A new book reviewing 70 years worth of letters to the editor in newspapers across the United States includes letters from Wichita Falls in its study.
“Civic Hope: How Ordinary Americans Keep Democracy Alive,” by Roderick Hart, is a nearly 20 year-effort, reviewing thousands of letters to the editor in local newspapers, including letters to the editor published in the Wichita Falls Times Record News.
During a recent interview on Texas Public Radio, Hart said he looked at letters from 12 cities in the United States will populations around 75,000-100,000.
Hart said he looked for areas that were “middle-class, blue collar, everyday folks.”
Newspapers in towns of this size, he said, tend to print most – 89 to 95 percent – of the letters to the editor submitted.
These newspapers differ from larger cities, where letter writers have less of a chance of their submission being published.
Hart looked at letters beginning in 1948 through present day.
Using Wichita Falls as an example, Hart said there was a “smorgasbord” of letters voicing concerns and opinions on everything from pot holes in the streets, the price of onions and need for new jobs all the way to the missile crisis.
These letters, Hart said, show the concerns of ordinary citizens.
Letters to the editor writers, he found, are not much different from the average citizen.
Through survey research spanning 12 years, Hart said letter writers are representative of people in the town, with a few minor differences.
Writers, he said, tend to have lived in the cities a little longer than the average voter, tend to care more about politics and are slightly older, on average.
Harts said letters to the editor are one of the top four most-read parts of newspapers along with the front page, sports and obituaries.
“People do pay attention to them,” Hart said.
In this day of social media and comment forums, letters to the editor stand out, because they have a real name and sometimes address attached to the writer, Hart said.
With their identity attached to their political opinion, Hart said there does not tend to be the “nastiness, the subterfuge,” that sometimes occur in online spaces.
Letters to the editor writers in local newspapers are not “Russian bots,” Hart said.
They are real people – friends and neighbors – that people know in their community.
Different from a comment column open to anyone in the world, letter writers tend to be based in the physical community.
“These people have a stake in the community they are part of. It’s not someone in California writing in from a comment stream. They live in and care about the place in which they live,” Hart said.
Letters to the editor are, generally, more “wholesome,” Hart said, as compared to online comments.
While letters are sometimes opinionated, that “feisty attitude,” Hart said, is part of what made America what it is today.
That feistiness, he added, embodies civic hope – the idea that things might be difficult today, but people believe it will get better.
Hart conducted in-depth interviews with frequent letters to the editor writers and found some people felt they made a difference in their community by writing, while others claimed they did not know if they made a difference, did not care – they were going to keep writing letters.
As some people turn away from their local newspapers to online sources of information, Hart said he fears the art of writing letters to the editor is in danger.
A change in recent years, he said, is writers previously often referenced basic principles of democracy - such as free speech and right to bear arms.
Today, he said, arguments are more often policy based rather than value centered.
“If we are not able to articulate basic values that we hold, how will we be able to hold on to them together?” Hart asked.
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Another change in recent years, Hart said, is lack of oppositional literacy, or being able to see a topic from the other side’s point of view.
“This is something that has gone down over time, dramatically,” he said.
It’s becoming more difficult for people to articulate what their opponent is feeling, it appears, Hart said.
“At least if understand where they are coming from, then you can have a conversation. They don’t frame the opponent’s stance, they just attack,” Hart said.