Years ago, a county supervisor in Des Moines complained to me about the local newspaper’s coverage. The complaint was not what I expected because it wasn’t about a parochial issue like how he had been misquoted. Rather, it was because the paper’s belt-tightening had made it more difficult for him to do his job. He explained that, as a formulator of public policy, he depended heavily on the paper to keep him informed about local needs and problems. As he saw it, the paper’s single-minded focus on profits undercut the coverage he needed.
Bill Keller, the former head news honcho of the New York Times, voiced essentially the same insight in his column of December 3. Keller wrote: “The price we pay for not being where news happens can be reckoned not only in less good journalism but in less good policy. Because, make no mistake, some portion of the information governments call ‘intelligence’ is nothing more than attentive reading of the news.”
Much of that news-gathering is by the New York Times. Its capacity to gather and intelligently process news from around the world is unmatched. So when I was interviewed recently about what in contemporary journalism needs to be preserved, I answered, without hesitation, "The New York Times". I added that it would be catastrophic if the Sulzberger family splintered and the Times went the way of many other family-owned newspapers in this country.
Until now the quality of the Times has been protected by two classes of stock that effectively keeps the Sulzberger family in control. But other supposedly airtight family-ownership arrangements proved less than durable when stock was dispersed to shirttail relatives who tired of modest dividends. Who knows what will happen to the Times under that circumstance? The Times is much too important to readers and to the formulation of public policy for that to be left to chance.
It is vital, before the horse escapes the barn, to create a Committee to Protect and Preserve the New York Times to assure its future. The committee would be open to ordinary admirers as well as to financiers with the know-how necessary to fashion arrangements to guarantee family members that they will be rewarded for their patience and support.
Journalism in this country is littered with the wreckage of family-owned newspapers torn apart by the lure of big payouts. It should not be allowed to happen to the New York Times.
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