The Kingdom and the Power (85 page)

The publication of Rosenthal’s story enraged dozens of readers who saw Dr. Kirk as a villain of the uprising, a reactionary administrator whose ineptitude had fomented the discord, and whose tolerance of the university’s involvement with government military research projects was an affront to the integrity of Columbia. Several angry letters were sent to
The Times
, and in the
Village Voice
there were articles by Nat Hentoff and Jack Newfield that criticized both Rosenthal’s article and the paper’s broader coverage.
The Times
was portrayed as a monstrous organ of the Establishment that, in attempting to whitewash its sister institution on Morningside Heights, had arranged the facts and conveyed a tone in much of its reporting that vilified the student demonstrators and had not given equal prominence to the causes of their dissatisfaction or to the brutality of the police. (Almost one hundred young people were reportedly injured in scuffles with the police, including a
Times
reporter whose head wound—from handcuffs being used as brass knuckles—required twelve stitches.)

Rosenthal was upset by the negative reaction to his article, and while he attributed much of it to critics from the New Left who would go to any length to fault
The Times
, he nevertheless wondered what had suddenly gone wrong within his life. After a prolonged period of success, recognition, and reward, it now seemed that everything he touched was ill-fated: the book that he had coauthored with Gelb had been condemned by the critics; the afternoon edition that he had edited had been discarded by Sulzberger; the attempt to place Greenfield in Washington had boomeranged; and now the first news article that he had written in years had become a
cause célèbre
. He did not know what he had done, or had not done, to deserve such reversals, but he was fairly certain of one thing—1968 was the worst year of his life.

It was also an unpleasant time for Mrs. Arthur Hays Sulzberger. She was soon to be seventy-six, and she had lately become deeply concerned with the future of
The Times
. In recent years there had been an extraordinary amount of criticism of
The Times
published in various periodicals and magazines—
Commentary
and
Encounter
,
The Saturday Evening Post
,
Esquire
,
The Public Interest
,
among others—much of it concentrated on the paper’s news coverage, some of it centered on the personalities of the men who help to run
The Times
. Following the publication of these critical articles, Clifton Daniel and his associate editors had carefully reread them to see if they could find any errors of fact or omission so that, should Catledge or a member of the Sulzberger family make inquiry, Daniel would be prepared to reply with a memo that might invalidate the criticism, and might also serve as a basis for a letter of correction to be sent to the offending magazine. Until 1968 Mrs. Sulzberger was convinced, as were nearly all the editors, that there had been little merit in the published criticism. The articles either made factual errors while accusing
The Times
of the same, or they gave the impression that
The Times
’ editors were having grave personality differences and were engaged in an internal struggle. Mrs. Sulzberger believed this to be exaggerated, and she said so in one lettter that she wrote to the author of one such magazine piece.

But now in 1968, following the Greenfield incident, she could no longer be so sure. She had also been disturbed recently by some stories that she had read in her own newspaper, stories that emphasized sex and suggested the younger generation’s complete abandonment of the moral strictures of the past. One article that was particularly offensive to her appeared on the women’s page: it described how young college women at New York City universities were living with young men in an atmosphere of sexual emancipation, and one coed who was cited but was not named was a sophomore at Barnard College, Mrs. Sulzberger’s alma mater. The Barnard girl was reported to be living with a Columbia College junior in a $100-a-month apartment within walking distance of classes. The couple had lived together for two years, the article continued, and had once flown to Puerto Rico for an abortion. But now, having abandoned birth control pills, the couple was attempting to have children but was not necessarily ready for marriage, believing it “too serious a step.”

Shortly after the
Times
article was printed, the Barnard authorities located the girl and sought to expel her because she had disregarded the dormitory regulations and had also lied in the process. But the coed asked for an open hearing, and this prompted student support within the adjoining campuses of Barnard and Columbia: they brandished signs and petitions in front of the Barnard College library, demanding a change in the student housing
regulations, and these demonstrations and the debates that followed kept the story alive for months.
The Times
covered it fully, to Mrs. Sulzberger’s increasing chagrin. It was as if the editors had just discovered sex, she thought, and one day she chided her son: “Why not put sex in perspective?” reminding him, “It went on in my day too.”

But what most bothered her now was the seeming lack of direction that had gripped
The Times
; it was getting larger, fatter, richer, and yet it appeared to have lost some of its sense of mission. When she pondered this, her mood was not lighthearted and the question that she posed one day to her son was not meant to be answered easily or quickly. “
Where
,” she asked, “
are we going?
”

Punch Sulzberger spent the rest of the year trying to reply. His answers were in the form of documents that he composed, regarding them as part of his self-education, and he shared them with no outsiders. He sent the first document to his mother in the winter of 1968, and he continued to work on others throughout the year and into 1969. But within a few months of the Greenfield resignation, Sulzberger decided that an immediate and painful decision had to be made. The executive leadership in the News department had been shattered by the recent Washington-New York confrontation, and Sulzberger felt compelled to replace his old friend and adviser, Turner Catledge. Catledge had been one of the great figures of
The Times
, had taken over a sprawling mismanaged operation in 1951 and had coordinated it; but now, at the age of sixty-seven, Catledge’s energies were not what they had been, and the scars from the February feud had not healed, and if the situation remained as it was, the morale of the entire staff might continue to deteriorate. Nobody in the newsroom seemed to know who the boss was; even the senior editors did not know which way to turn for a decision. Ochs had had similar problems a half-century ago, Iphigene informed her son, and Ochs had never permitted his personal concerns to impede the progress of the paper.
The Times
came first, and now Catledge had to be replaced by a man who could reunite the paper, perhaps restoring some of the Ochsian spirit of the past, and there was only one
Times
man who could do this. James Reston.

At fifty-eight, Reston had been a
Times
man for nearly thirty years, and his stature was such that no other editor—not Daniel, Salisbury, Rosenthal, or Catledge—could question his right to the
top job in the newsroom. Furthermore, by bringing Reston to New York, it would remove from Washington the one individual with the power to challenge the New York leadership; it was an ingenious plan that would centralize all the authority in the home office, would eliminate the last of the old dukedoms, and would also represent a triumph of sorts for Washington—their man had gained control of the newsroom, and the directives from New York would henceforth not seem so unsavory in Washington. Punch Sulzberger, his mother, and the rest of the family all agreed that the plan should be instituted as soon as possible, but the publisher, still sensitive to Catledge’s feelings, was hesitant about revealing it at this time. So much had already happened in so short a time, and he would have preferred to wait awhile, although he knew that he should not. He did not want to risk losing Catledge, for he hoped that Catledge would remain as a director of The New York Times Company and a vice-president, devoting himself to the general problems of corporate policy and serving in his natural capacity as a kind of elder statesman and diplomat during the period of transition.

Sulzberger was contemplating this in his office one day in April when his friend Sydney Gruson, who had decided to leave
The Times
to become an associate publisher of
Newsday
, walked in for a brief chat. Gruson’s new position at
Newsday
had already been announced, but he was not scheduled to begin until May, and Sulzberger, who felt very comfortable with Gruson, decided to discuss the Reston plan with him, adding that Reston had been consulted and had agreed to accept it. Gruson conceded that the move was a wise one, perhaps the only one that would accomplish Sulzberger’s aims, although Gruson felt badly for Clifton Daniel. Gruson was one of the few men who had enjoyed a long and warm relationship with the managing editor; the latter had been instrumental in getting Gruson onto
The Times
in 1944 and had also supported Gruson’s appointment to foreign editor in 1965. Daniel, who had been under Catledge for so long, would now be under Reston, and would never know the feeling of being completely in charge.

Later that day, Gruson was walking through the newsroom and he encountered Daniel, who was leaving his office. Daniel paused for a moment, and then invited Gruson into the office for a drink. After Daniel had fixed the drinks and sat down in the small room, he looked at Gruson and he appeared to be troubled and mildly confused. “Tell me,” Daniel said finally, “what is going on around here?”

Gruson felt compelled to tell Daniel what he knew he should not. Sulzberger had spoken in confidence, and yet Gruson felt a strong sense of loyalty to Daniel, particularly now when things seemed to be uncertain, and so Gruson told Daniel what he had heard. Daniel turned pale and swallowed his drink. Then he stood and relayed the news to Catledge, who consulted with Sulzberger, and thus the elevation of Reston was confirmed.

Gruson was extremely embarrassed by what he had done on this Friday afternoon, and he quickly wrote a note of apology to Reston. On the following Monday, he revisited the publisher’s office, and Sulzberger looked at him and swore in a loud voice, exclaiming, “Sydney, I didn’t think you’d have the nerve to show your face in this place again!” But Sulzberger did not really seem upset. If anything, he seemed relieved; the word was out. He had since spoken at length with Catledge, and the latter would remain with the paper to help during the period ahead. It was possible that Sulzberger, subconsciously, had leaked the word through Gruson to the editors on the third floor. Among Gruson’s many assets and charms, there was also an inability to keep secrets, and Sulzberger knew Gruson well enough to know this. So Gruson had really done Sulzberger a favor, and the publisher’s fondness for Gruson was such that he wished he was not leaving to take the
Newsday
job. Before Gruson left, the publisher informed the owners of
Newsday
that he would be making attempts to rehire Gruson; and within a year, he would. Gruson would return in 1969 as Sulzberger’s special assistant.

Reston came to New York as the executive editor in the early summer of 1968, and within a very few months his presence had influenced the daily coverage of the news and had brought a new atmosphere of informality to the newsroom. Reston walked around the room in his shirt sleeves, introducing himself as “Scotty” to those
Times
men that he did not know, and his “office” was a desk in full view of everyone—it was actually Harrison Salisbury’s desk, the latter having moved temporarily into the national-news editor’s chair to replace Claude Sitton, who had resigned in May to become editorial director of the News and Observer Publishing Company in Raleigh, North Carolina. With Reston’s arrival, the seat syndrome and much of the pomp and ritual of the newsroom was
passé
, and so was the four o’clock conference, which Reston thought was
unessential. He did not abolish it, however; in deference to Daniel, who continued to preside at four o’clock, the meetings went on, although Reston himself did not attend, and soon other editors were regularly absent, sending subordinates. Reston held
his
conference at 11:30 each morning. It was held in Daniel’s office and attended by Daniel and Rosenthal, Salisbury and Topping, Gelb and the new picture editor, John G. Morris, who had worked at Magnum and
Time-Life
. Daniel occupied his regular chair at the head of the table, but the focus of attention was entirely on Reston no matter where he chose to sit, and Reston’s ease and geniality were pervasive—a stranger would never have guessed that there had recently been animosity and discord among editors at this table.

Reston had not come to New York as a conqueror but rather as a conciliator, and the editors now seemed to recognize the need for a
rapprochement
—for the good of
The Times
and their own good as well. With a minimum of effort, Daniel was soon able to work under Reston as he had under Catledge, and Reston himself often visited Catledge’s back office for advice and reassurance on subjects about which Catledge was better informed. Rosenthal and Salisbury seemed cordial, and it was Salisbury who suggested, at a meeting one morning, that Rosenthal write a column for the editorial page in July while Wicker was away on vacation; Reston endorsed the suggestion and Oakes concurred. Rosenthal had made his peace with Reston after their emotional scene following Greenfield’s resignation; Rosenthal had called Reston in Washington a day later, saying that he did not want twenty years of friendship to be eradicated by the outbursts of a single evening, and Reston said that he felt the same way. Rosenthal did not exactly know what his future was under Reston in New York, but he quickly sensed the excitement and change that Reston’s presence was bringing to
The Times
.