Censorship Ground Rules

The official rules of what-you-can't-print were laid down last week by Censor Byron Price.

Censor Price's ground rules were all labeled "requests." The rules are to apply to news, photographs, maps, letters to the editor, interviews with soldiers or sailors on leave, even advertising. They set up a list of 105 subjects concerning which editors are asked to print nothing except "when authorized by appropriate authority." The range of subjects includes the weather, damage to military objects, movements of the President of the U.S. and allied military or diplomatic missions; the progress of war production; location of minefields, of archives and art treasures. Sample paragraph:

"Specific information about war contracts, such as the exact type of production, production schedules, dates of delivery, or progress of production; estimated supplies of strategic and critical materials available; or nationwide 'roundups' of locally published procurement data except when such composite information is officially approved for publication."

In short, the publication of virtually any news about the U.S. war effort is now forbidden unless specifically sanctioned by the Government. Since all information is of value to the enemy in one degree or another, Censor Price's code could be literally stretched to a ridiculous extent. That it might be so stretched, few editors feared. The majority trusted Censor Price, an A.P. veteran, to give them the best breaks he knew how.

The press itself was largely responsible for the issuance of the code, hoping thereby to escape from the uncertainty of not knowing what was printable. Actually, the list, couched necessarily in blanket terms, solved few problems for the press. Most of the important news of today comes under its terms and no reporter or editor can check everything back with the censor. It did not relieve newsmen of their main risk, which is not merely of being fined and sent to jail under the Espionage Act, but of being accused of being enemies of their country.

Vaguer was his answer to a more crucial question: What about Congress, which is not subject to censorship? Censor Price classified as "official" the Congressional Record and committee proceedings, but warned against word-of-mouth information from individual Congressmen. (Columnist Frank Kent has suggested that Congressmen's immunity to censorship may put them back into the news spotlight as they have not been for many years.)

Censor Price's own A.P. ran into a concrete censorship problem last week. While other newspapers and wire services vainly besought Navy for confirmation of the torpedoing of a second ship off New York last week, A.P. on its own hook got confirmation from the Coast Guard (now part of the Navy), released the story despite Navy's official declaration that it was "impossible to confirm" the news. Rival newsmen vainly redoubled their frantic appeals for official confirmation. Next day Navy confirmed the sinking, apologized for its "confusion."

The code undoubtedly left much to be desired. It went on the tacit assumption that any information given to the U.S. public was thereby given to the enemy. It did not make even a theoretical concession to the principle that news should be kept from getting out of the country (by peripheral censorship) so that the public at home can be allowed to have significant information. By making censorable all news of the progress of production it at least theoretically denied the public any chance to know and criticize if the President's arms program (60,000 planes and 45,000 tanks this year) falls down badly--any chance to know, that is, unless the Government chooses to admit it. Under such circumstances abject compliance by the press might prove far from the public interest.

But the press as a whole was not critical of the code. It was so anxious to be patriotic that it accepted the code without public criticism. It shared in part the attitude of famed liberal William Allen White's Emporia Gazette. Dropping the syndicated column Washington Merry-Go-Round, Editor White explained: "We. felt the authors, Mr. Pearson and Mr. Allen, were too anxious to print . . . matters which would offend the censor and possibly give aid and comfort to our enemies. . . . These young men are good reporters. They are honest and conscientious but just a shade too enterprising for these troublous times."

The attitude of the press in general could be further gauged by the fact that some publishers asked Mr. Price to station censors in their offices so that they could be relieved of worry about printing anything that might get them into trouble with the Government.

This attitude made it clear that Censor Price erred when he praised the press because it "understands the need for temporary sacrifice." Censorship is not a material sacrifice for the press. It is chiefly a sacrifice for those who are kept in the dark, i.e., the public.

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