Editorial views of past that should stay there
As we contemplated an editorial about Joe Biden’s inauguration, I checked what we wrote four years ago.
“In an era of rapid transformation in the media, all Americans must be watchdogs. Hoping for Trump to succeed does not mean forsaking a duty to hold him accountable. Responsible citizenry also calls for fierce resistance to abuse of power and for a call to the barricades on the issues of social justice that so many people have fought for long and hard.”
I guess readers do listen.
Of course, the “watchdogs” at times seemed more like Doberman Pinschers trained by Marvel Universe villains. But they got the job done.
I decided to dig a little further back, stopping in the 1920s because that’s about the time the papers started refining their editorial voice (yeah, I know, it remains a work in progress).
Not surprisingly, most of the editorials summon idealism from the writers, along with an “invocation of Divine guidance,” that is largely absent from the media today.
So many writers seemed to think the latest commander-in-chief faced greater perils than any predecessor (it’s not a competition, but our Class of ’21 wins/ loses). Back in 1929, unaware the Depression was nine months away, Herbert Hoover seemed primarily concerned with making an appeal “to the people to stop buying the bootleg product” during Prohibition.
Only one editorial, in 1963, made me want to invent a time machine just to go back and drop the typewriter on the author’s head like James Caan in “Misery,” but let’s rewind to get to that one.
2009: “It will take more than the elevation of one man to our highest office to truly bring Black Americans to an equal footing with whites. Anyone who rejects that notion should consider that in the history of our nation, which dates back roughly 400 years, Black people have enjoyed legal parity with whites for less than 50 of them. And even that time has witnessed forms of tolerated bigotry too numerous to mention.”
Again, note the “tolerated bigotry.” It will be relevant when we arrive in 1963.
2001: My colleagues of the day chose to take a pass on “W,” opting instead to address the need to “Take steps to avoid candle tragedies.” That edit would have played better in 1901.
1993: Hmm, Clinton got a pass too. Am I wrong to think editorials about the inauguration of an incoming American president is a time-honored newspaper tradition?
1989: Ahh, this is more like it. George H.W. Bush, who spent his boyhood in Greenwich, draws worthy coverage on the news and editorial pages. The Greenwich Post Office opens its doors to 300 people waiting for special cancellation stamps showing the Capitol and the words “Inauguration Day,” offered in the four towns Bush called home. Dolly Powers, then Greenwich Republican Town Committee chair, waited with her 5-week-old son to have 13 envelopes stamped (three for her sons and the rest to be auctioned at a party fundraiser).
The editorial, meanwhile, is a reminder of Connecticut’s economic status of 32 years ago.
“(In Connecticut) can be found the nation’s highest per-capita income and several of its cities are among the nation’s poorest. Bush has promised more of the expansion and economic prosperity that have kept the White House in his party’s hands since 1980 . ... If he can strike a balance in furthering the kind of prosperity his home state has enjoyed, and in addressing the kinds of urban problems it has, he will go a long way toward understanding the challenge that lies ahead in the next four years across the land.”
That the Republicans occupied the Oval Office for 12 years may not seem like a big deal, but consider the perspective in the wake of Richard Nixon’s election.
1969: The editorial stresses that the United States has elected only its second Republican president in 36 years, and almost discounts Dwight Eisenhower because he wasn’t “a party man.”
“Party leaders, however, were aware that his election was due to his reputation as a war hero and not because he represented the GOP.”
It’s almost as if they didn’t like Ike, though they deemed it a “happy day” when he ended the 29-year Republican drought in 1953.
After so many Democratic initiatives (deemed “razzle-dazzle”), the 1969 editorial celebrates a more “sober” administration.
“Before and after Ike’s terms, we had the New Deal, the Fair Deal, the New Frontier and the Great Society. For a time it looked as if the GOP could never make a comeback. But those who buried the party were premature.”
Richard Nixon, party savior.
1963: So, here we are, lugging a Smith Corona through the time machine. Understandably, it’s a sensitive time given that John F. Kennedy has just been assassinated, but acknowledging his legacy came with some racism that isn’t even coded.
“Twenty million Negro Americans determined that now was the time to join their white fellow citizens as full partners.”
Read it again. It’s remarkable, isn’t it? In the mind of the writer, Black Americans couldn’t be bothered to ask that justice and human rights be granted to them. That somehow it was their fault. That up until the March on Washington three months earlier, they just didn’t want the added responsibility of equal citizenship.
As you try to swallow that, have a side of sexism. “The President of the United States is like a bridegroom. Those who choose him never know how he is going to turn out until they have lived with him for a while.”
Upon reflection, dropping a 15-pound typewriter on my predecessor’s noggin might not have enough impact. How about this: “Hey, Mister 1963 editorial page editor, c’mon up to 2021 and meet Madam Vice President Kamala Harris.”