Word: press
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...Apologies. Like the U.S. Commission on Freedom of the Press (TIME, March 31, 1947), the 17-member Royal Commission was mainly composed of nonjournalists; it was headed by Sir David Ross, provost (now emeritus) of Oxford's Oriel College and a distinguished Aristotelian scholar. As Britain's press lords paraded before the commission, they made no apologies...
Last week, after two years of hearings and deliberation, the commission planted a bombshell in the laps of its Labor patrons. To the shocked surprise of left-wing politicians and press, its 3&2-page report was a sweeping vindication of the private ownership of Britain's newspapers...
Flatly disputing Nye Bevan, the commission reported itself satisfied that "the British press is inferior to none in the world." Rejecting government licensing or control, it added: "In our view free enterprise in the production of newspapers is a prerequisite of a free press, and free enterprise will generally mean commercially profitable enterprise . . . We see no reason to think that newspapers attached to ... political parties, trade unions or other organizations would . . . have greater regard for truth and fairness...
...commission concluded that the National Union of Journalists' talk of blacklists and fears about monopoly were exaggerated: "There is nothing approaching monopoly in the press as a whole." But it noted that in 58 of 66 towns with daily newspapers, there was no competition except from London's nationally circulated papers. The commission warned: "We should deplore any tendency on the part of the larger chains to expand...
...most world capitals. There the resemblance stops. Tass's chief clients are Russian newspapers, its reporters are frequently Communists, and they often seem more interested in keeping the Kremlin in formed than they do about making a Pravda deadline. For this reason, their presence at off-the-record press conferences has sometimes worried officials of Western nations who prefer to keep their confidences off-the-record from Moscow...