Fighting for the First Amendment Stanton of CBS vs. Congress and the Nixon White House

Subjects:

• Communications » Communications Law
• Popular Culture » Radio, TV
• Communications » Journalism
• Law » Constitutional Law

Reviews:

• Highly recommended for all collections in journalism, communications law, and US history.
  —Choice
• Media mavens will drool for [this] meaty volume....Fighting for the First Amendment captures a past battle between government and the electronic media: 'Selling the Pentagon' confrontation between CBS president Frank Stanton and politicians--in Congress and Nixon's White House--who tried to use the broadcast media's narrower press-freedom standards to restrain journalists' ability to investigate and report. Dunham was for many years a top executive and general counsel for NBC, so he understands the issues as well as the venues of this story. Like Stanton did years ago, Dunham maintains that broadcast journalists should have the same First Amendment protection as print reporters.
  —Booklist
• Dunham...has written an absolutely gripping account of the parlous times in 1971 when, after CBS News broadcast a documentary called The Selling of the Pentagon, CBS News was investigated by a committee of Congress with support from the Nixon White House....Besides providing invaluable historical perspective...the author gives fascinating insights into the relationships and antagonisms prevailing among CBS's top brass....Fighting for the First Amendment is a page-turner, a dramatic evocation of what the author aptly calls `a defining moment for broadcast journalism.'
  —Television Quarterly
• Corydon Dunham...has written a passionate account of the Congressional-media uproarfollowing the broadcast of a CBS documentary called `The Selling of the Pentagon' on Feb. 23, 1971.
  —Greenwich Time
• Five Stars (exceptional).
  —Today's Books
• The book is meticulously documented....Dunham is knowledgeable, and the book is well orgainzed, concise and scholarly.
  —Journalism History

• Endorsement From Walter Cronkite (from the Foreword)Anchorman and Managing Editor
  The CBS Evening News, 1962-1991: History serves dramatically to illustrate the need for continuing public awareness that our press freedoms must be protected. This is vital as we enter the new Information Age with all its promise for us and our descendants. That's why Corydon Dunham's book Fighting for the First Amendment is must reading.
• Endorsement From Bill Moyers
  : This book is about a remarkable moment in defense of the First Amendment, and the remarkable man who rose to the occasion. Read it--and you will never take freedom of the press for granted again.
• Endorsement From Dan Rather
  CBS News: Frank Stanton is a living legend at CBS News and throughout the broadcast press. His crusade for the recognition of the First Amendment rights of broadcast reporters is the keystone of that legend. This was his finest hour, and we are fortunate to find in Corydon Dunham so able a chronicler. Anyone who values the freedom to speak and publish needs to know how narrowly that freedom was protected in this country, only a few years ago. And as Dunham reminds us, the battles are far from over, and we are sorely in need of more Frank Stantons to lead us.
• Endorsement From Mike Wallace
  CBS Correspondent
  60 Minutes: It is non-fiction but it reads almost like a novel, with a cast of characters that includes two Presidents, a covey of Congressional titans and one broadcasting executive icon, in a fascinating struggle of competing agendas--political, financial, personal--a struggle to confirm broadcast journalism's right to the protection of the First Amendment of the Constitution.
• Endorsement From Bill Small
  Larkin Professor of Communication, Fordham University
  Past President NBC News and UPI
  Former Senior Vice President, CBS News: This brilliant look at a major event in American broadcasting's battle to be free is a marvelous tribute to Frank Stanton's courage and his position as one of the greatest figures in broadcast history. Even those who lived through these conflicts with big government will find Cory Dunham of NBC revealing things that even we CBS insiders didn't know until now. Easy to read, extensively researched, this book also clearly shows how the lessons of a struggle in 1971 are as fresh today for the Internet, cable and the other innovations which will dominate information dissemination in the 21st century.
• Endorsement From Don Hewitt
  Executive Producer
  60 Minutes: Frank Stanton comes as close as anyone to being the patron saint of broadcast journalism. We will, I fear, not see his like again.
• Endorsement From Marvin Kalb
  Edward R. Murrow Professor of Press and Public Policy
  Director of the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy
  John F. Kennedy School of Government
  Harvard University: Dunham's report on Frank Stanton's heroic defense of the First Amendment in the early 1970s is important, fascinating, and very relevant in this age of the Internet. Anyone interested in press freedom--indeed freedom--should read it.
• Endorsement From Sam Donaldson
  ABC News: It's easy to talk in defense of the First Amendment. It's much harder to put your very freedom on the line for it. But that's what Dr. Frank Stanton did at a time when some of the most powerful people in Washington wanted to force CBS News to knuckle under to outside control of its editorial content. Frank Stanton risked jail in order to stand up for freedom of the press. All of us--print as well as broadcast--are in his debt. When Stanton led CBS he did so with intelligence, civility and vision. Thank goodness he had one more quality as demonstrated in his confrontation with Congress over the First Amendment: Courage.
• Endorsement From Julian Goodman
  Former President of NBC: Lawyers aren't supposed to write this well, but Cory Dunham has picked out an important moment in the life of our free press, and given it spirit and meaning. Even as one who was in the thick of it, I learned a lot by reading about things I had forgotten. This is a book of entertaining scholarship.
• Endorsement From Scot Powe
  Professor of Law and holder of Anne Green Regents Chair
  University of Texas at Austin: At a time when network television news was at its best, its independence was under constant challenge by the White House, the Congress, and the Federal Communication Commission. For those who lived through the era Fighting for the First Amendment is a welcome refresher. For those who didn't, it is an important lesson.
• Endorsement From Jerome J. Shestack
  President, American Bar Association: Dunham's captivating saga of the battle for broadcast freedom is like a gripping mystery novel, infused with the insight and analytic power of a foremost First Amendment advocate and with striking current relevance for today's information superhighway.

Table of Contents:

• Foreword by Walter Cronkite
• Introduction
• Congressional Subpoena
• The Selling of the Pentagon
• Staggers' First Hearing on the Subpoena
• Stanton: The Broadcast Executive
• Stanton in Washington
• Congress and Television News
• The White House
• Opposition Programming and The Selling of the Pentagon
• Is This Fight Really Necessary?
• "You Are in Contempt"
• Down to the Wire
• "Dear Colleagues"
• The Constitutional Debate: Historical Moment for the Press
• The Public's Interest
• On a Personal Note: Stanton's Departure
• Afterword
• Selected Bibliography
• Index