A Response by Cohen and Murrow

David O. Percy claims that our article on the Georgia Historical Quarterly (GHQ) censorship dispute was biased and that in it we were guilty of drawing conclusions without evidence. But his  letter proves only that he is too partisan to confront the evidence we did present. In opening his letter, Percy seeks to challenge the credibility of our article by arguing that it was "based on unidentified sources."  Later, however, Percy inadvertently contradicts this charge when he acknowledges that two of the main sources we used  were indeed identified as "the former editor of the Quarterly [John Inscoe] and the chair of UGA's [the University of Georgia's] history department [James C. Cobb] ." In this same sentence Percy again makes false claims about our evidence, stating that these two were "the only named critics of the G[eorgia]H[istorical] S[ociety] (GHS)" to appear in the article. Actually, in addition to Inscoe and Cobb, our article prominently featured the criticisms of the GHS made by Glenn Eskew, another central figure in the GHQ controversy. Eskew, a professor of history at Georgia State University and former member of the GHS Board of Curators, charged that GHS leaders Todd Groce and Lisa White had spearheaded "a movement to censor" the GHQ. Our article cited the open letter in which Eskew made these charges, so that the accusations about GHS censorship were, as our report indicated, made publicly by  named sources, in fact, by well regarded historians whose words deserve to be taken seriously. Percy contends that because we reported these accusations we had engaged in "a one-sided attack on a colleague," but both Groce and White were interviewed for the article and we published the comments they made as they attempted to rebut the charges against them. Thus the article showed that there were two sides to the GHQ controversy, and reflected  the comments that were made by all the principals in the dispute.

George L. Vogt chides us for employing "loaded language" against the GHS. He charges that bias against the Georgia Historical Society led us to use  such words as "censorship" and "ally" in discussing GHS leadership  behavior, and that this same bias caused us to "imply racism at the Georgia Historical Society."  As has already been discussed above, critics of the GHS accused it of censorship of the Georgia Historical Quarterly. It seems self-evident that when writing about a censorship dispute  the word "censorship" will appear in the story. The use of this word is not inherently biased, and, in fact, we indicated in the story that Groce denied engaging in censorship--but even here you need the word "censorship" to indicate what the controversy was primarily about.  Similarly, much of the GHS-GHQ correspondence (dating back to 1998) and the interviews with all parties to the dispute indicated that Groce had allies in his struggle to assert control over the Quarterly. So did his adversaries. The term "ally" denotes "a formal or close relationship or bond," according to our dictionary. It is difficult to discern why Vogt thinks this is a loaded term. As to the subject of racism, we  deny that our reporting on this reflected any bias on our part. A Georgia historian interviewed for our story told one of us (Cohen) that he had learned that some vocal GHS members were irate that "all we see here [in the GHQ] are women and niggers." We reported his words verbatim.

Vogt suggests that the Quarterly was a worthy target for change (or censorship depending upon your perspective) because it was "dull."  He implies that readers "want[ed]" their money back after having a "steady stream of econometric, gender, class, and race articles... cram[med] ... down their throats" by the editors of the GHQ. The problem here is that Vogt seems never to have read the Quarterly. He tells us that his characterization of the journal as "dull" comes not from his own reading of it, but rather from an unnamed colleague who, as he puts it "is also a professional historian and has a particular expertise in journal publishing." Vogt  imagines that the Quarterly ignored its popular constituency, which was bored to death by highly technical econometric articles and other tedious academic writings. Nothing could be further from the truth. Actually the GHQ (under the editorship of Inscoe and his predecessor Thomas G. Dyer)  was one of those rare historical journals that combined critical historical scholarship with colorful local history that could appeal to the public as well as to scholars.  The GHQ regularly featured photo essays on Georgia history, articles on popular southern writers, political cartoons, graphics, and engaging historical narratives  that were free of jargon. The covers of the Quarterly were not the bland ones that one associates with many academic journals, but were designed with the public in mind, featuring historical paintings, photos, etchings and color backgrounds that changed with each issue. Vogt is even more off-base in suggesting that the GHS leadership attacked the review section of the Quarterly because it was boring; the evidence we presented indicated that the review essays were if anything too lively for the GHS, too lively that is, in their criticism of the white south.

Both Frank B.Vinson and Percy falsely accuse us of prejudging Anne Bailey, the new editor of the GHQ. Percy "wonders how the authors could conclude that significant changes in either the content or quality of the Georgia Historical Quarterly would occur" when "Bailey... has yet to publish an issue." Vinson pleads with our article's "bias[ed]" authors (and the GHS's critics) to be "more reasonable... [and] wait and examine a few editions under Bailey before passing judgement..." Actually we were very careful in the article not to pass any such judgements. We interviewed Bailey and quoted her to the effect that she had no intention of diluting the quality of the journal. The big questions, however, were whether the GHS would allow her the editorial autonomy to maintain that quality, and whether leading Georgia historians would continue to contribute to a journal sponsored by a historical society they deemed guilty of censorship. These are serious questions which we were obligated to raise in our article, but nowhere in it do we answer them, since we are historians, and our business is to study the past and not to predict the future. To her credit, Bailey, insisted (as we reported in our story) that the GHS give her a  written agreement not to violate her editorial freedom. Our hope is that the GHS will honor this agreement, and that the publicity generated by both our article and the subsequent reports on the GHQ censorship controversy that appeared in the  Atlanta Constitution and other Georgia newspapers will help protect Bailey's editorial freedom. But the very fact that she felt the need to get such a written agreement speaks volumes about the behavior of the GHS leadership in the recent past, and suggests that the censorship charges discussed in our article were not  figments of our imagination.

We agree with these letter writers that historians and historical societies, academics, and the public need to find better ways to work together to promote interest in history. But the bitterness generated by the GHS's behavior suggests  that  historical societies cannot achieve such cooperation unless they respect the freedom of  historians who edit their state historical journals. 

Robert Cohen, director of NYU's Social Studies program, is a historian who formerly served on the Georgia Historical Quarterly's board of editors. Sonia Murrow is a historian who teaches in NYU's Department of Teaching and Learning.