The Prophet Motive

At the ripe old age of 184, the Hartford Courant is still hale, hearty (circ. 61,000) and articulate. Its readers speak up, too. In a single letters-to-the-editor column last week they hurled such epithets at the editorials across the page as "boorish," "intolerant," "jaundiced," "smug," "partisan propaganda," and "poorly written." The editors hardly winced; as long as they were getting back talk, they knew that their stuff was being read.

It is one of the signs of the decline of the editorial page that many papers rarely get either brickbats or backpats. Editorial writers, feeling a little obsolete, often wonder out loud why they don't have as many readers as the comics and the sport pages. Last week, in the Saturday Review of Literature, the man who bosses the Courant's editorial page threw them some answers.

"Too many of our editorial pages," wrote tweedy, 49-year-old Editor Herbert Brucker, "are journalistic quick lunches, manned by short-order essayists . . . What ought to be incisive opinion all too often turns out to be a collection of cliches . . . Is it any wonder that editorials are read by only 49% of the men and 29% of the women?"

Most editorialists, Brucker guessed, are moved by the "prophet motive." But the role "calls for more knowledge, time and energy than they possess. Most. . . are so busy that they stay in their offices, read the headlines, and say what they can about the news. No wonder the product is often dreary." Considering the pressures against them, it was also no wonder, he said, that many ducked local controversies and took refuge in faraway topics.

Editor Brucker's remedy for the U.S. editorial page would probably be too drastic for many publishers: newspapers must break "the habit . . . of attaching themselves to one of the major political parties. This is a hangover from the days when there were many papers, each speaking for a particular faction. Today, when we have few papers, it is their obligation not to be a Dr. Goebbels for any group . . . Our journalistic Jeremiahs must breathe more hellfire and damnation than ever. Only they need to get all the facts, and not just some of them, first."

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