Behind Editorial Endorsements

by Pia Lopez
Newsworthy 1997

Editorial boards have long been criticized as isolated from the public -- and unaccountable to them.

Several years ago we created a rotating position on the editorial board for a citizen representative. That person has equal say and voting power with the five other members of the editorial board, composed of the publisher, executive editor, assignments editor, editorial page editor and a non-news employee representative. Several people a year get an inside view of the editorial board that they bring back to the community.

This year, for the first time, we televised our candidate-endorsement interviews on a public-access cable channel. We decided to televise our interviews for a number of reasons:

1. It gives a human face to what has the appearance of a nameless, faceless editorial board. Few people understand that editorial boards work by consensus, a process that requires discussion and compromise. We are individuals, but editorials reflect the consensus of the board, not any one person's opinion. With televised interviews, people can get a sense of our individual personalities and concerns as well as a sense of the interplay of opinions on the board.

2. It is a way to show people that endorsements are not "backroom deals." Many people believe endorsements are predetermined and that candidate interviews with the editorial board are merely a formality or even a ploy. Televised interviews show that we are asking questions sincerely because we're trying to make a decision.

3. It gives people a critical perspective on the endorsement itself. In the past, our editorial endorsements simply showed up in the newspaper, and voters could take them or leave them. Some considered them a joke; others saw them as the kiss of death. With televised endorsement interviews, voters were able to see the candidates as we saw them and to see the direction of our questioning.

4. It gives people one more source of information about the candidates. We believe voters benefit from questions asked by people who follow issues daily on a year-round basis. Many people told us that they learned more about the candidates and about issues they hardly knew existed in our short televised interviews than from any other source - whether the League of Women Voters forums, radio interviews, news articles or candidate flyers.

There were limits to what we did.

We did not televise our deliberation and decision process, only the candidate interviews. We told viewers that we would meet in private to make our choices.

We prepared elaborate written questionnaires for candidates to fill out before the interviews. These helped us craft our questions and made a lot of difference in drawing distinctions between the candidates. Viewers were not privy to that information. We printed coupons on the editorial page asking readers to tell us what issues they'd like candidates to address. These also helped us develop questions.

The process, to fit into an exact time frame, was tightly scripted. We lost some of the spontaneity of past interviews. One big advantage to our format, however, was that we allowed time for follow-up questioning. Candidates weren't able to get away with mere rhetoric or "sound bite" answers.

The principal reason newspapers do candidate endorsements is to foster a climate in which citizens can make informed choices. To do that successfully, however, the endorsements must be considered credible. We believe opening the endorsement process by televising our interviews has increased the credibility of the editorial board with the public. We will continue televising our candidate interviews - and continue looking for more ways to open our editorial board process.

Pia Lopez is the editorial page editor for the Duluth News Tribune