Censorship in the Making

The most outspoken sense-making examination of Government censorship yet offered the U.S. public was last week put forth in an article in the June issue of FORTUNE. Its basic perspective: "That the deepest duty of a democratic press in wartime is to remain aggressively free, critical, and informative."

Some of FORTUNE'S points:

P: "The press in a democracy is still the fourth estate; it is almost a fourth branch of government. It is not, as in Germany or the U.S.S.R., a branch of the government, .but a part of our constitutional system. It is impossible to imagine governmental processes in the U.S. without a press. Its first function is to inform, its second to criticize. Censorship is a direct threat to both functions and hence a direct threat to effective democracy. . . ."

P: "The question that lies at the heart of the whole present censorship debate in the U.S. is the confusion of the press with the enemy. They are not . . . one and the same. . . . Press censorship is not going to curtail or hinder the flow of information to the enemy because the enemy is not dependent in important measure on the press."

As "prime points of a censorship policy in the best interest of the nation in this emergency," FORTUNE declares:

1) Unequivocal opposition to press censorship in any form, with this exception: Press cooperation in maintaining secrecy of a limited list of truly vital technical secrets and of troop, ship, and plane movements and other information of strictly military value so long as they are secret in fact.

2) The most effective way of keeping valuable information from the enemy is: a) secrecy at source; b) peripheral censorship (outgoing communications), which may, if necessary, include a limited censorship of radio.

3) The Army and Navy have the undisputed right to control correspondents and photographers in military areas and to censor their news and pictures. Such censorship, however, should be limited to vital military and naval information and not extend to the vague fields of politics and public morale.

Concludes FORTUNE: "The one hard and indisputable fact about censorship is that there is nothing, absolutely nothing, to be said in its favor. It is a deliberate retrogression, an admission of defeat, temporary at least, in the ageless fight for freedom and truth. ... But whereas the case against censorship is overwhelming, there is a case for propaganda--good propaganda, of which the best is the truth . . . Democracy's most potent weapon against all-out totalitarian warfare is, in the most practical sense, all-out truth." Meanwhile last week censorship developments included:

P: A bill submitted to the Senate Naval Affairs Committee by Chairman David I. Walsh, making it a criminal offense to photograph any kind of naval equipment, and giving Secretary of Navy Frank Knox total powers of censorship over news photographers.

P: A request by Maritime Commissioner Rear Admiral Emory S. Land that newspapers, radio stations, etc., practice "voluntary censorship" regarding movements of all merchant ships being used to aid the democracies.

P: The Navy announced that in the future any newsman wishing to visit a private plant working on Navy contracts must first apply to the plant for permission.

The plant can refuse or pass on the request to the Navy. If plant and Navy both approve, in due time the newsman will get his permit.

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