USA: the old/new debate about confidential sources

Posted by Bertrand Pecquerie on August 19, 2004 at 6:51 PM

Dan Kennedy writes in the Boston Phoenix: "The question of whether reporters have a legal right to protect their confidential sources has been with us for at least a generation (in the US). By one estimate, some 18 reporters have spent time behind bars during the past dozen years for refusing to name sources or provide information they had obtained in confidence. Rarely, though, has the issue been as prominent as it is right now... Time magazine’s Matthew Cooper has refused to identify his confidential sources to Patrick Fitzgerald, the special prosecutor trying to find out who exposed undercover CIA operative Valerie Plame. The upshot: Cooper faces jail, and his employer a hefty fine. The New York Times and the Washington Post have been dragged into this as well...

Rarely, though, has the issue been as prominent as it is right now. Altogether, according to the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, at least 10 face jail or heavy fines in these three cases. "The number of journalists facing jail in the United States to protect their sources is unprecedented," the organization says." It's a very long and very juridical article but a good synthesis about the "sources' debate".

According to Editor and Publisher, two leading journalism organizations, the American Society of Newspaper Editors (ASNE) and Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), are speaking out on recent government efforts to have reporters reveal sources in two high-profile cases, but with completely opposite opinions.

FAIR, a national media watchdog group, is urging the reporters and news outlets who have been asked to reveal confidential sources in the Wen Ho Lee and Valerie Plame cases to do so, while ASNE leaders are condemning the demands of investigators, contending that such actions will hurt press freedom.

"Ultimately, the public loses," ASNE leaders said in the release. "Every day, confidential sources provide journalists with information about alleged wrongdoing, especially when it pertains to the functioning of government. After that information is verified for its accuracy, the resulting news stories serve to enlighten the public about official corruption and misconduct. By seeking to remove that First Amendment shield, judges are stifling the free flow of information and making it difficult for journalists to provide the public with important information."

Source: Boston Phoenix via mediachannel.org. See also Editor and Publisher

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