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By Casey Bukro
Ethics AdviceLine for Journalists
The Society of Professional Journalists has had a love/hate relationship with its own code of ethics for a long time.
It loves being praised for having a code of ethics that is admired by professional journalists and considered a “gold standard” worthy of guiding the conduct of all ethical journalists. Wikipedia says the code is”what the SPJ has been best known for.”
It hates being expected to actually do anything about ethics and insists the code of ethics is strictly voluntary, take it or leave it. The society says its code is “a statement of abiding principles” and “not a set of rules.”
I’ve been involved in this push-and-pull tussle for years and called SPJ an ethics wimp for refusing to enforce its own code of ethics. That’s when I learned who my friends really were, and who really believed in free speech.
No ethics cops
Journalists thrive on controversy, but not in their own ranks. They bash everyone, but go easy on fellow journalists, saying they don’t want to be ethics cops.
Seems like a double standard, one for journalists and another for everyone else.
I’ve argued that if journalists don’t face up to their ethics obligations and put their own house in order, someone is going to try to do it for them.
Then this happened: Members of the Hawaii state senate on Jan. 23, 2025, introduced a bill calling for penalties against journalists operating in the state for ethics violations.
Evolving media landscape
“The legislature finds that in today’s rapidly evolving media landscape, the need for ethical standards in journalism has never been more urgent,” said the proposal. “The rise of social media, deepfake technologies and generative AI has amplified the spread of misinformation, posing new challenges for journalism and public trust.”
The statement points to “a significant decline in public confidence in media.”
Hard to deny any of that.
But then the legislators dropped a bombshell. The bill says journalists, editors or news media outlets shall “comply with the code of ethics adopted by the Society of Professional Journalists.”
Horrified
You’d think SPJ leaders would take that as a compliment. But SPJ leaders with a history of doing nothing about ethics except talk about it were horrified.
“The Society of Professional Journalists views this legislation as patently unconstitutional and calls for the Hawaii legislature to remove it from consideration,” said the organization in a statement.
SPJ’s national president, Emily Bloch, had this to say: “While the Society of Professional Journalists is flattered that the Hawaii State Legislature recognizes the SPJ Code of Ethics as a gold standard for journalistic integrity, we must strongly oppose any attempt to use our code as a tool for policing journalists through legislation. Such measures fundamentally contradict the principles of the First Amendment and the freedom of the press.”
Unconstitutional
SPJ has long argued that any attempt to do something about unethical journalism is unconstitutional. Worse yet, SPJ shows no ambition for addressing the seismic shifts in American journalism that the Hawaii state senate spelled out clearly.
A trailblazer in journalism ethics, SPJ once boasted of having 15,000 members. Then it lost its way, becoming what a consultant once said was “nice but not necessary.” Today, membership reportedly is down to about 4,000.
Founded in 1909, SPJ once touted itself as the oldest and largest journalism organization in the U.S. It’s website now describes the organization as “the nation’s most broad-based journalism organization” that, among other things, is dedicated to “stimulating high standards of ethical behavior.” An interesting word usage, since stimulating means “to arouse to activity or heightened action.”
Stimulation
SPJ does not want to stimulate the Hawaiian state legislature to act on its code of ethics.
It could be said SPJ lost its way when it went soft on ethics, and might have lost members too.
I’m an SPJ member, and feel personally involved any time the SPJ ethics code is mentioned. I wrote the version adopted in 1973, the first code of ethics that SPJ could call its own.
It happened this way: In 1972, when SPJ was known as Sigma Delta Chi (SDX), I was chairman of the society’s Professional Development Committee.
Abuses
At its national convention in Dallas, the society adopted a resolution asking journalists and the public to be aware “of the importance of objectivity and credibility in the news media by calling attention to abuses of these tenets when they occur.”
That resolution was sent to my committee “for study and program proposals.”
Committee members considered a list of things to do in response to the convention mandate. At the top of the list was a code of ethics SDX could call its own.
While I researched what a modern code of ethics should contain, committee members offered ideas. With that, I batted out a code of ethics on the Underwood typewriter I used at work at the Chicago Tribune. (This was before computers, if you can imagine that.)
Soaring ideals
I wanted it to reflect the ideals of SDX and of journalism in soaring ways, reflecting not only what journalism is but what it wants to be.
The next year, in 1973, I presented the new code of ethics at the national convention in Buffalo, N.Y., calling it “strong stuff.” It outlawed accepting “freebies”, free travel and secondary employment that could damage a journalist’s reputation and credibility.
Most of all, it contained a pledge, saying “journalists should actively censure and try to prevent violations of these standards, and they should encourage their observance by all newspeople.” That became known as the “censure clause.”
For the books
What happened next is one for the history books. I moved for its adoption, it was seconded and adopted unanimously by hundreds of delegates without a word of debate.
Those delegates had copies of the proposed code of ethics in their notebooks. Typically, journalists haggle for hours over the proper use of words, sentences, phrases and even punctuation in written material. But not this time.
What happened next was bizarre, surprising and maybe unprecedented in the history of the world. As I walked from the dais, the society’s executive director, Russ Hurst, grabbed my arm.
Once again
Looking worried, Hurst said maybe the delegates did not realize what they had just done. He expected a long and bitter floor fight over the code, especially the part about censuring journalists. He told me to introduce the proposed ethics code again.
So, I returned to the dais, interrupting the society’s president as he was going on to the next order of business, and told him I was instructed to introduce the code a second time, which I did.
This time, I emphasized it was a tough code “with teeth,” telling journalists to take action on ethics. Ethics requires thought and action. I moved again for its adoption.
Ayes
And a resounding second chorus of louder “ayes” rang out, without objections or debate.
It was the only time in SDX history that a resolution was adopted unanimously twice. And probably the last time ethics was discussed without heated debate.
That year, the organization changed its name to the Society of Professional Journalists, and I became chair of the newly created national Ethics Committee.
SPJ leaders responded cautiously with a go-slow campaign of hanging copes of the ethics code on newsroom and classroom walls.
Next decade
For the next decade, the code nagged at members, as a good code should. It should not simply be words on paper, but a call to action.
On Nov. 19, 1977, an SPJ convention in Detroit adopted a resolution mandating that “chapters be encouraged to develop procedures for dealing with questions of ethics.” That never happened.
SPJ was torn between a desire to lead journalists toward more ethical conduct, and a fear that could lead to “witch hunts” and litigation.
My greatest fear was that 326 SPJ professional and student chapters had no idea how to handle ethics complaints if they arose. It made sense to offer some guidelines, some boundaries.
President’s request
While I was national ethics chairman In 1984, at the request of SPJ president Phil Record, I drafted procedures for addressing ethics complaints. On May 17, 1985, the SPJ board of directors unanimously rejected the procedures proposed during a meeting in Salt Lake City.
I was not proposing draconian measures. Censure could mean anything we wanted it to mean, including a mild rebuke pointing out that a member or one of the SPJ chapters were doing something contrary to the ethics standards.
I believed that the SPJ code of ethics should be considered a condition of membership, like the bylaws which spelled out the conditions for being a member in good standing. First and foremost, it belonged to SPJ and our first duty was to be sure our own members understood the code and lived up to it.
House in order
SPJ had an obligation to make sure its own house was in order before preaching ethics to others.
If other organizations wanted to adopt the SPJ code, that was their business. And they could decide what to do about it.
The censure clause issue came to a head at the 1986 convention in Atlanta, 13 years after the code’s adoption. A delegate from Mississippi said that his chapter started an investigation into an alleged ethics code violation, but dropped it when SPJ national official said they would not support any action.
Proper and just
A delegate from Arkansas proposed a resolution asking the SPJ board of directors to recommend, in consultation with the national Ethics Committee and local chapters, procedures for chapters to use to handle ethics complaints, subject to approval by the national convention the following year in Chicago. She wanted guidance for what is “proper and just.” The resolution was adopted.
On April 30, 1987, the SPJ board of directors met in St. Paul and voted to recommend no procedures for chapters to handle ethics complaints, and the board recommended removing the censure clause from the code of ethics.
At that meeting, Bruce Sanford, SPJ’s lawyer, is quoted in the minutes saying “if you believe in ethics, you have to take some risks.” That seemed like a moment of enlightenment. But then Sanford handed the board a memorandum calling ethics enforcement an “oxymoron.” He urged “using hypothetical situations to provoke discussion,” as lawyers do, not real ethics issues. The memo warned enforcing the code “would likely engender a rash of lawsuits.”
A menace
Sanford had been terrifying board members with this kind of language for years, describing the ethics code as a menace to be feared. It should be noted that various professional groups are bound by professional standards, including lawyers. The American Bar Association has model rules of professional conduct, including disciplinary authority.
Lawyers advised SPJ that admitting to having a code of ethics could be held against journalists in court, which never happened.
The trouble with hypotheticals is they are fiction, although a room full of clever journalists can devise some amazing and far-fetched hypotheticals. But that’s just an amusing game. Life often is far more complicated and surprising than anything you can imagine.
Refusal
At the 1987 national convention in Chicago, the SPJ board refused to follow the 1986 convention’s mandate. After delegates voiced disapproval of the board’s failure to act on that mandate, a proposal to delete the controversial censure clause was adopted by a 162-136 vote. It was replaced by a passage calling for ethics education programs and encouraging the adoption of more codes of ethics.
By my reckoning, SPJ leaders by this point had overruled or ignored four convention resolutions mandating action on ethics abuses and procedures for addressing ethics complaints.
For years, SPJ bylaws stated that conventions are “the supreme legislative body of the organization.” Their mandates typically were honored and considered the voice of its membership, helping to set the organization’s agenda.
Bylaws amended
In 2023, the bylaws were amended, deleting references to conventions being a supreme legislative body. Instead, it said the SPJ board of directors “shall determine the priorities of the society’s business in furtherance of its mission…” In effect, SPJ leadership censored its members. This made official the board’s long-held suspicion that the boisterous rank and file can’t be trusted.
This history describes an organization leading the way on ethics, then losing confidence as its leadership turned timid and out of touch with the wishes of its membership, then turning a deaf ear to its members.
So ended a stormy period that provoked hard feelings and some broken friendships.
All for ethics
Though everyone is for ethics, you’d get an argument on what that means.
The toothless 1973 code and its amendments, though considered a model for journalists for 23 years, was ready for retirement.
SPJ’s national Ethics ommittee met in Philadelphia in 1996 with the intention of drafting a new “green light” code of ethics, which it did in two days. The backbone of the new code hinged on four principles: Seek truth and report it, minimize harm, act independently and be accountable. I was told the Poynter Institute suggested that framework.
Four principles
Participants gathered into four groups to suggest standards for each of the four principles. I chaired the “be accountable” section, later changed to “be accountable and transparent.”
The new code of ethics was adopted by a national convention in 1996, including passages urging journalists to be accountable by exposing “unethical conduct in journalism, including within their organizations” and to “abide by the same high standards they expect of others.”
The code was tweaked again in 2014.
I served as SPJ’s national ethics chair from 1983 to 1986, and left the national Ethics Committee in 2010. I also served for many years as Midwest regional director for Illinois, Indiana and Kentucky. And in 1983 was awarded the Wells Memorial Key, the society’s highest honor. I served the society for many years, but also feel an obligation to hold its feet to the fire, as I would with any organization that considers itself vital to the future of journalism. I want SPJ to live up to its own ideals.
Calls for action
Clearly the current SPJ ethics code still calls for action, where it says journalists should expose unethical conduct in journalism. That is something SPJ is unwilling to do, and might be the next thing to disappear from the code.
The Hawaiian state legislature is taking aim at wayward journalists, despite SPJ’s protests. And the legislature has a definite plan for doing that. It calls for:
*Establishing baseline ethical standards and transparency requirements for journalists, editors or news media outlets operating in Hawaii.
Training
*Requires news media to train their employees in ethics.
*Establishing a journalistic ethics commission to render advisory opinions about violations of the journalistic code of ethics.
*Establish a journalistic ethics review board.
Penalties
The commission “shall enforce penalties” recommended by a review board.
*Create a dedicated hotline and online reporting system to file complaints related to violations of the code of ethics.
*Create a complaint and appeals process.
Investigate
Under the legislation, the ethics review board would investigate complaints and file a written determination within 30 calendar days. The board could recommend a penalty for noncompliance, which could include a fine for a second violation.
Penalties could include “suspension or revocation of state media privileges, including press credentials for government-sponsored events.”
The proposed legislation goes on to say, “The state shall not deny or interfere with a journalist’s, editor’s or news media outlet’s right to exercise freedom of speech or freedom of the press….A journalist, editor or news media outlet shall be responsible for determining the news, opinion, feature and advertising content of their publication.”
Unacceptable
Unacceptable expressions include libel, slander, invasion of personal privacy, obscenity and inciting unlawful acts.
Locally, Hawaiian media express disapproval of the proposals.
The Sunshine Blog in the Honolulu Civil Beat, said: “Just say no to giving the state power over the press.”
Journalists will say, as they have in the past, that ethics enforcement is a violation of their First Amendment rights, and maybe it is and will be shot down for that reason. Courts these days, however, seem to differ on the meaning of constitutionality and press freedoms as government officials turn increasingly hostile toward the media. Two U.S. Supreme Court justices want to reconsider New York Times vs. Sullivan, a 1964 landmark First Amendment decision in libel cases.
It could be healthy to nudge journalists into thinking about what they should do to keep journalism honest, fair and ethical in these times of political polarization, media fragmentation, a divisive internet and a disappearing newspaper industry.
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The Ethics AdviceLine for Journalists was founded in 2001 by the Chicago Headline Club (Chicago professional chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists) and Loyola University Chicago Center for Ethics and Social Justice. It partnered with the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University in 2013. It is a free service.
Professional journalists are invited to contact the Ethics AdviceLine for Journalists for guidance on ethics. Call 866-DILEMMA or ethicsadvicelineforjournalists.org.
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