Press Versus Government: Constitutional Issues

by Donald J. Rogers

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0671611054
• ISBN13: 9780671611057
• Release Date: January 1986
• Publisher: Julian Messner
• Age Range: 10 to 14 years
• Grade Range: Grades 5 to 9

Customer Reviews

In the Wake of the Plame Affair

In the wake of the Valerie Plame affair, I decided to read a book on the struggles between the government and the press written 20 years ago for the perspective that time has. In his book Donald Rogers presents nine cases of struggles which he divides up into three sections. In the Press versus the Executive Branch, Rogers starts out with the Pentagon Papers, the Watergate Story, and the Invasion of Grenada. In the Press versus the Judicial Branch, Rogers includes Branzburg v. Hayes, the Mystery of Doctor X, and Zurcher v Stanford Daily. In the third section Rogers writes about the Press versus Other Government Officials; New York Times Company v. Sullivan, the H Bomb Secret, and Westmoreland v CBS, Inc. At the heart of each of these cases is the First Amendment. In writing his Supreme Court opinion of the Pentagon Papers case, Hugo Black lectured the executive branch saying that it was the purpose of the press to "serve the governed, not the governors." Justice Douglas added that the purpose of the First Amendment was to protect the press/media from seditious libel. (see Sedition Act of 1798) But the Pentagon Papers case was not a carte blanc for the press. In Zurcher v Stanford daily, the Supreme Court upheld the right of the police to search a newsroom, and is well known from the Plame case, reporters may have to reveal their confidential sources. The Invasion of Grenada presents an interesting parallel to our own times. The administration maintained that the reasons for the invasion were 1) the Point Salines airport was a threat to national security because of its length, 2) the Soviet arms buildup on Grenada threatened of other Caribbean nations, and 3) American citizens on Grenada were in danger. However when the press investigated these reasons it found that 1) other Caribbean nations had longer runways, 2) the legal right of other Caribbean nations to request a US invasion was in question, and 3) on the day before the invasion, the US embassy in Barbados had been informed that American citizens were not in danger. Like our own times, the stated reasons for invasion and the real reasons are not the same. Over 200 years ago, just after the Constitutional Convention, a woman asked Benjamin Franklin whether the delegates had created a republic or a monarchy. Franklin answered,"A republic, madam, if you can keep it." (from page 114)

Correction to Ms. Gelfand's Review

As much as I appreciate Ms. Gelfand's very positive review, I wish to make a correction. Using the Flesch Readability Scale, the publisher determined that the book's vocabulary is at a high school junior's level. Also, librarians have often placed the book in their adult reading sections because of the sophistication of the subject matter and the subtlety of the Justices' opinions.

Booklist Review by DMW

"This book summarizes major events and court cases involving freedom of the press, with emphasis on recent trends. Rogers, a former social studies teacher, describes and discusses the issues raised by the Pentagon papers, Watergate, the barring of the press from the invasion of Grenada, three trials regarding 'journalistic privilege' not to reveal sources and to be free from newsroom searches, a landmark newspaper libel case, government attempts to prevent publication of an article entitled 'The H-Bomb Secret' in The Progressive Magazine in 1979, and the Westmoreland vs. CBS libel case.Relating not only the opinions of media and government, but also the shifting climate of public opinion during the period, Rogers reports the facts as an absorbing story, while keeping a perspective on the largers issues raised. A balanced,well-documented, thought-provoking book."