'Wash. Post' Issues New Rules for Sources, Quotes

By: Joe Strupp The Washington Post issued new updated guidelines for reporters and editors that clarify the use of confidential sources, datelines and quotations, Executive Editor Leonard Downie Jr. said Thursday.

Following months of discussion by a group of Post editors, who decided to examine the paper's policies in light of the 2003 Jayson Blair scandal at The New York Times, Downie and other editors unveiled the new guidelines in a staff memo distributed to employees at a Wednesday meeting.

"We decided that in the wake of some of the things that have happened elsewhere, we ought to put together a more detailed guide for our policies, update some of them, and make them clear," Downie told E&P. "There were two overriding objectives -- one is to be fair and accurate in our reporting; the other is to be more transparent with our readers."

Among the most significant changes is the policy on quotes, which requires that all quotes appearing in the paper reflect exactly what the person said. "I think, with good intentions, people have attempted to correct grammar in some cases" in the past, Downie said. "Anything else has to be paraphrased."

There are also new, clearer directives for sourcing. The paper will require that at least one editor know the identity of a confidential source used in the paper. "When it says, 'according to an unnamed source' one editor has to know who that someone is," Downie explained. "That way they can decide if it is a good use."

In other sourcing rules, specific definitions were spelled out for how an interview is to be handled. Post (Click for QuikCap) reporters are advised to use these terms when laying the groundwork for discussions with sources:

Off the record: The information is not to be used in the paper in any way, not even if it is confirmed elsewhere. "We recommend that reporters not get into those kinds of conversations," Downie stressed.

Not for attribution or on background: The information can be used, with the source being identified only through a description, such as "a White House source" or "FBI official."

Deep background: The information is useable in reporting, but not sourced to a specific person. "Deep Throat was the classic deep background source," Downie said.

In addition, datelines must be considered more carefully under the revamped guidelines. The policy will now state that a dateline can only be used if at least one of the reporters on the story has done "substantial reporting" in that location. "If you did all of the reporting in Washington and then you fly to Chicago, you can't slap a Chicago dateline on it," Downie explained.

The style for corrections received a slight alteration in the new rules. From now on, blame will not be assessed in a correction upon any staff members for mistakes, Downie said. For example, corrections will no longer state, "due to an editing error" or "based on a reporting mistake."

Peter Perl, a 23-year Post reporter and a Washington Baltimore Newspaper Guild official, said the corrections policy is the only one that drew criticism from some staffers, who complained that it would make it seem that a reporter made the error if a clear explanation is not printed. "A couple of people raised questions, saying it may make it look like they made the mistake," Perl said.

But Downie stressed that the idea was to approach the paper as a collective effort, pointing out that editors who often catch reporter mistakes are never given public credit, so should not have blame attributed to them in such a public way. "That has generally been our policy, with some exceptions, but now it will be the policy for all."