ABSTRACT
Historian Charles Beard once wrote that freedom of the press means “the right to be just or unjust, partisan or nonpartisan, true or false, in news columns and editorial columns.”1 Very few people still have confidence in such belligerent libertarianism. There is now substantial doubt whether the truth will emerge from a marketplace filled with falsehood. The contemporary mood among media practitioners and communication scholars is for a more reflective press, one conscious of its significant social obligations. But servicing the public competently is an elusive goal, and no aspect of this mission is more complicated than the issue of social justice. The Hutchins Commission mandated the press to articulate “a representative picture of the constituent groups of society.” The commission insisted that minorities deserved the most conscientious treatment possible and chided the media of their day for tragic weaknesses in this area.2
