Dennis Hetzel has been a reporter, editor, general manager and publisher at newspapers including The Capital Times in Madison, Wisconsin, The Cincinnati Enquirer and The Daily Record in York, Pennsylvania, where he was editor and publisher for 13 years. Under his leadership, the York paper won national awards from the Scripps Howard Foundation in public service journalism and a Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award. He also has taught journalism at Penn State and Temple universities. Hetzel has won numerous awards for writing, industry leadership and community service as a journalist and media executive, including the 2003 Paul Tobenkin Memorial Award from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism for leadership in coverage of race and diversity issues. From 2010 through 2019, he was president and executive director of the Ohio News Media Association in Columbus, Ohio, and president of the Ohio Coalition for Open Government.
More Articles from this Author
Autopsies and Treatment of the Dead
Sometimes state autopsy laws conflict with religious objections to such procedures, bringing into play First Amendment questions of religious liberty. Public access to autopsy records of the government have also been disputed.
Ballot Access
Ballot access refers to procedures regulating how candidates will be presented to voters in elections. Ballot access continues to be the subject of First Amendment debate.
Cameras in the Courtroom
Allowing cameras in courtrooms has stirred controversy and led to Supreme Court decisions in First Amendment cases. The Court has allowed states to experiment with this issue.
Joseph Pulitzer
Joseph Pulitzer came to the United States in 1864 as a restless Jewish immigrant from Hungary. He knew little English. Despite poor health and weak eyesight, he had contracted with a bounty hunter in Germany to be paid to fight for the North in the Civil War as a substitute for a draftee – something […]
SLAPP Suits
A SLAPP suit is a civil claimed filed against an individual or organization for exercising their First Amendment right of petition about an issue of public concern.
TikTok Bans and Regulation
It’s no exaggeration to use the term “exploding growth” if you’re referring to TikTok, a social media, content-sharing platform that has gone from zero to more than 2.5 billion worldwide users, including an estimated 150 million or more in the United States, in less than six years. The platform showcases short-form user videos. While […]
Voting Rights and the First Amendment
The First Amendment freedoms of press, speech, petition and assembly are all designed to encourage citizen participation in democracy and hold government officials accountable. Yet the First Amendment never cites the right to vote, the ultimate check on government corruption and incompetence. Voting is instead a process managed primarily by 50 different state legislatures. If […]
White Supremacists and White Nationalists
Members of white supremacists and white national groups have tested the limits of the First Amendment through hate speech and threatening demonstrations.