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essence of the issue. We did, as I say, compromise in an editorial. I would have been willing to run nothing more so that we stood on our previous view. He wasn't willing to do this, and so we reached a mutually agreeable piece so the problem was surmounted. But this was a difficult thing, because I could not agree to running an editorial (particularly since we had taken a specific position previously under my regime, and, incidentally, under his, too) contradicting what we had said before when I myself saw no reason for contradicting it. I simply couldn't agree to that. For a while I wasn't even sure I should stay as editor if the publisher insisted on this. But, as I say, we worked out a piece that I was satisfied with as being sufficiently in conformity with our previous view that I was willing to run as an honorable man, and he was willing to accept as a sufficient carrier of the ideas that he wanted to add. That's what we rested on.
This incident is illustrative of the difficulty when the publisher feels, as really in theory he has the right to feel, that he has to agree with what appears on the editorial page. As he has said to me, he can't go around making speeches or even talking to people about public issues when the editorial page of the paper that he is heading takes a different position. I sympathize with that. I understand, of course. On the other hand, I can't be expected to run an editorial page with the publisher looking over my shoulder and directing every issue or every statement, and of course I wouldn't stay under such circumstances, and neither would any other self-respecting editor. And I have told him this. In fact, we have discussed this several times, trying to reach through discussion the area in which he has the right to practice to interfere. As I said at the outset of this discussion, this is one of those things that you simply cannot define. You simply have to establish a mutual relationship between two reasonable men.
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