On Sept. 11, Scripps-Howard's San Francisco News printed an item saying that a Roman Catholic priest with a woman companion had pleaded guilty, in a Medera, Calif. court, to drunken driving. Other San Francisco papers passed up the story.
When a News reporter called Monsignor Harold E. Collins, secretary to San Francisco's Archbishop John J. Mitty, to check the spelling of the priest's name, the Monsignor said: "No one in San Francisco has ever used a story like that."
Later, he called back and asked the News to lay off.
The News printed the story,...