Determination
3
Minnesota
News Council
In the Matter of the Complaint of
Mary Jane Rachner against the Union Advocate
Complaint: Mary Jane Rachner, a candidate
in the 1972 elections for St. Paul School Board, complained that the
newspaper was unfair and discriminatory when it refused to accept
her paid political advertisement. The Union Advocate is a weekly serving
primarily organized labor in the greater St. Paul area. Rachner was
not a labor-endorsed candidate and did not claim to be in her ad.
Response of the news organization: The paper
rejected the ad citing its policy of accepting political ads only
from labor-endorsed candidates.
Determination of the Council: A newspaper
has considerable latitude in establishing policies governing acceptance
of advertising, both because of its status as a private business and
because it assumes some ethical responsibility to its readers for
the integrity and propriety of the matters advertised. Any newspaper
would be wise to clarify and publish its advertising acceptance policies,
most particularly as to political advertising, if only to avoid the
misunderstandings illustrated in this case.
The acceptance standards for political advertising
are peculiarly subject to a newspaper's moral obligation; a standard
under which only advertising of political candidates approved by the
publisher are accepted would be patently offensive to fundamental
principles of fairness and accuracy. However, this paper is not a
general newspaper but a special-interest publication for the sponsoring
organization, and it functions basically as an appendage of the AFL-CIO.
Although its format is that of other newspapers, the paper is, in
fact, a private publication devoted to advancing the interests of
a particularly defined constituency and presenting news aimed at the
(primarily) economic self-interest of that constituency. The paper
does not accept the obligation to function as a general newspaper
or to be bound by the conventions usually associated with general
publications. When the grievance was considered in that light, the
Council concluded, with regret, that the paper's advertising policy
must be accepted. The complaint against the newspaper is not upheld.
July 19, 1972
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