Imperial Valley press., 1943-04-30
KEEP THE DOORS OPEN
editor and Publisher)

editor and PublisheD
Editors who read in last weeks devel-
opments an indication that the Washing
ton A Administration had changed its mind
about permitting press coyerage of the
forthcoming international conference on
food We're Il bit premature in their opti-
misn1. it now appears. The victory
which was proclaimed in Editor < Pub
Usher and other papers a few days ago
Is based on mere token recognition of the
right OF newspapermen to be present.
The important fact is that the press will
be permitted, under present rulings, to
cover only the opening and closing 'show-
case sessions of the conference Dur
ing the remainder of the fortnight's meet
ing, the hotel at Hot Springs, Va, will be
out OF bounds To reporters, who will have
to depend on owl handouts for news of
its progress.
The order for this extraordinary and
wholly un-American proceeding seems
from Washington dispatches, to have
come direct from President Roosevelt
1t is against the advice of Elmer Davis
and other experienced publicistS in the
Office of War Information. And of
course, it is wholly in conflict with the
ideas OF all neWspapermen. The Presi-
dent remembering his conference at Cas-
ablanca with Winston Churchill, wants
to duplicate that happy affair, at which
reporters were kept away from the sacred
precincts by ring of bayoneted rifles.
Newspaper people did not object to Sc
crecy on that occasion.
The food conference is by no means on
all fourS with the Casablanca meeting.
The latter was within easy reach by ene-
my aircraft. The former will be held in
the heart of the Appalachians. four
thousand miles from the nearest guns or
hostile planes. The Casablanca meeting
dealt with future military plans. The
food conference presumably, will con-
Germ itself with a non-mlitary subject
of immediate and daily Importance to
ing in Africa was properly subject to
strict censorship. The meeting on food
problems is not, for publication of its
deliberations and decisions cannot by any
conception benefit the military position
of the Axis nations, nor harm our own
1t is with growing alarm and dismay
that Editor & Publisher notes the en-
thusiasm with which Mr. Roosevelt and
his advisers are cutting the press off from
direct contact with affairs of national
Importance. The tendency which began
with D2Tflng reporters from the PreSl-
Dental tour of inspection last year and
his personal censorship of the stories of
the three press service men who were al +
lowed on his train, has grown to proper
tions that threaten the foundations of
free journalism.
We do not believe that Mr. Roosevelts
plan will work, for newspaper people are
just as resolute and resourcaful as he is.
They will find the way to learn and
print the news OF the conference at Hot
Springs, and also the conference on ref
ugees at Bermuda next week One thing
all conscientious newspaper people agree
are not going to permit the estab-
lishment of a Goebbels press bureau
here, armed with authority to tell the
newspapers what they shall and what
they shall not publish.
There are lots of lives being lost in
the Army because Of the accumulation of
fatigue and the lack of endurance and