Linda Greenhouse

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Linda Greenhouse

Linda Greenhouse in San Francisco in 2005
Born January 9, 1947 (1947-01-09) (age 61)
New York City
Occupation Journalist
Known for Pulitzer Prize winner

Contents

Linda Greenhouse (born 1947-01-09 in New York City) is a Pulitzer Prize winning reporter who covered the United States Supreme Court for three decades for the The New York Times.

[edit] Education

Greenhouse received her BA degree in government from Radcliffe College in 1968 and a Master of Studies in Law[1] from Yale Law School in 1978.[2]

[edit] Career

She covered the Supreme Court from 1978 to 2008, with the exception of two years during the mid-1980s during which she covered the Congress.[2] Since 1981, she has authored over 2,800 articles for the New York Times.[3] She has been a regular guest on the PBS program Washington Week.[4]

In 2008, Greenhouse accepted an offer from the New York Times for an early retirement.[5]

[edit] Awards and Prizes

Greenhouse was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in Journalism (Beat Reporting) in 1998 "for her consistently illuminating coverage of the United States Supreme Court."[2] In 2004, she received the Goldsmith Career Award for Excellence in Journalism[6] and the John Chancellor Award for Excellence in Journalism.[7] She was a Radcliffe Institute Medal winner in 2006.[8]

When she was at Radcliffe, she said in a speech given in 2006, "I was the Harvard stringer for the Boston Herald, which regularly printed, and paid me for, my accounts of student unrest and other newsworthy events at Harvard. But when it came time during my senior year to look for a job in journalism, the Herald would not even give me an interview, and neither would the Boston Globe, because these newspapers had no interest in hiring women."[9]

[edit] Criticism of Greenhouse

Some critics on the political right, notably retired Appeals Court Judge Laurence H. Silberman have complained of what they call the "Greenhouse Effect." They believe that some federal judges have changed their opinions to win favorable coverage, either in the New York Times or in the legal press in general, which they view as being part of the "Liberal Establishment." This criticism seems directed less at Greenhouse personally than at a general assumption of a liberal media bias.[10]

In 1989, she was rebuked by Times editors for participating in an abortion-rights rally in Washington. Though the New York Times public editor Daniel Okrent attests that he has never received a single complaint of bias in Greenhouse's coverage,[11] some other media observers have been critical of the perception of bias that her personal actions create.[citation needed]

[edit] Harvard speech

She has also faced criticism for expressing publicly (at Harvard University in June, 2006) her personal views supporting abortion rights and criticism of US policies and actions at Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib, and Haditha.[11]

Greenhouse said that she started crying a few years back at a Simon & Garfunkel concert because her (Sixties) generation hadn't done a better job of running the country than previous generations:

And of course my little crying jag occurred before we knew the worst of it, before it was clear the extent to which our government had turned its energy and attention away from upholding the rule of law and toward creating law-free zones at Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib, Haditha, and other places around the world. And let’s not forget the sustained assault on women’s reproductive freedom and the hijacking of public policy by religious fundamentalism. To say that these last years have been dispiriting is an understatement.

– [9]

Media critic Howard Kurtz of the Washington Post commented, "Don't those remarks, publicized last week by National Public Radio, go too far for a beat reporter covering such issues at the high court?" Kurtz quoted Greenhouse defending her comments, calling them "statements of fact," not opinion.[12]

"The notion that someone cannot go and speak from the heart to a group of college classmates and fellow alums, without being accountable to self-appointed media watchdogs, means American journalism is in danger of strangling in its own sanctimony," Greenhouse said.[12]

She told National Public Radio: "I said what I said in a public place. Let the chips fall where they may."[11]

[edit] Greenhouse in the news

On August 9, 2007, a television crew from C-SPAN was forbidden to film a panel discussion at a meeting of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication. Greenhouse had told organizers that she would not be able "answer [questions] as fully and frankly" as she would be if the session were not filmed.[13]

[edit] Bibliography

  • Linda Greenhouse (2005). Becoming Justice Blackmun: Harry Blackmun's Supreme Court Journey. New York: Times Books. ISBN 0-8050-8057-0. 

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ Yale Law School : M.S.L. Program. Retrieved on 2007-10-07.
  2. ^ a b c Pulitzer Prize Winners 1998: Beat Reporting - Biography. Pulitzer.org. Retrieved on 2007-08-09.
  3. ^ Linda Greenhouse. The New York Times. Retrieved on 2007-10-07.
  4. ^ Washington Week . Linda Greenhouse. PBS. Retrieved on 2007-10-07.
  5. ^ "NYT's Greenhouse Takes Buyout Offer", Houston Chronicle, 2008-02-27 accessdate=2008-02-28. 
  6. ^ Goldsmith Career Award. The Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy, Harvard University. Retrieved on 2007-10-07.
  7. ^ John Chancellor Award for Excellence in Journalism - Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. Retrieved on 2007-10-07.
  8. ^ Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Harvard University (2006-06-08). "Linda Greenhouse ’68 Wins 2006 Radcliffe Institute Medal". Press release. Retrieved on 2007-10-07.
  9. ^ a b 2006 Radcliffe Institute Medalist Linda Greenhouse ‘68. Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. Retrieved on 2007-08-09.
  10. ^ Dahlia Lithwick (3-August-2005). The Souter Factor. Slate. Retrieved on 2007-08-09.
  11. ^ a b c Folkenflik, David (26-September-2006). Critics Question Reporter's Airing of Personal Views. All Things Considered. Retrieved on 2007-08-09.
  12. ^ a b Kurtz, Howard (2-October-2006). The Right Man For Fox News: Roger Ailes Soldiers On For the Good of the Cause. The Washington Post. Retrieved on 2007-08-09.
  13. ^ John Eggerton. "Journalism Educators Bar C-SPAN Cameras", Broadcasting & Cable, 10-August-2007. Retrieved on 2007-08-10. 

[edit] External links

Persondata
NAME Greenhouse, Linda
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION Journalist
DATE OF BIRTH 1947-1-9
PLACE OF BIRTH New York City
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH