The newly installed publisher of the Times, A.G. Sulzberger, is out with "A Note From Our New Publisher" that suggests that maybe he might want to, you know, re-read the First Amendment before he spends much more time out in public on his new job. The "note" contains this doozy:
There was a reason freedom of speech and freedom of the press were placed first among our essential rights. Our founders understood that the free exchange of ideas and the ability to hold power to account were prerequisites for a successful democracy.
Uh, sorry to break it to you, Mr. Sulzberger, but there is no accurate count by which "freedom of speech and freedom of the press were placed first among our essential rights."
Not the Declaration of Independence, which said, "they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." That one, in other words, put "life" on the list before liberty.
Not the Constitution itself, in whose original text the first right is that "The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it."
Not the Bill of Rights, whose First Amendment begins, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," and caused religious liberty to be known as the First Freedom. Only after mentioning the religious freedoms does the First Amendment then go on to address the freedoms of speech, press, assembly, and petition.
Not the New York State Constitution, which places the right to vote, to trial by jury, to religious liberty, to habeas corpus, and to private property all ahead of the rights of speech or the press.
Not the Massachusetts Constitution crafted by John and Samuel Adams that was the model for the U.S. Constitution; it put property rights and religious freedom ahead of the press freedom.
Rights are rights, regardless of the order in which they are enumerated. But given that Mr. Sulzberger's note goes on to fret about "a dangerous confluence of forces," among them that "Misinformation is rising and trust in the media is declining" and "polarization is jeopardizing even the foundational assumption of common truths," you'd think the publisher would be more careful about himself contributing to the misinformation by claiming something that is just flat-out false.
One of the realities about the New York Times is that many of the people who work there are afraid of the members of the family that controls it. The best advice I can give A.G. Sulzberger as he takes over is, if he is going to be writing for the paper, to find someone smart to edit his copy who isn't afraid to tell him when he is wrong. Maybe it is another family member. Maybe it is a volunteer or consultant who isn't an employee of the family newspaper. The second-best advice would be to re-read the First Amendment.