Newspaper Preservation Act of 1970

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The Newspaper Preservation Act of 1970 was an Act of the United States Congress, signed by President Richard Nixon, that authorized the formation of joint operating agreements among separate competing newspaper operations within the same market area. The act was designed to exempt newspaper from antitrust laws to allow the survival of multiple daily newspapers in a given urban market in the face of declining circulation. This exemption stemmed from the fact that the alternative is usually for at least one of the newspapers, generally the one published in the evening, to cease operations altogether.

In practice two daily newspapers published in the same city or geographic area combine business operations while maintaining separate — and competitive — news operations.

Contents

[edit] History

The first joint operating agreement was between Albuquerque Tribune (then the New Mexico State Tribune) and the Albuquerque Journal in Albuquerque, New Mexico, signed on February 20, 1933. Their agreement became typical of the type — both papers were printed on the same presses at different times of day. Classified advertising sales were consolidated, as were distribution agents. A joint entity to perform these functions was created, with equal representation on its board from both papers. Newsgathering and editorial operations remained completely separate, although located under one roof in different portions of the same building.

Arrangements similar to this allowed most medium-sized U.S. cities, and some of the larger ones as well, to have two daily newspapers until fairly recently. The number of joint operating agreements, as well as the number of evening-published daily newspapers, has declined considerably in recent years, due to the ongoing consolidation of the newspaper industry as a whole, and the decline in readership and interest in evening newspapers in particular, which many observers have attributed to television and the internet, of which the former seems to be magnified by the presence of several 24-hour-a-day news operations on cable television. There have been 28 Joint Operating Agreements to date.

[edit] Cities with newspaper joint operating agreements

[edit] Cities with joint operating agreements that terminated

[edit] References

  • John C. Busterna and Robert G. Picard. Joint Operating Agreements: The Newspaper Preservation Act and Its Application. Norwood, N.J.: Ablex Publishing Co., 1993.