FIRST AMENDMENT TEACHER AND ADVOCATE, CRITICAL THINKER, DEBATER BEFORE THE DREARY DAYS OF POLITICAL CORRECTNESS AND ENTERTAINMENT AS NEWS
JOHN WAS A CHARISMATIC, ENIGMATIC MAN AND MANY, MANY, MANY THINGS TO MANY PEOPLE OVER THE YEARS.
He was husband to wife Delores, father to John Michael the consummate newspaper reporter, editor, publisher of the big morning daily in Nashville, friend of the Civil Rights movement, and close friend to the Kennedys (an honorary Kennedy----if that is important to you). All of it is mostly true. Still critical and balanced thinking, as he taught me, is always required in writing, reading and absorbing the news.
John Seighenthaler's greatest legacy, at least for as long as I knew him professionally was none of this. His greatest legacy and that of his city room and the editorial board, was that he and it were major proponents of our First Amendment---America's most basic freedom. How shocking and shameful that The Tennessean's story today gives absolutely no mention of this in its writeup of his life's major accomplishments.
How far the limp MSM has fallen.
John Seigenthaler, along with his most famous city editor and my old, ailing friend Frank Ritter, drilled the real meaning of the First Amendment into my and every reporter/writer they hired heads day-in and day-out. For the record, they were never about being politically correct, nice or saying what readers wanted to hear, no matter what your political persuasion.
The newspaper business was a rough-and-tumble business where I was assured I would be offended, lied to and threatened with my life on a continuing basis. I was also taught I would have to defend what I reported and wrote in the paper.
After Al Neuharth and Gannett bought The Tennessean, John went to USA Today as director of editorials and commuted to and from Washington, D.C for years. After that stint, he came back home to Nashville as the head of Gannett's newly created First Amendment Center in our hometown. It is his greatest legacy, no matter what anyone else says.
I respected John Seigenthaler for his dedication to the First Amendment and thank him and Frank Ritter for what they taught me. It has and continues to serve me well..
MEANWHILE, CHANNEL 5 AND PHIL WILLIAMS GETS IT RIGHT.
When I see and hear Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton saying the wildest things imaginable, I remember that John and Frank told me to expect it. They said that most people in America have no idea what the First Amendment really means. They also warned that readers needed to engage critical thinking and never believe everything they read or hear in the news, but they usually don't.
This training---even as I've moved to the right of John over the years--- has served me well in the age of political correctness and news-as-entertainment and fluff which often has nothing to do with reality....
Thank you, John. May you rest in peace.
Postscript: For all that I learned from John Seigenthaler and Frank Ritter, they never could teach me to spell very well...instead, they insisted I carry a dictionary in my purse, in my car and everywhere I went in between. Of course that's what good editors are for.Thank heavens for spell-check today.
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