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Jewish World Review Feb. 18, 2000 / 12 Adar I, 5760
Jonathan Tobin
Our current leaders have got nothing on America's founding fathers
http://www.jewishworldreview.com -- ISRAELIS WHO WISH to ban violent speech and Americans who are fed up with yellow journalism should remember the Aurora and the Sedition Act. It was Koheles, son of David, who first informed us that "There is nothing new beneath the sun" in Ecclesiastes 1:9. This would be an apt motto for those interested in political scandals both in Israel and the United States. Most people I know are ambivalent about scandalmongering. They are, on the one hand, disgusted by those who traffic in tales about the high and mighty. Yet, they find themselves drawn to the juicy details whenever they get the chance. Thus, in a week when Israel's latest scandals are still sorting themselves out and American presidential candidates are whining about who went "negative" first, it's reassuring to remember that there are plenty of precedents for our current dilemmas. Precedents, I might add, that include the peccadillos of some of America's founding fathers. Though scandalmongering is as old as the human race itself, its place in American newspapers dates back to a little more than 200 years ago to two rags edited and printed not that far from where I am in Philadelphia. Their names were Porcupine's Gazette and the Aurora. Living as we do in an era in which scandals seem to define the political discourse of both the United States and the State of Israel, the lessons to be learned from the mud slung in the 1790s by the Federalist party's Porcupine and the anti-Federalist Aurora can be highly instructive for readers and citizens today. That's what inspired New York Times columnist and author William Safire to write his latest historical novel Scandalmonger. He was here in the birthplace of American yellow journalism last week to speak to the World Affairs Council about his new book. Like his previous novel, Freedom, Scandalmonger is a delight for history lovers. Personally, I'm a sucker for a novel with footnotes (Safire has voluminous notes at the end of his book where he details exactly where history ends and fiction begins). JEFFERSON AND HAMILTON
It is impossible to read this book without thoughts of Bill Clinton and Monica intervening. But the most interesting parallel is not in the misdeeds of the great men. Rather, it is the way the objects of scandalmongering reacted to the mud-slingers. In no small measure, the garbage flung at Federalist hero Hamilton led to the enactment of what Safire rightly calls the "worst law" ever passed in American history: the Alien and Sedition Act of 1798, which made it a crime to insult a public official. That's a measure Hillary Clinton may have envied when she blamed her husband's troubles on a "vast right-wing conspiracy."
ISRAELI PARALLELS
In each case, the focus of the investigation rails against the press for
bringing the matter to the attention of the public. Yet, the same public
figures who don't like being pilloried have, in the recent past, delighted in
the similar misfortunes of their political rivals.
Thus, the same Barak loyalists who scoff at the seriousness of the charges
against the prime minister's campaign were speaking of similar allegations
against Netanyahu imperiling "the rule of law" in Israel. And those who
defend Weizman called critics of the conviction of former Shas party head
Aryeh Deri a threat to democracy.
Even more telling is the Israeli government's indiscriminate use of the
charge "sedition" to prosecute unpopular demonstrators and its repeated
attempts to close down the right-wing, counter-cultural radio station Arutz
Sheva. In the aftermath of Yitzhak Rabin's tragic assassination, all too many
Israelis seemed to be willing to ban unpopular or inflammatory speech.
As with many Americans in the 1790s, some Israelis seem to think that freedom
of speech is a fine thing as long as it is confined to nice people who agree
with them. But, when it is used to criticize the ideas and the leaders
they hold sacred, they are uninterested in protecting it. That's a slippery
slope that came very close to plunging the young American republic into chaos.
What, then, do we do about scandalmongers?
Jewish religious tradition takes a dim view of yellow journalism. The Torah
tells us, "You shall not go about as a talebearer" (Leviticus 19:16). Other
citations, such as the prohibition against shaming a Jew, are balanced by
precepts such as the religious duty to rebuke a fellow Jew for improper
behavior.
But when one considers the obligation, "You shall not stand idly by the blood
of your neighbor," the second clause to Leviticus 19:16, one can see a
paradigm for journalism emerging. Moreover, the prohibition against leaving
obstacles or hindrances on public or private property (so as to prevent
injury to the public) demonstrates a clear and present need for reliable
forums of public information.
According to Safire, "the solution" to the problem of a muckraking press "is
worse than the problem." Restrictions on the press undermine democracy.
Israelis who wish to ban violent speech and Americans who are fed up with
yellow journalism should remember the Aurora and the Sedition Act.
Responsible journalists are chastened by the example of James Calendar's
tale-bearing. But that cannot deter those charged with bringing truth to the
public from doing our jobs.
After all, the real scandal in the coverage of Clinton and Monica was how a
tawdry sex story overshadowed and ultimately overwhelmed coverage of more
important wrongdoing, such as the foreign money raised by the 1996 Clinton
campaign. That's a precedent that my Israeli colleagues would do well to
avoid in the coming
JWR contributor Jonathan S. Tobin is executive editor of the Philadelphia Jewish Exponent. Let him know what you think by clicking here.
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