NORTH CAROLINA — Last week, North Carolina voters overwhelmingly passed Amendment One to the state constitution, defining marriage as between one man and one woman only. The May 8 vote—coming a day before President Obama’s declaration of support for gay marriage—produced renewed national debate about gay marriage as well as jokes portraying this state as backwards.
Amendment One supporters said the measure was aimed at protecting traditional marriage. Opponents of the loosely worded amendment warned it could affect all civil unions, weaken laws protecting domestic partners and adopted children, and cut off benefits for partners of government employees. (One Mecklenburg County commissioner has already challenged the county to consider dropping the domestic partner benefits.)
The debate around Amendment One drew to a head in the weeks prior to the primary, generating big ad dollars for North Carolina TV stations. For the opinion pages at North Carolina newspapers, it offered an opportunity to exercise a unique muscle: convening and leading civic—and civil—discussion. Historically, the opinion function of newspapers weighs particularly heavy in the South, where strong voices like Ralph McGill ushered in a broader recognition of civil rights.
In the case of Amendment One, some papers in North Carolina made better use of that traditional role than others.
In Greensboro, a medium-sized city in the heart of the Piedmont, the Greensboro News & Record invited attention for what it didn’t do. The paper, owned by Landmark Communications, drew fire from a local blogger and earned a spot on Jim Romenesko’s blog for failing to take an editorial stand on Amendment One. The editorial board and the publisher could not come to agreement on the amendment and so chose not to editorialize on the issue at all, according to Allen Johnson III, the editorial page editor, in a reply to Romenesko.
The paper’s columnists and reporters, though, logged multiple stories about people in the community who were fighting the amendment with songs and a play, and staffer Susan Ladd told a compelling front-page story in February of a couple who wanted to get married before their 50th anniversary. (While many of the columns by Greensboro’s Allen Johnson and Jeri Rowe are now buried in NewsBank archives, both columnists explored the nuanced, changing attitudes in the African American community toward gay people.)
But the official voice of the newspaper, the editorial, remained sadly silent.
The Romenesko post prompted John Robinson, the News & Record’s former managing editor, to take to Facebook to gather opinions on this question: “Would you prefer the local newspaper editorialize in favor of a position you oppose OR take no position at all?” The results of Robinson’s informal survey: Most people wanted their local newspaper to take a stand, regardless of whether they agreed with it.
Robinson elaborated in an email exchange with me on Monday:
Of course the newspaper should have weighed in on the issue, and I know the editorial staff desperately wanted to. To remain silent on a pivotal constitutional amendment—and one that affects so many people in the community—courts editorial irrelevance. I know the paper doesn’t want that, and I hope the publisher learned something about the need for a strong editorial voice.
In small-town Shelby, in the rural western part of the state just where the foothills begin to rise, another publisher did take a stand. Skip Foster, the publisher of Freedom Communication’s Shelby Star, editorialized on April 27 against the amendment, couching his argument in a libertarian framework of separation of church and state. He followed that column with another on May 4, days before the vote, declaring victory for high-level discussion in the letters sent to his paper and in the comments at his paper’s website. Wrote Foster:
For the most part, I have been very pleased with the level of discourse— respectful, intelligent and informed. It’s an emotional issue for many, but folks have tried to respond with their noggins, not their feelings, which helps the debate. My favorite email in the wake of all of this was from a supporter of Amendment One who said he appreciated the civil tone that was fostered around the [April 27] column. That was much appreciated.
Interesting discussion, especially about the echo effect of the FB filter for reader comments. These are many good examples of editorial writers being willing to take a stand at the risk of angering readers. The irony for the publisher in Greensboro (where I live and used to write a metro column) is that the motivation seemed to be that he wanted to avoid angering readers about a a vote he called a "highly personal" decision (although it seemed a highly public community decision.) The trouble was, at least in the city limits, the newspaper's core circulation and advertising area, the precincts went 60-40 against the ballot question. So in possibly not wishing to offend, the newspaper appears to have angered readers by not taking a stand one way or another. Being neutral has its own perils.
#1 Posted by Lorraine Ahearn, CJR on Wed 16 May 2012 at 07:44 PM
And in spite of all the editorials against, the voters overwhelmingly supported the amendment. It makes me wonder about the relevance of op/eds. I don't recall seeing in print a full dissection of the actual amendment wording and any point by point rebuttals to the provisions of the text which may have in fact dissuaded some pro voters - when advertising breaks down important legislation into two-word sound bites like "marriage protection" it seems to me it is incumbent upon the voters to learn more of what is behind the actual legislation - I think the journals I read generally let voters down by not providing more depth in this regard.
#2 Posted by michael j. solender, CJR on Wed 16 May 2012 at 09:05 PM
Michael wrote: when advertising breaks down important legislation into two-word sound bites like "marriage protection" it seems to me it is incumbent upon the voters to learn more of what is behind the actual legislation
padikiller responds: This is just the latest iteration of the standard liberal "the average slob is too stupid to make his own decisions" schtick....
All we need is little more reeducation, and the masses will swing into line, right?
What is "behind" the "actual legislation" you ask?
Well, just read it!
"Marriage between one man and one woman is the only domestic legal union that shall be valid or recognized in this State. This section does not prohibit a private party from entering into contracts with another private party; nor does this section prohibit courts from adjudicating the rights of private parties pursuant to such contracts."
What about these two sentences is hard to understand? What is "behind" this straightforward definition? Why do we need an editorial board to tell us what these two sentences "really" mean?
The simple fact of the matter is that the majority of Americans don't want gay marriage. To them, in fact, "gay marriage" is an oxymoron.
This isn't about morals for many people (though it certainly is for many), instead it is about culture and tradition and families.
All the op/eds in the world aren't going to convince these people that gay marriages should be legally recognized.
#3 Posted by padikiller, CJR on Wed 16 May 2012 at 11:03 PM
Yet another area where govt gets more authority than it should, and taxpayers foot the bill for another bureaucracy. All hail the marriage police! *smh*
#4 Posted by Dan A., CJR on Thu 17 May 2012 at 02:40 AM
This isn't a bureaucracy...
This is the people directly defining a social institution through plebiscite.
Lefties are typically hypocritical over the matter.
The lefties will blither on about the "fundamentalist" intolerant "uneducated rednecks" of North Carolina when it comes to this issue... But see how many of them have publicly castigated Islam for its much less tolerant stance on homosexuality.
NOTE: I am not against gay marriage, personally. Not really for it, either. I probably would not have voted on the matter. I can see both sides of this issue.
#5 Posted by padikiller, CJR on Thu 17 May 2012 at 08:45 AM
One aspect of the 'framing' of this issue worth mentioning is that in press coverage, the issue is promoted as being about homosexuality, rather than about marriage. This emphasis permits most coverage I've seen to (big surprise) present the issue in terms of that apparently-addictive story device, 'tolerance' vs. 'intolerance'.
This is of course narrow and misleading - especially if you ask a simple question like 'What does marriage equality mean for the third wheel in the LGBT vehicle, bisexuals'? The framing of the issue strictly in terms of same-sex couples allows the advocates to avoid answering the tough questions. We went through this slovenly thinking after the civil rights movement, which started with giving all people their rights regardless of ancestry, and ended up with students being assigned to public schools and evaluated for college admissions and jobs specifically according to their ancestry.
#6 Posted by Mark Richard, CJR on Thu 17 May 2012 at 12:35 PM
Bravo to Andria for this analysis of the Amendment One issue and newspaper editorial pages. I think the power of the editorial page may be waning as Dan Gillmor suggests. To not use the one place where point of view is celebrated to take on such an important issue does consign the News & Record to editorial oblivion on other issues.
To really measure the value of editorial pages, we would need to know which voters actually read the newspaper. And whether they are influenced by these editorial pages. That data will remain elusive, however.
#7 Posted by Michelle Ferrier, CJR on Thu 17 May 2012 at 01:09 PM
Gay or not, just don't force me to subsidize the perks or penalties to other people's personal choices. I'm egregiously taxed for many detestable and illicit undertakings as it is.
#8 Posted by Dan A., CJR on Thu 17 May 2012 at 01:15 PM
For Michael and others who brought up framing, it's a good point. Perhaps newspapers could have focused more on the law's effect on all unmarried couples of any gender. Some advertising brought up that point, but most of the discussion and stories focused on gay couples.
The initial impact: State institutions and municipalities are reexamining the benefits they provide all unmarried couples. It's begun:
http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2012/05/17/3247708/city-council-shouldnt-snub-amendment.html
Public Policy Polling has a new survey that shows an 11-point shift in the percentage of African Americans who favor gay marriage since President Obama's statement.
http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/main/2012/05/movement-among-black-north-carolinians-on-gay-marriage.html
...and finally, Michelle's right in that it's *not enough* to say editorials have a unique, traditional role in shaping community opinion. We need data, and we could get it. Some research papers on the subject likely exist; more study, under current print and online readership levels with social sharing, seems a worthy effort.
And thanks, y'all, for reading and commenting!
#9 Posted by Andria K., CJR on Thu 17 May 2012 at 09:27 PM