Al Cross, director of the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, spoke about the pressures of covering elections and endorsing candidates in small communities at RJI's "Down-home Democracy: Empowering Citizens With Outstanding Coverage of Local Elections" on Friday, Jan. 31, 2014.

1. Covering Elections and
Endorsing Candidates in
Small Communities
Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues
University of Kentucky School of Journalism
www.RuralJournalism.org
Al Cross, Director and Associate Professor
Down-Home Democracy Workshop
Reynolds Journalism Institute
University of Missouri
January 31, 2014

2. Politics in small towns
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Try to be friends with all factions
Personality features can help
Don’t be defensive, or pugnacious
Look for chances to make
connections and show understanding

4. Politics in small towns
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Don’t treat it clinically
Cover it like you’re at the Capitol
Pull back the official curtain
Write about local factions and
patronage contacts – often, much
power rests with those not in elective
office

5. Politics in small towns
• Write about the personalities and their
personal connections

7. To endorse or not?
• 90 percent of dailies do; most
weeklies don’t
• Generally, the smaller the paper, the
less likely it is to endorse

8. To endorse or not?
• 90 percent of dailies do; most
weeklies don’t
• Generally, the smaller the paper, the
less likely it is to endorse
• Reasons include risk, resources and
relationships
• Some races are too close for comfort
• But that’s where you can have impact

9. To endorse or not?
• Endorsements are most effective in
local, nonpartisan elections when the
candidates are unfamiliar, the ballot is
long and complicated, or voters have
received conflicting information or
have conflicting loyalties. Other
research suggests endorsements
have more effect on referenda, and
more in primary rather than general
elections. (K.F. Rystrom, 1986, 1994)

10. To endorse or not?
Arguments for:
•The newspaper knows the people and
the issues, or it should
•It is in a unique position to inform and
advance debate
•Editorials can separate the wheat from
the chaff in a stronger way than news
stories

11. To endorse or not?
Arguments against:
•May cast a shadow on news coverage
•People already know the candidates
•Folks at the newspaper sure do:
“In a smaller town, you often run into all
the players at least weekly at church,
Rotary, or on the street.”
•But what’s “a smaller town”?
In a nearby county of the same size . . .

12. To endorse or not?
• The News-Enterprise example

14. The candidate the
paper endorsed
for county judgeexecutive, the
county’s chief
administrative
office, won the
election. He was
the first
Republican ever
elected to that
office in the
county.

15. Editor Warren
Wheat also began
the practice of
having two
members from the
community to serve
rotating terms on
the editorial board,
to provide broader
perspective.

16. To endorse or not?
• Columns can provide an alternative,
short of endorsement
• Editorials can analyze and offer
perspective short of endorsement
• Play it straight, don’t get cute, and be
self-aware
• Whatever you do, make sure you
have some sort of editorial voice