Connections: Vox Populi

The job of editing letters to the editor landed in my lap a few years ago and has remained there ever since. I don’t know whether I was given this difficult task because the editor or managing editor decided it would be a suitable slot for an old hand like me or because they thought it would keep me out of harm’s way (or prevent me from doing harm as I “age in place,” as the saying goes).

Readers know that The Star publishes every letter it receives provided it is exclusive, neither libelous nor obscene, and the writer is identified. Of course, the letter also has to arrive before our deadline of 5 p.m. on Monday. Recently, the East Hampton Star motto “Shines for All” could well have been changed to “Letters for All”: We ended up publishing 35 letters in each of the last two editions. We are proud of this service, an open forum — one of our previous editors called the pages “Freedom Hall” — that we believe is healthy for the community and that has for many decades now been a medium through which important issues and ideas have been raised leading to important progress in government, in our local organizations, and in our school districts.

In order to keep the letters pages from becoming an incoherent hodgepodge, each missive is edited to conform to our standards of grammar and punctuation (but otherwise, in general, left as written). Because we are a newspaper of record for local municipalities, it is incumbent on us to check the accuracy of the titles of the various entities mentioned: Is it Workmen’s or Workers’ Compensation, for example? We give each letter a headline taken from words or phrases within it, and then we put them in what seems to be a common-sense order, grouping those on the same topic.

That sounds easy, right? But there’s more: the human element. We typically have to engage with the letter writers, devoting many hours to checking that names are real and not pseudonyms, checking addresses, deciphering bad handwriting, transcribing, and fielding angry phone calls from cranks and from those who don’t agree with an opinion someone has expressed in one of the letters.

In the past, if there happened to be, say, 20 or more letters in a given week, we would find the  time to engage their writers, by phone or, later, by email, in a more or less pleasant give and take about anything confusing. Even recently, with so many letters, the majority of writers make it easy. Those who write regularly are usually savvy enough to make sure they aren’t just composing the same letter each week, and they become familiar with the process.

It may not be surprising, however, that there also are a few letter writers who try our patience. Some have an urge to submit a flow of letters that are very long and/or technically obscure and therefore difficult to proofread. Some refuse to understand that we cannot print letters that have been sent, en masse, to a score of other publications. Last week, one writer wanted to know why he couldn’t have two published in the same week, and then, when we agreed, kept changing his mind about which of the two should be published first. We let him know our decision was to use the first first, but he wasn’t satisfied. Now imagine engaging in this way with 35 writers. It adds to my gray hair each week, and holds up the whole process of going to press.

Not that I’m complaining. I believe The Star’s role in publishing letters, which began as a promise to readers, has become a civic institution; it is a responsibility that none of the other local publications can match. Week after week, the letters provide readers with information and opinions on issues of myriad concern and offer reflections on ideas both simple and profound (and sometimes silly). To be sure, it is sometimes a heavy duty task, but the letters to the editor can also be a laugh. I hope you agree.