Making News That Isn't

Sometimes, in dogged quest for the meaning behind the meaning, the Washington press corps finds top-headline news where there is none. This happened at Secretary of State John Foster Dulles' press conference last week, and before the over-interpretation and overextension were through, the press-created fantasy had reverberated round the world.

Most of the Dulles conference was devoted to discussion of the German reunification problem. The Secretary had characterized as "brutal" and "stupid" the latest Russian proposals for reunifying Germany, had restated his adherence to U.S. policy on Germany: "We believe in reunification by free elections.'' Late in the conference (the 26th question), the Newark News's able Reporter Arthur Sylvester spoke up.

Q. Mr. Secretary, is it our position that free elections are the only method of reuniting Germany? In other words, do we say, "no free elections, no reunification?"

A. Well, we never have said that. The formula of reunification by free elections was the agreed formula. It seems to us to be a natural method. But I wouldn't say that it is the only method by which reunification could be accomplished.

Headlines v. Facts. The U.S. Secretary of State, anxious to avoid the appearance of keeping his mind closed to new avenues toward peace, had made a logical answer to an "or else'' question. What he said was not new: in the Sept. 30 note to Moscow, the U.S. had offered to discuss "any other proposals genuinely designed to insure the reunification of Germany in freedom." But what Dulles said in his news conference last week was presented in much of the press as a positive statement suggesting an important change in U.S. policy.

DULLES SAYS VOTE NOT ONLY WAY TO UNITE GERMANY, boomed the Page One headline in the New York Times, above a story beginning: "Secretary of State Dulles said today the United States and its allies were trying to find new proposals for solving the problem of Germany." Elsewhere in the same issue the Times, which had printed a front-page-dope story two days before predicting just such a shift in U.S. policy, reported world reaction to the press conference over interpretation, quickly threshed by Timesmen abroad. From London: SECRETARY'S VIEW DISTURBS BRITISH. From Bonn: BONN is SHOCKED BY DULLES' WORDS.

At first, the big press services played down the Dulles-Sylvester exchange--or skipped it entirely. United Press International ignored it in its first story; the Associated Press put it in paragraph three, later moved it down to the sixth paragraph. But soon nearly everybody was following the imaginative lead adopted by the Times, the New York Herald Tribune, and several other papers. Said Walter Lippmann: "Mr. Dulles opened the door to negotiations on the future of Germany." Growled the New York Daily News: "It seems to us that Mr. Dulles has dropped a king-size brick."

Echoes & Repercussions. Because of the worldwide repercussions, both President Eisenhower and Secretary Dulles took pains to explain that there had been no change in policy. At that, some of the press compounded the press's fault by blaming it all on Dulles (he was "maladroit," tch-tched the Times), and charging that he was backing away from his press-conference position.

Perhaps the calmest participant throughout the whole press-born nap was Victim Dulles. It has happened to him before, and no doubt it will happen again. And perhaps the most remarkable newspaper handling of the story was that of the Newark News, whose Correspondent Sylvester had asked a legitimate question that caused a phony furor. The News didn't carry a line about the question and answer--until two days after the press conference, when the false echoes got so loud that they could no longer be ignored.

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