• Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, who as as publisher of the newspaper and as chairman and chief executive of The New York Times Company helped bring the New York Times into the modern era by establishing an era of fiscal responsibility, helping to create multiple sections that went beyond hard news and covered consumer issues, and saw the paper through tough financial periods that could have threatened its existence, died over the weekend after a long illness. He was 86.
- KC's View:
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While Sulzberger's responsibilities focused on the paper's business side, he also understood the importance of a free press. It was under his watch in 1971 that the Times published the Pentagon Papers, thousands of pages of classified materials that detailed the government's mismanagement of the Vietnam War. Challenged by the Nixon administration, the Times published the papers nevertheless; when a temporary injunction stopped the Times from moving forward with its series, it then went to the Supreme Court and won what is generally acknowledged to be a landmark First Amendment ruling supporting press freedom.
