Free The Kingdom and the Power by Gay Talese

it was allotted, where it appeared in the paper; and sometimes, instead of conducting theircampaigns quietly, the dukes or their henchmen played out their ambitions openly on the very locations where headline news was being made, providing journalistic sideshows that were as lively on occasion as the news happenings reported in the paper.
    During the Korean war, for example, there were
Times
men at the front who were attached to Markel’s Sunday department, Krock’s Washington bureau, and the foreign desk in New York, and the hostility that developed between certain members of these factions was such that even now, nearly two decades later, these individuals rarely speak when they meet by chance in the elevators of the
Times
building. There was one incident in Korea during the winter of 1950 in which a
Times
man from Washington, assisted by a colonel who was his frequent drinking companion, schemed to have a
Times
man from New York removed from the theater of operations on the false charge that he was a psychotic who feared the sound of gunfire, a result of a combat wound he had received in the cheek of his buttock during World War II, and consequently he was covering the Korean War from his hotel room. The New York man, disliked by the Washington man for competitive reasons and by the colonel because his reporting of the war had seemed too pessimistic, was completely unaware of the plot until he received his notice of disaccreditation—and then he protested so loudly that it came to the attention of General MacArthur. MacArthur was also very annoyed because he had been kept uninformed of the disaccreditation order and because he had recently been called upon to arbitrate a similar dispute involving the
Herald Tribune
’s correspondent Marguerite Higgins. She had been asked to leave Korea but, after the protests of
Tribune
executives and other high-placed individuals, MacArthur had reinstated her, relieved to have the problem off his back. Now, in
The Times
’ case, MacArthur did not want a feud with the newspaper that had been giving him editorial support at a time when he greatly needed it at home; still, he was infuriated by all the journalistic backbiting of late, and as he listened to the
Times
man’s plea to be reaccredited, he frowned, drawing on his corncob pipe. Finally MacArthur granted the correspondent his wish, but then he angrily waved him out of his office. “For God’s sake,” MacArthur cried, “can’t
The New York Times
wash its dirty laundry in private?”
    The managing editor who succeeded Edwin James was a tall, smiling, dark-eyed charmer from Mississippi named Turner Catledge. Catledge was a man who liked to spend evenings with friendsdrinking whiskey and telling good stories, and some people misinterpreted this as a sign of his laxity or indifference to work. Actually, Catledge was probably the shrewdest managing editor of them all. While lacking Van Anda’s brilliance or the busy-beaver quality of Birchall, Catledge was their master when it came to handling men and manipulating situations without seeming to be doing so. He had covered politics in Washington through the Thirties and Forties, and he was a believer in the political organization, the coordinated team with unchallenged hard power at the top, and he was appalled by what had been going on within
The Times
during James’s final years. When James died in December of 1951, Catledge’s main problem was what to do about the dukes.
    Had he been on another publication the solution would have been simpler, but on
The Times
it had never been easy to remove people, particularly people with power, or people who possibly had connections with the publisher or members of the family.
Times
men in key positions like to stay there, they fight to stay there, for employment on
The Times
is very prestigious—doors open elsewhere, favors are for the asking, important people are available, the world seems easier. Also, from the early days of Ochs,