Joseph Pulitzer Quotes

The media owes the responsibility to constantly tell the public the truth.

Journalism without a moral position is impossible. Every journalist is a moralist. It's absolutely unavoidable.

I have always thought it morally unacceptable to kill stories, not to run stories, that people have risked their lives to get.

Thus, neither my government nor myself, personally, are without ideals and responsibilities.

There is kind of this spirit in journalism to tell both sides of the story and to just let the listeners choose what they want to choose, and I understand that, and there's a place for it, but on some issues, we really do need to take a stand.

Journalism can never be silent: that is its greatest virtue and its greatest fault.

It was long ago in my life as a simple reporter that I decided that facts must never get in the way of truth.

I think the bottom line for me and for Newsweek is that there were a lot of - we did retract this specific matter about the Koran and the toilet for the reasons that you just cited.

If a tech journalist needs financial security before doing what their conscience dictates, I'm not sure they should be calling themselves journalists at all.

By definition, a government has no conscience. Sometimes it has a policy, but nothing more.

I do think that there are gray lines of morality in a newsroom, when it comes to some stories. The best-intentioned journalist still has a difficult mission, to try to boil down people.

Some in journalism consider themselves apart from and to some extent above the people they purport to serve.

Americans have not only a right but a responsibility to consider the values of those who seek to lead them - whether they arise from life experience, political ideology or religious belief.

Public business … must always be done by somebody…. If wise men decline it, others will not; if honest men refuse it, others will not.

When a man assumes a public trust, he should consider himself as public property.

… keeper of the national conscience

There are certain stories that remind you of the moral purpose that originally drew you to become a reporter.

You have to create public activist pressure on papers like the 'New York Times' to keep them accountable.

What I say is that there are not half a dozen papers in the United States which tamper with the news, which publish what they know to be false. But if I thought I had done no better than that, I would be ashamed to own a paper. You have to make everyone connected with the paper believe that accuracy is to a newspaper what virtue is to a woman.

Leaders, whether in the public or the private sphere, must understand the responsibilities that come with their role. They are the most visible standard-bearers of their organizations. Holding them accountable to this responsibility protects the promise of our organizations and our communities.

As anchorman of the CBS Evening News, I signed off my nightly broadcasts for nearly two decades with a simple statement: 'And that's the way it is.' To me, that encapsulates the newsman's highest ideal: to report the facts as he sees them, without regard for the consequences or controversy that may ensue.

The journalist confines himself to the clean, gentlemanly work of exposing the griefs and shames of others.

We need ethical journalism. There is also capacity limitations in journalism.

It is hard to speak the truth about valued national institutions. But when they are not fit for purpose, we must speak out.

Some journalists are schmucks, in it for themselves, willing to cut corners. But in my experience the vast majority of journalists are trying to contribute to their communities, honestly and reliably.