Page:The Social Value of a Code of Ethics for Journalists.pdf/7

 it can—to like the latter (routine superficial sensationalism) and to accept the former (news requiring research) in its new predigested form together with the little pinch of poison the press agent inserts, we have the beau ideal of gutter journalism.

The business of a written code is to point out to all concerned that there are deep social reasons why such tendencies must be resisted. Beyond the making clear of causes and results, ethics, as a science, does not go. From that point good will and clean intent must take hold; if these do not exist society is in a parlous state.

The Oregon Code

The Oregon Code, reprinted on page 283, was written in acute awareness of the actual conditions existing in the profession. It is complete only in the sense that the author of the code was conscious and deliberate in what he was leaving out as well as in respect to what he was putting in. Intra-professional relations are not treated at all; the code studies only the relation of the newspaper to society. What freedom of action an owner owes to an editor or an editor to a subordinate; to what extent the business office may advise the professional departments, and what attitude the latter may assume toward the business problems of the publication are entered into not at all. The Oregon Code is addressed to the responsible controlling power in the newspaper office; whoever may be in control, in general or in a particular matter, these are the principles he should follow.

Proposal and Adoption

To an unusual degree, also, the Oregon Code is, in its own state, a declaration by, as well as for, the controlling element in journalism. The adoption of the code was decided upon

by the Oregon State Editorial Association in its annual session at Bend, Oregon, in July, 1921. This body is composed almost entirely of the owners of smaller newspapers, most of them weeklies or county seat dailies. The proposal was presented to this body by C. V. Dyment, a newspaper man of many years' experience, who in 1913 became a professor in the School of Journalism at the University of Oregon, and who has lately, in addition to his duties in the professional school, become Dean of the College of Literature, Science and the Arts. The Convention commissioned Mr. Dyment, who was the representative of the School of Journalism at the meeting, to take charge of drawing up a code which should lay the emphasis not upon such matters as the maintenance of rates, etc., but upon the ethical relation of the newspaper to the public. He was instructed to report at the winter meeting of the Oregon Newspaper Conference at the School of Journalism at Eugene, a larger body which includes besides the membership of the State Editorial Association strong representation from the state metropolitan papers.

Mr. Dyment first laid his code before the faculty of the School of Journalism, and then before the annual Conference which, as it happened, was the most representative body of newspaper men, both employers and employes, that had ever assembled in Oregon. All the Portland dailies were represented, nearly all the dailies in the state, an unusually large proportion of the weeklies, and a good scattering of the trade and class journals. In most instances the papers were represented by their controlling authorities in person.

Character of the Code

The strength and the weakness of the Oregon Code can be expressed in the