of the blame on the faculty) that policies of news coverage practiced by the Kansan constitute hypocrisy and make a sham of the reader's right to know all the facts. You cite two cases to support this contention, and on these I should like to comment.
FIRST, YOU DENOUNCE a decision to withhold publication of a story about the "intentions" of a young woman involved in campus politics. Would you indeed run a story about someone's intentions, and specifically in a situation where the individual concerned has refused to make a statement as to her intentions? Might it possibly be considered ethically wrong to report reports of intentions as facts? There is at least room for debate on this point.
SECOND, YOU DENOUNCE the decision not to run a story in the Kansan last fall about the effigy hanging of Coach Mitchell. I felt there should have been a story about it, for it happened, and, particularly when several hundred persons have congregated and raised a ruckus in a public place, it seems to me it is in the public interest to tell in quiet words what happened. But there were others, such as Professor Elmer F. Beth, an authority on law of the press and certainly a person whose opinion must be respected in the area of ethics, who supported the Kansan and its decision not to run the story.
WHAT SHOULD BE DONE in either one of these situations is at least debatable. Jenkin Lloyd Jones delivered a William Allen White lecture in 1958 on the subject, "The Inexact Science of Truth-telling." In this lecture he reviewed case after case and situation after situation in which one side could yell loudly, "You are ethically bound to run a story about this," and the other side could yell equally loudly, "You are ethically bound not to run a story about this." The text of this speech is required reading in our course on ethics and responsibility, Editorial Problems and Policies.
Sincerely yours.
Burton W. Marvin
Dean, School of Journalism
To the Editor:
IN YESTERDAY'S University Daily Kansan (Jan, 21, 1965) Mr. Rick Mabbutt, in an editorial entitled "A Responsible Kansan," makes a plea for "ethical conduct in student journalism."
It is interesting to this untrained observer that Mr. Mabbutt in conducting his trial, violated the very ethics which he preached.
BY THIS I MEAN the printing of a rumor which at this time is still just a rumor and by invading the personal privacy of Miss Whitaker. It is in my opinion unfortunate, that Mr. Mabbbutt saw fit to charge Miss Whitaker with "running out" and "suppressing news." Neither of which is true.
The burden of being vice-president of the student body is immense and in the recent past no one has carried this burden in such a commendable manner as has Miss Whitaker. Her efforts have been unceasing and her dedication to the student body unsurpassed.
I WOULD ASK MR. MABBUTT if he bothered to confirm his information with Miss Whitaker. If he had done so, he would have found that she wished to:
Make her resignation to the Council first
Carry on her duties until the end of the semester and then resign (at which time her resignation would become news)
Complete her studies without the time consuming bother of charges and counter charges; and Inform the members of the faculty, with whom she had worked, of her transfer.
AS TO THE CHARGE that Miss Whitaker had planned to criticize the Council and run, it is not only senseless, but baseless. Miss Whitaker has been dedicated to the worth of student government since she assumed her position, and does not now, nor has she ever, had the intention of which Mr. Mabbutt attributes to her.
I WOULD ASK MR. MABBUTT what responsibility to his readers he performs when he "breaks" a story that hasn't occurred, when he reports unconfirmed rumors as fact, when he questions the integrity of a person who has contributed her time unselfishly to student government. I do not know what personal vendetta Mr. Mabbutt may have with the Kansan staff or faculty. It is however certainly unfortunate that he should have picked Miss Whitaker as a means to carry his "cause" to the students. We hear a great deal about the rights of the journalist. Perhaps Mr. Mabbutt should contemplate the rights of his prey.
MISS WHITAKER IS RESIGNING in good faith to continue her education at an institute which is outstanding in her field of study. It is each student's responsibility to take advantage of every educational opportunity available to him and Miss Whitaker would be neglecting this responsibility if she did not accept this particular opportunity.
As far as student government goes, Miss Whitaker will be irreplaceable, but those of us who have had the opportunity to work with her are thankful that student government has had the benefit of her services and talents, if only for a year.
IN CONCLUSION, it is a deplorable shame that Miss Whitaker, who so richly deserves praise for a job well done, should, upon parting this University, be blasted by Mr. Mabbut in an editorial based on rumor, unconfirmed opinion and a misconception, or at least distortion, of journalistic ethics.
Robert B. Stewart
Robert B. Beasley
Vancouver, B.C., senior
Student Body President
Editor:
HUS EDITORIAL. "A Responsible Kansan" of Jan. 21, Rick Mabbut courageously stated that "the Kansan has failed to inform its readers as honestly and accurately as it could . . . due to personal motivations and a desire to skirt controversial topics in the news columns." Mr. Mabbut listed what he felt were three results of a supressive atmosphere surrounding the Kansan: (1) the failure of news editors to report Kaye Whitaker's intention to resign her student body post, (2) the position of the faculty advisor in neglecting controversial news sources such as the Civil Rights Council, and (3) the absence of a story on an effigy hanging.
MR. MABBUTT'S POSITION on any of the three examples he used may be a tenuous one. Perhaps Kave Whitaker's intentions should not have been reported; perhaps an effigy story would have been libelous; perhaps the faculty advisor is correct in treating the Civil Rights Council as merely a minor news source. But Mr. Mabbutt's personal feelings on these matters as specific examples is not the issue. The problem is that the Kansan has consistently demonstrated weak-willedness and a "play it safe" attitude over a pattern of all the issues and news events.
(OTHER EXAMPLES are not hard to find. For instance, during the controversy over Sigma Nu's discriminatory clause, the Kansan persisted in leading its readers to believe that the local Sigma Nu chapter could not in any way retain its charter from the national group if it were to strike the clause locally. This impression was given by quoting Sigma Nu officers on
the Hill. However, it was common knowledge that several Sigma Nu chapters at other universities had received waivers from the national allowing them to strike the clause. News stories which appeared recently in the Kansan now tell of the "possibility" of the KU Sigma Nu chapter obtaining a waiver, as if his were a new development in national Sigma Nu policy. Actually, it is not a "possibility" at all. The waiver will be granted, and such a move is regarded as automatic whenever a local chapter is directed by the school administration to drop the clause or lose university affiliation, as is the case at KU.)
IT IS IRONICAL that a student newspaper could show such self-interest and negligence of controversy such as the Kansan has. Students, we are told, thrive on controversy; they are not bound by Establishment rules and security needs as are their "adult" counterparts. They have little reason to fear offending politicians, churches, or businesses. Most of all, they yearn for truth, and they must be willing to face any issue in seeking it. The Kansan, therefore, should enjoy much greater flexibility than its metropolitan counterparts. The tragic joke, as Mr. Mabbutt implied, is that the conservative Lawrence Journal-World has given better treatment to sensitive issues on the Hill than has the Kansan.
ONE HAS ONLY TO glance at other student newspapers to know that freedoms are open to the student press. The Harvard Crimson, for example, is a soul-mate in print or Harvarddians and "Cliffies." It consistently maintains dialogue on issues which strike at the hearts of students: premarital sex, student-faculty relationships, inter-racial dating, alcoholism, mental problems, and other serious and sensitive matters. The Crimson isn't beyond providing the students with the lighter side of life, as it consistently pokes fun at Yale, ugly buildings on campus, and a competing magazine. The fact that such excellent dailies as the Crimson are printed at schools which do not offer courses in journalism raises some real questions about the value and quality of the KU School of Journalism. Doesn't it follow that a university which offers academic training in journalism should be able to produce a more meaningful campus newspaper than one which does not? And does it not also follow that such a newspaper should be a reflection of the quality of that training?
I CAN RECALL being told as a high school student that KU offered highly respected courses in journalism, and my acceptance of this view was a major factor in coming to this school. But who can say that a high school student of t- day would be encouraged by reading the Kansan?
HOPEFULLY. Mr. Mabbutt's editorial will have become a turning point in revitalizing the value of this newspaper. It should be mentioned that he, like myself and others, must share the guilt for past failures. His editorial came at the end of his editorship; it should have come earlier. My personal reaction, as a member of an editorial class, to the suppressive atmosphere surrounding the Kansas was to give up and quit. Mr. Mabbutt showed a great deal more courage. Through his self-criticism and regard for truth he has left his post with honor. And he performed a fine service for the interests of this outstanding university.
Daili Hansan
Lee Byrd Salina, junior
111 Flint Hall
University of Kansas student newspaper
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"You Know What? It May Be A Great Society, But My Feet Still Hurt"
Civil Disobedience
AUSTIN —(CPS)— The increase in civil disobedience on the contemporary American scene reflects a need for change in U.S. social institutions and practices, two leading educators said recently.
The two, Morris Keeton, Dean of the Faculty at Antioch College, and Charles L. Black Jr., of the Yale Law School, spoke at a University of Texas Law School program on "Violation of Law as a Form of Social Protest."
BLACK SAID "much of what has lately been referred to . . . as civil disobedience is really not that at all" but is a "solemn assertion of the nation's law."
He said it is "facile and misleading" to assume that "no one is obligated to obey any law he thinks wrong," but added "there may be circumstances, going far beyond a simple conviction of injustice, in which such disobedience is both justified and compatible with the general continuance of the legal order."
Black said that "very little in the last years' protest against racial injustice, that no major component in that protest up to now, bears the character of disobedience to law."
"THESE PEOPLE (those involved in civil rights protests against injustice) do, indeed, act in conscious violation of what is asserted to be legal authority, and they do offer themselves for arrest by the constituted authorities. But they do so in the belief, more or less clearly held and more or less clearly warranted, that the law itself is on their side, and that the law' processes, in the end, will uphold them, or will fail to do so only through an error in law," he said.
Black said that "nothing in our Constitution makes such action incompatible with federal allegiance."
KEETON ECHOED THIS view, saying civil disobedience was not directed "toward overthrow of law and order," but rather "works within the upholding of that order to rectify specific wrongs within the legal system.
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"Civil disobedience is neither right nor good in and of itself," he said. "It is both beneficial and right under certain conditions. These conditions can be very complex."
KEETON SAID historically "dissent has cost us dearly, but it has also enlarged our freedom and multiplied its fruits." He said "there are overdue reforms to which the civil disobedience movements are an adaptive response. In particular," he said, "our progress in effective provision of equal rights to the races is too slow and too restricted in scope."
Neither speaker referred directly to the recent disturbances at the University of California's Berkeley campus.
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