The Press: Truce in Cincinnati

The fight over control of the Cincinnati Enquirer appeared to have reached a truce last week. It began when Reporter James H. Ratliff Jr. and City Editor Jack Cronin charged top management with feathering its own nest at the paper's expense—and promptly lost their jobs (TIME, Dec. 5 et seq.). But last week stockholders overwhelmingly re-elected Reporter Ratliff to the Enquirer's board of directors. Assistant Publisher Eugene Duffield—one of the employees' main targets—announced his resignation, and Publisher Roger Ferger, whose annual earnings of as much as $104,700 had come under fire, admitted that he might well take less for his services. The board told Ferger to "adjudicate" the question of Ratliff's and Cronin's discharge, and he assured everyone that his first task would now be to "recreate harmony" on the paper.