By happy coincidence rather than clever planning, the Winter 2013 issue of Gateway Journalism Review is filled with stories about the full range of First Amendment issues in the news. This focus on free speech is fitting, because GJR just celebrated the First Amendment at its annual fundraiser in St. Louis.
The end of December is the season for newspapers to unveil big projects aimed at changing public policy – and, not incidentally, winning prizes. (I know. I’ve done it.) This year, the Kansas City Star printed an unappetizing but provocative series on meat production showing that modern industry methods may be harmful for people’s health. Across the state, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch ran a series on pedestrians killed on railroad tracks and what it saw at the weak industry response. The reader reaction was quite different.
Bob Hoemeke was every journalist’s favorite lawyer. He tried to get information into the newspaper instead of keeping out. Hoemeke, the most prominent media lawyer in Missouri during the last decades of the last century, died Nov. 28 of the effects of Parkinson’s disease. He was 77.
Illinois’ toughest in the nation eavesdropping law is partly unenforceable now that a Chicago prosecutor failed to persuade the U.S. Supreme Court to revive the law. Citizens now can make an audio tape of Chicago police making a stop without fear of prosecution. The taping of police stops is part of an ACLU of Illinois program scrutinizing police conduct.
Terry Ganey is one of the most respected investigative reporters and political correspondents of the past 40 years in Missouri. With the November issue, he takes over as St. Louis editor of Gateway Journalism Review. Ganey, a former colleague at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, is taking over from Roy Malone, another valued Post-Dispatch colleague. Malone will continue to contribute but is taking a break from the many years he and Charles Klotzer kept this publication alive.