PAGE TWO
THE MICHIGAN DAILY
t: 'tTl CTY A tT A Y S/"STT t 7 i'! nnr a
T~lEMICICEN f~_-
rntWIlcRSAY AUGUT 3, 96
77
Year Legacy of Editorial Freedom Contiim
res
--- --- I - - - - -1 .1 - I
(continued from Page 1) members viewed it as a char
All this brought intense criti- "do something" about ther
cism of The Daily-from Regents, while others thought it woul'
s o m e faculty members and The Daily a vote of confi
administrators. The c r i t i c i s m and take some of the pressu
brought intense pressure on the the Board.
Board in Control of Student Pub- Therfaculty did even
lications to "do something" about authorize a study of Univ
The Dily.communications media but a
The Daily. ed initiating the type of in
The Board oversees all student gation requested by the
publications including Gargoyle, obviously reluctant to step
Generation and the Michiganen- the controversy. Thus the pre
sian as well as The Daily. An in-
dependent s t u d e n t association
formed The Daily in 1890 and in
1903 sold it to the Faculty Senate,
which had earlier created a Board
in Control of Student Publications.
As it evolved{ over time, the
Board lost its tie to the, faculty
and became an autonomous body
reporting directly to the Regentsh
like the Board in Control of In- r
tercollegiate Athletics.
Consisting today of five faculty
members, three students, two
alumni and two administrators
(the vice-presidents for student
affairs and University relations),f
the Board has increasingly limited
itself to overseeing The Daily's
financial affairs, avoiding any in-
trusion into Daily editorial policy.
But the Board had voted-on
Feb. 6-to ask the faculty for an
"investigation" into the "proper
purpose, function and responsi-
bility" of The Daily. Some Board Killingsworth
nce to
paper,
d give
dence
re off
tually
versity
avoid-
on the Board to "do something"
increased as the day for Daily
senior appointments approached.
Daily senior appointments are,
in the view of Daily staffers, a
question of editorial freedom just
as much as news and editorial
content.
They generally believe that the
editors have the requisite 2.0 aver-
age and meet the other empirical
standards set forth.
eral Board members had suggested discussing, the Free Press editorial,
that adding several new elements the telegrams and the disclosure
to The Daily's Code of Ethics about Hatcher all apparently had
vesti- Board's appointments role should
Board, be limited to seeing that the jun-
into iors recommended for senior ap-
essure pointments by the outgoing senior
But perhaps because senior ap- mignt serve as a "face-saver" for the desired effect.
pointments have become virtually the wavering Board members. The Board voted, first 6-5 in a
the only real control it can em- Rapoport and Killingsworth straw poll and then 7-4 in an
ploy-and even though it usually talked over seven of these pro- official tally, to accept Rapoport
rubberstamps the seniors' recom- posed "additions"-such as an edi- and the rest of the senior editors'
.mendations-the Board generally torial-page spot for faculty and recommendations.
says that its role should be more administration opinion, which had Crisis Not Over
direct and influential than that. already been initiated-and Rapo- The crisis wasn't entirely over
. When the Board had finished port began discussing these with yet, however. Many Daily staffers
interviewing the juniors recom- the three Board members. were concerned that the seven
mended for senior positions, Prof. Important Developments proposals submitted to the Board
LukeCooperrider of the law Tby Rapoport, largely as face-
LukeCooprnier o thelaw There were also three other im- savers, might be construed as con-
school, Board chairman, called the portant developments before Feb. cessions the Board had squeezed
senior editors into the room and 23: s shBrad
said that the Board had voted 7-4 36 state legislators and num-
to reject Rapoport as editor-al- erous Daily alumni sent telegrams
though he declined to say why- t Hatche and Cooperide, con
and added that it would considerj demning Rapoport's rejection and Ti t
Rapoport for any other position urging that the Board reverse its
on the senior editorial staff, decision.
Authorize Strike '0The Detroit Free Press print- S a les,
The Board then adjourned, set- ed a strongly-worded editorial at-
ting another meeting two days tacking the Board, praising Rapo-
later, Feb. 20. port and urging his appointment.
The Daily staff met continu- It had earlier attacked the pro- Chances are you've never had
ously until 4:30 the next morning posed faculty investigation of The your hands in the operation of a
and several times during the next Daily in a laudatory editorial ' $250,000 business. If not, The Mi-
three days to discuss what it titled, "The Daily Does Its Job." chigan Daily business staff is an
would do if the Board refused to The Daily learned from a opportunity that you cannot pass
appoint Rapoport on Feb. 23.'hi h ersiyol thatdrem- by. We run our own business from
Finally, it decided to authorize high University official that Pres the smallest classified ad to the
the senior editors to call a strike ident Hatcher had tried-unsuc distribution of over 10,000 papers
and shut down publication if nec- cessfully-to get Board Chairman to students and facultyacross the
essary. Cooperrider to block Rapoport. campus and throughout the na-{
At the same time, Daily staffers The Daily then printed the tion.
and several Board members had story-it appeared the morning of It takes awell-organized staff
been meeting in an attempt to the Board meeting - which of fifty students to do the work on
"work something out," as one prompted faculty and student the business staff. Publishing The
Board member put it. comment highly critical of Hatch- Daily six times a week means that
Rapoport himself had met with er's attempt to manipulate the each of those fifty people shares
three Board members who werte supposedly independent board. a large amount of responsibility in
known to be wavering in their A combination of Rapoport's his department. As a result Th
opposition to him. Moreover, sev- lobbying, the proposals he was Daily is always ready to welcome
- new faces.
t
r
5
1
i
i
out of The Daily in exchange for
Rapoport's appointment.
As the New York Times reporter
there to cover the story later
drawled, "There are two schools
of thought about those proposals"
- the "face-saving" school and
the "concession" school.
But in a series of hectic meet-
ings held during the Board meet-
ing, the staff voted to accept
Rapoport's suggestion that the
staff could vote to accept or reject
any or all of the proposals at,
a later staff meeting.
In the end, most Daily staffers
considered that they had won al
victory over the Board-which ir
the early 1960's had eventually
managed to get the senior editors
to revise some of their recom-
mendations and in 1943 had
blocked the appointment of c-e
junior recommended by the seniui
editors
Rapoport's rejection was the
first time in the 77-year history
of The Daily that the Board had
rejected the senior editors' recom-
mendation for Daily editor-in-
chief. And, Daily staffers contend,
it was the first clear-cut defeat
for the Board over appointments
as well,
*
off Means Business'
Circulation Mount
cokes you'll find that the people
who "really" manage the paper are
the junior managers. The junior
year on The Daily is probably the
most busy of the four yoi'll have
on the staff. You are now the
person responsible for the quality
and type of ad that will run in
tomorrow's paper or the many
problems that always seem to
come up in circulation.
Direct Contact t
and then spend a whole year
watching your ideas take effect.
The senior staff focuses around
the business manager; a trainee
just a few semesters ago. He is the
one responsible for the fifty peo-
ple who work on his staff and all
of the decisions that they make.
The Daily's biggest asset isn't
the amount of money that it
makes or its net worth, but the
fact that it is truly an independent
I!.
Rapoport
is immaterial
1
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staff is probably the easiest thing
to do-a talk with our personnel
director is all that it takes to be-
come a member.
If you should decide The Daly
is for you then the next few
months will be spent working in
each of our departments as a
trainee. Each trainee spends a.
month in each department, mov-
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a complete knowledge of how the
business staff functions.
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After completing v our tratrte-
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added responsibility comes one of
the many small rewards found on
The Daily and in this case it is
monetary.
An assistant managership is
really only the second step in your
progress to the top of the busi-
ness staff hierarchy. After a few
weeks of work and many nickel
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As a junior, your contacts are di- paper-a privilege that not many
rectly with the people who patron- other college newspapers share.
ize The Daily. If you're the kind During -the past 77 years we have
of person that finds all types of built up assets of $450,000 through
people interesting, then servicing our advertising and subscription
the advertising accounts of Alii revenue, thus guaranteeing our
Arbor merchants is your type of financial and editorial indepen-
work. Management in circulation dence of the University.
and classified brings you and the The Daily is neither financially
students of the Univeisity toget°.- or editorially controlled by the
er. Much time is spent over the University's administration o r
phone making sure they ,gt their journalism departments. This in-
Daily or figuring out why in the dependence is of prime concern to
world they didn't get it. the businesst staff for by continu-
Senior staff positions aren't the Ing and even increasing the reve-
nue of the paper we insure The
end of the road, for after threeDaily's long tradition of editorial
years of listening to seniors make freedom.
decisions the tables are finally Chances are that a few minutes
turned. Now you, along with the spent at the Student Publications
other five senior managers, can building may well be worth your
decide what is best for The Daily while.
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