"Lincoln's Surveillance State" Op-Ed NYTimes July 6, 2013

[Liz Rosenthal]

David: I think the 150-word limit is more of a guideline than a hard-and-fast rule. I've seen longer letters and shorter letters in the NY Times, although I'm sure the editors prefer shorter ones. They're easier to get through, edit and fit on the op-ed page.

One of the problems I see with the approach that you've taken with the NY Times is your heavy reliance on long quotations. Unless the quote is extremely memorable or precisely on point, I wouldn't bother with the quote. For one thing, you're going to lose your audience - in this case, the person who is reading your letter - with long quote after long quote.

My suggestion is to summarize, in your own words, the substance of the research you've done. But before doing that, in a letter to the editor, I would begin with the assertion made by Minchin (is that his name?) that you believe is erroneous. Then I would indicate why you believe it's erroneous, in a succinct manner, and at this point identify the correct fact or facts by way of briefly summarizing the research you've done to support the fact or facts. Finally, you could end with something like, "It's unfortunate that Mr. Minchin felt the need to misrepresent the facts in order to support his argument that the N.S.A. spying program is nothing new."

One last thing - I am confused by the information about the Bureau of Ordinance and how that relates to control of the telegraph system. I would have thought that the censoring of reports of military movements would be more relevant and might be what Minchin was thinking of. But he may have decided to rely on a faulty memory rather than double-check the facts. Unfortunately, prominent columnists, bloggers and authors acquire, in the course of their prominence, a certain amount of hubris, which can lead to carelessness in what they offer for public consumption.