A Few Rules On Letters To the Editor

It’s election season. News and signs of the local, state, and national campaigns are inescapable. Because we know we will be receiving letters to the editor on politicians and political views in the coming weeks, we want to remind our readers of a few rules that apply.
Letters to the editor allow our readers to express how they feel about the challenges facing their communities, what steps they think need to be taken to address them, and how our elected officials are performing. They address the stands and character of those running for state and federal office.
We encourage our readers to write. The best editorial pages are those in which our readers express a variety of views.
Letters to the editor offer a safe space for their views and a place for civil conversation. By being civil in how we express ourselves, we open the door to understanding one another rather than offending readers and shutting the door to their consideration of our thoughts.
As we consider publishing the letters we receive, here are a few rules that we apply:
- We want letters from local writers with our subscribers given preference when several letters are on the same subject in the same week. We get letters from far and wide. They come from outside this region and even other states. Letters that are not local or not from subscribers are unlikely to get printed.
- All letters must be signed with an address. They must also contain a phone number by which we can verify the sender’s identity. We will not publish the address or phone number. We only identify the town where the letter writer lives on the published letter.
- We ask that writers know the facts of what they are writing about. Rumors and half-truths are not the stuff on which letters should be based. Letters that contain provably false information will not be printed.
- Letters should be no more than 350 words. State clearly and precisely your point or points.
- We will carry one letter per person per month unless the person is the direct subject of a letter.
- No letters will be accepted in the week before an election unless it is in response to a direct assertion made by a previous writer. Only a response to the previous letter will be allowed – no new points can be raised.
- We don’t print letters that attack individuals. You can challenge a belief or a way of life that you don’t agree with, but you can’t attack the individual whose lifestyle you disagree with or find offensive.
- Language that threatens harm or incites action to harm an individual or group is hate speech, and we don’t print it. Letters that demean others won’t be accepted.
- Letters generated by an artificial intelligence program will not be printed. If we discover that one has slipped past us and has been printed, the person who submitted the letter will be banned from our editorial pages. We want you to say what you think in your own words.
- We don’t print letters submitted to other publications, or those written by campaigns, or organizations representing political campaigns or candidates – that’s advertising.
- We reserve the right to edit the letters for clarity.
- We won’t hold out letters simply because we disagree with an opinion. If we were to hold all letters that offended our readers, we would be a weakened and poor reflection of the depth and breadth of people living in our community.
Why do newspapers print letters that many would see as offensive? Letters play a safety valve role of letters in a community. “Better a hateful bigot express himself with a vile opinion than with harassment or violence,” Bill Reader, an associate professor at E.W. Scripps School of Journalism at Ohio University, says.
Second, it is important to ensure the community remains aware of the broad range of thought among its people. The letters we print allow the community to look at itself and ask, “Is this a reflection of who we are?” Those who disagree with what they read can respond with their perspective.
Only being exposed to ideas we agree with builds walls to challenging thoughts that might give us new insights and new perspectives that help expand our thinking. Those new ideas might make us more tolerant and more willing to compromise.
We also do not publish news releases for candidates running for office. Incumbents have an unfair advantage in that they can send us news releases about their accomplishments in the weeks before an election. While these news releases would have been edited and added outside the time frame of an election, they are a form of promotion and advertising during the election season.
We encourage our readers to write letters and become part of the dynamic representative democracy the nation’s founders created and which millions of American soldiers have fought to protect.