05-18-2015, 12:51 PM
(05-18-2015, 12:44 PM)StLucieBengal Wrote: White house corespondents were started to smoothe it out with Woodrow wilson because he threatened to stop having press conferences. So he made the media basically make nice with him to get access. Which pushed them to be friendly instead of adversarial
Coolidge attended because there was Wilson backlash.
The WHCA is an independent organization that was started, indeed, because of Wilson threatening to revoke access. The only thing that was "playing nice" that was required was not reporting things that were intended to be off the record, something that had been a thing for decades before, and continues to be a thing up to present day.
Wilson never got cozy with the press, though, and in fact stopped with the meetings with the press in 1915, after the sinking of the Lusitania. There were a couple meetings in his second term after that, but it never was a regular thing as Wilson did not like the press.
"A great democracy has got to be progressive, or it will soon cease to be either great or a democracy..." - TR
"The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little." - FDR
"The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little." - FDR
