Landmark editors' meeting, October 1986
In Landmark we have long worked to demolish racial barriers in our communities. And it was almost 20 years ago when I first addressed Landmark's executives about our obligation to increase employment of minorities throughout our workforce. I concluded my remarks then with the following paragraph:
"The only way to discharge this obligation is to make up our minds that it is going to be done and that the obstacles are going to be overcome. I think each division should set a goal for itself that will make a substantial improvement in our record when we look at it again next year. It will take courage. It will cost some money and there will be risks. But the alternatives are unacceptable."
I quote those remarks because they state Landmark's attitude as well today as they did in 1968. We have made some progress, but not enough. We have worked hard, but with insufficient consistency on a problem that abounds in frustration. We have been distracted by radical change in our industry - learning to use new technology, reshaping our products to meet new competition, merging newsroom staffs, learning how to manage better.
If it were excuses we sought today, they would come readily. It is not excuses we seek, but progress in changing the racial composition of our reporting and editing staffs.
I think it is important to ask to whom we owe our unfulfilled obligation. Is it to black individuals we would have as our colleagues, friends and fellow workers? In part, the answer is yes: A large debt does lie with them. As citizens, we wear moral blinders if we do not work to include those who have been excluded by customs of class and prejudice. As we grapple with the frustrations of recruitment and retention, we have to remember that, as history goes, our welcome mat for minorities is still new.
Racial memories are long memories. "Join us" is a new phrase. "Stay out" is an ancient injunction sent by newspapers to black citizens - stay out of our professional ranks and, yes, stay out of our news columns, too.
That is a sad history - one that can be explained but not one that can be justified. And so I think we who are shaping the future have some obligations that are, in essence, moral debts.
As a matter of practicality, our obligation lies as much to ourselves as to minorities. For as journalists we should reflect the life of our communities and the texture of our times.
We kid ourselves if we think to report a multiracial society through white eyes only. Or, for that matter, through the eyes of any elite - whether it be racial, cultural or ideological. To do our job well, we need reporting and editing staffs representing the broadest possible range of social and cultural backgrounds. The nation and our communities are growing more diverse, not less; newspapers must do the same.
Newspapers, like society, have been a long time learning the cost of elitism - based on sex as well as on race. It is sobering to me to remember how recently it was that women were excluded from the mainstream of news operations and confined to clerkship and the women's department. We have come a long way in opening opportunities for women in our newsrooms.
I am confident that we will make similar progress in our employment of minorities, chiefly because our top editors have not succumbed to frustration.
Someone has said that leadership is doing the right things and that management is doing things right. We must intensify and broaden our recruitment programs. We must look harder for potential than for experience. I am enthusiastic about our new intern programs. I have met our interns in Carroll County and Elizabethtown. They are bright, eager young people. All they need is the experience we can give them.
But hiring minorities is only the beginning. Together we must create in our newsrooms a commitment to succeed in this endeavor. We must help those we hire to succeed, as others have helped us to succeed.
Coaching is part of that task. Equally important is the climate in the newsroom. The help we can give minorities to feel a part of the newsroom and make a life in the community. The support we must give minority reporters when they face hostile news sources. That climate depends upon our commitment. How much we want minorities and how much support we offer them. When the word gets around that our newsrooms are good places, minorities will not only come, they will stay.
It is a deep source of satisfaction to me that Landmark newspapers were among the few in the South that supported from the outset the Supreme Court's desegregation decisions. Our editors had the courage to set an example for their communities. But that is history. We speak today of the future, and of the fact that if we do not add muscle to goodwill, we will lag - not lead - the communities we serve. This must not happen. Minority employment will remain a top priority here until we succeed.
Copyright 1986 Frank Batten
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