A Nation Evaluates the President, and Itself; Zone of Privacy
Published: February 8, 1998
To the Editor:
In your Feb. 4 editorial ''The Press's Mea Culpa Epidemic,'' you try to justify your newspaper's elaborate (and excessive) reporting of the President's alleged sexual conduct on grounds that at the Presidential level ''many aspects of character and behavior are relevant to making an informed judgment about a person's ability to lead in time of crisis.'' Really? How did the character of Franklin D. Roosevelt affect his decisions in World War II? Why is it unreasonable for Mrs. Clinton to desire ''a rigid 'zone of privacy' around the personal conduct of the President'' when, as you acknowledge, word of that conduct would inevitably lead to distortion of the boundaries of good taste by practitioners of ''nonorthodox journalism''? It is shameful to compare this coverage to the great moments of journalism.
J. HERBERT ALTSCHULL
Baltimore, Feb. 5, 1998
The writer teaches the history of ideas at Johns Hopkins University.