Student
Journalism at
New York University
1894-1970
By
Richard D. Carreño
I
LATE
IN AUGUST 1968,
The New York Times
reported that
John F. Hatchett,
New
York University’s
Black
student center head, had made remarks construed as antisemitic. The
ensuing controversy
over the interpretation of Hatchett’s views threw
the
University into
turmoil. Many Black
students, some of whom had nominated Hatchett as director of the
Martin Luther King Student Center, resented "outside"—and
even, it
was
contended—racially-motivated
second-guessing of their choice. The
Times, in an
editorial, had
furthermore suggested that Hatchett should consider resigning, or be
removed.
Tempers
were already emotionally charged. In Chicago, the Democratic National
Convention nominated Hubert H. Humphrey, an apologist for the
Vietnam War, over peace candidate Eugene McCarthy as the
Democratic Party's presidential candidate. In a Los Angeles hotel
kitchen a month earlier, Senator Robert F. Kennedy was
murdered. A few months before, Martin Luther King had been
killed in Memphis. That spring, at Columbia University's Morningside
Heights campus, radical students went on strike, effectively closing
the university. Police intervention assured the strike's bloody end.
With
the University’s autumn semester soon underway, many students at
NYU’s Washington Square campus sensed that a strike of their own
was in the wind—largely powered by anger and frustration bred by
the Vietnam War. A galvanizing catalyst for protest had become the
swirling hostility surrounding John F. Hatchett.
***
The
Washington Square Journal had reported the student strike at
Columbia. Two reporters had covered, earlier in August, the
Democratic National Convention—and subsequent rioting—in Chicago.
For now, at NYU, the possible spill-over from the Hatchett Affair had
become the story.
In
mid-September 1968, as the new semester began,
the
Washington Square Journal went missing in an official
listing of student-run publications at the Greenwich Village campus,
in the then-current, new edition of "On the Square," the
campus’ activities directory. "On the Square" editors
knew, unlike the 17,000 returning undergraduate and graduate students
that fall, that the Journal was
riven by internal
strife over editorial direction and management that might prevent
publication for the first time in its thirteen-year history. Out of
caution, “On the Square” spiked the Journal entry.
***
THE
PAPER’S WOES began in the spring. Co-editors-in-chief
Andrew Cagen (later, in the fall, a reporter for The
Record in Hackensack, New Jersey) and Richard Prince
(later a reporter for The Washington Post), had planned to
upgrade the tabloid's twice-weekly publication to three times a week.
This latter schedule had been the rule until 1963. Despite some
misgivings by the business staff, reporters and editors largely
greeted the proposed change with enthusiasm. The Managing Board
agreed the increased frequency would revitalize the paper. But Cagen
and Prince also argued that the revised schedule would not be financially feasible. For one thing, they said, the paper's printers,
All-Set Printers in Chelsea, would not print the Journal
within the paper's current, or anticipated fall budget.
Moreover,
they added, the paper's editorial freedom could be compromised if the
University continued to underwrite the paper's operating budget and
staff stipends. Financial independence, a model at other university
papers, was recommended. Some editors stressed potential
Administration censorship. Others noted a growing rift between the
paper’s editorial and business-advertising divisions.
"The
business staff was always appointing Phi Eps to new positions on its
staff," Prince remembered. "They tended to be—they
were—more conservative, and they didn't go along with the paper's
semi-New Left editorial policy."
Highlighting
the estrangement was the prospective endorsement in the 1968
presidential contest. Editorial had supported
Kennedy.
Shortly before his
assassination, Barry Newman, The Times'
NYU correspondent reported the Journal’s endorsement of
Kennedy. The business staff—despite its depiction as
"conservative"—endorsed former Wisconsin Senator Eugene
McCarthy, an anti-Vietnam War candidate viewed to be even to the
left of Kennedy. Outraged by the published Kennedy endorsement, the
business staff (including future editor-in-chief Madeline
Weisberger) wrote to The Times "correcting"
Newman's endorsement story.
Their
letter to the editor was ignored. Friction between the two staffs
heated up. Prince complained that the sports and business staffs
operated like "fiefdoms." "The editor-in-chief [was]
really only the editor of the news columns," he said. Joining
editors Cagen and Prince in their critique were Nancy McKeon,
another former editor-in-chief, and the Journal's executive
editor, Robert Oppedisano, who had been elected incoming
editor-in-chief.
Their
solution was expanded publication frequency. The plan was risky,
given the paper’s known budget constraints. Still, the editors
believed that it would be almost certain that the Administration
would fund any forthcoming shortfall. They also knew that their
expansion plan would meet with resistance from Business Manager Louis
Capozzi, a fiscal watchdog who
believed that the paper should publish within budget.
As
for potential censorship, that point theoretically was correct. The
University, as Journal's publisher, could attempt to influence
the paper. This had never been done, and there was no reason, nor,
evidence, to believe that the liberal-minded Administration of
President James M. Hester would so going forward. In the
1967-1968 school year, the only "intimidation" had been a
few letters from Dr. Harold B. Whiteman, Jr., the
mild-mannered assistant chancellor for student affairs, requesting
that the paper revise its policy of freely printing vulgarities. The
letters were dismissed. Moreover, the Journal's faculty
advisor, M.L. “Mike” Stein,
the journalism department's chairman, had little interaction
with daily activities.
Finally,
plans for the Journal’s expanded frequency were scrapped.
Cagen, Prince, and Oppedisano had an unstated agenda in mind. "So
we decided to form a new paper," Prince recalled.
We
also hoped to take several reporters and associate board members with
us, which we did. We wondered at first what would happen to Journal.
But after a while, it didn't really matter what happened because, we
felt, we would have the superior paper. We would be aggressive in
getting ads, while Journal was lethargic. We had all the
experienced editors, while Journal's would be new.
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
