Evening star., 1936-04-18
L|PPMAN INVITES
COURTS TO CHECK
TRIAL SENSATIONS
Places Burden of Hating
Improper Exploitation
on Bench.
EDITORS GROUP OPENS
STUDY OF CRIME CASES
Seeks Agreement of Press and Bar
in Preventing Trials From
Becoming Public Scandal.

Walter Lippman today placed the
burden of correcting conduct OF Amer
lean criminal cases on the courts.
Public officials would have to be
heroes to refuse to let these cases be
exploited by the press, the noted
commentator told the American So
ciety of Newspaper Editors.
Lippmans speech opened formal
study by the society, closing its three
day convention at the National Press
Club with a luncheon at the Willard
Hotel, to determine whether the press
and the bar cannot jointly reach some
working formula to prevent senSa-
tional murder trials from becoming
public scandal The immediate point
In question was the Hauptmann trial.
"A judge" he said in discussing the
courts, does not have to admit more
spectators than can be seated COM
fortably in court room, or more than
reasonable number of newspaper
men,. He does not have to admit
cameras, radio broadcaSting machin-
cry, special telephones and telegraph
apparatus to the court room. The
streets can be cleared of crowds and
traffic kept moving.
Moreover, he does not have to sub
nit to having the case tried in the
newspapers. Under any realistic con-
ception of the judicial process, COM
ment on the evidence by the news
papers, speakers on the radio or by
the lawyers is contempt of court,
and it should be treated as SUCH"
Traces Popular" Trial.
Saying the irregular popular
process" interferes with, distortS and
''undermines the effectiveness of the
law and the peoples confidence in
It," Lippmann traced the evidence of
the popular" trial that ran parallel
to the court trial from the time Bruno
Hauptmann was arrested.
Newspaper comment affects not
only the general public but even the
jury, the speaker said, and he re-
ferred to one Characterization of
Hauptmann as "a thing lacking hu-
man characteristics.
1--WE should not delude ourselves
into thinking that comment of this
sort is of no effect simply because the
jury is locked up and is not allowed
to read the papers," he said.
1.-THE witnesses read them, the spec
tators read them, and no newspaper
man needs to be told that the senti-
ment of crowd communicates itself
more or less to every one. There is
no way of isolating a jury in such a
way as to protect it from the feeling
OF a crowd"
With Lippmann on today's con-
cluding program of the convention
appeared John Stewart Bryan, pub
Usher of the Richmond News-Leader
and president Of William and Mary
College. Bryan's topic was training
for journalism.
Lindbergh Case Discussed.
The problem of Col. Charles A
Iindbergh and the aspersions the press
has suffered because of him have been
mentioned many times during the con-
vention. During a discussion yester-
day afternoon of the problem of "pri-
vacy'' it was contended by one speaker
that as young transforming flyer
Lindbergh was an especially avid seeker
of publicity and even subscribed to a
clipping service.
The speaker who precipitated the
discussion was Lee A. White, of the
Detroit News. He delivered a
learned paper entitled "Our Journals
tic Problem of the Right of Privacy"
concluding:
THE press is free because, for all
Its faults, which are numerous and
obvious, the public is safer and hap
pier for the knowledge it is able to
disseminate. If the press is worth
continuance, it must have more free
dom Of action than an extension of
the principle of privacy would seem
to promise
Denies Issue is Clear.
After tracing the history of actions
based on this theory, White re-
marked:
"If we (the editors) end in con-
fusion, we end where I fear the courts
still find themselves. Despite the
apparent present trend of the bench,
bar. and legislature to protect the
press from too close application of the
theory. they have already gone
sufficiently far to suggest the possibil-
ity of reordering of the process of
newspaper editing and publishing
Earlier, the society was told by Ma
thaniel Howard, managing editor of
the Cleveland Plain Dealer, that no
country in the world possessed news
services capable of comparison "in
fairness with those of the United
States" and that ''the Associated
Press is most of the reason for this
distinction"
Any discussion, he said, must
recognize that the Associated Press
is the biggest and best of the press
associations"