The Cornell American

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The Cornell American
Type Monthly newspaper
Format
Owner
Founded 1992
Political allegiance Conservative
Price Free
Headquarters Ithaca, New York
Website: www.cornellamerican.com

The Cornell American is an often-controversial independent student-run conservative monthly opinion newspaper at Cornell University, founded in 1992. It competes for attention with the more established Cornell Review, another conservative paper founded in 1984.

Contents

[edit] Founding

Craig Hymowitz, a chairman of the Cornell College Republicans with a difficult history with the Review, is credited with the original vision for the American. After research, it was decided that an independent group would be a more viable project than a partisan publication. In January 1992, Hymowitz, Jonathan Bloedow, and Hartley Etheridge founded The American Society, an organization formed to "advance classical American values, and to publish a journal, The Cornell American."

The first issue, entitled "The Endangered American," was published in March 1992. It contrasted with the Review in appearance and style, but most notably in tone—the older paper was known for its "zany" humor and lampooning of campus excesses, inflammatory to its critics. The new publication was even and philosophical—pretentious, or boring, to fans of the Review. The situation paralleled that of Peninsula and the Salient at Harvard.

The American garnered media attention across the United States for its second issue, entitled "Residence Life: Guilty as Charged."[citation needed] In it, an employee of the university's campus housing unit provided a detailed description of resident advisor training program, which included the viewing of explicit homosexual pornography. The University has consistently denied the allegations.

While even-toned in style, the paper's ideological development tracked rightward, reflecting socially conservative, especially Christian conservative views. It heavily criticized the university's health clinic for its links with Planned Parenthood and the high local abortion rate; accused the College of Human Ecology of hostility to Christian and traditional morality and view of family; and accused Cornell's ethnic studies-oriented program housing for left-wing indoctrination and being a source of racial tension.

The American was unable to secure a strong financial base, however. It was repeatedly denied funds from the Collegiate Network, of which the Review was a longstanding member, and found it difficult to retain advertisers. It lost momentum after Bloedow's graduation in 1994 and published its final issue in 1996, after which most of its remaining staff joined the Review. The American Society persisted until 1998 as a sponsor of speakers and other campus programs.

[edit] Revival

After an unsuccessful revival attempt in 1998, the name lapsed. Publication resumed in early 2004 by former-Review writer Ryan Horn, a grad student at the time. Horn felt that the Review, for which he had written for four years, had become too moderate in tone and too libertarian in its philosophy, and did not provide a strong voice for the Right.

In December 2003, he secured the approval of Elliott Reed , Cornell College Republicans' Chairman and Speaker at the time, to recruit writers from the club. Pulling together a bunch of like-minded undergraduates and controversial funding from the Cornell Literary Society, Horn was able to put out the first issue of the new Cornell American in March 2004, titled Unholy Matrimony.

Unlike the first rivalry, in which the Review's treatment of the American was bemused (even publishing a satirical issue entitled The Cornell Canadian) and the American steadfastly refused even to acknowledge the existence of the Review, the two publications once sparred openly.

[edit] Recent controversies

The second American has run into considerable controversy for what many have considered inflammatory covers and articles. In April 2004, it published a cover story criticizing affirmative action in higher education under the headline "Unqualified!" above a picture of African American students in academic garb, provoking some to petition for revocation of student government funding.

In September 2005, it ran a cover article entitled "The Color of Cornell’s Crime — Unmasking the Face of Ithacompton," addressing race and crime in the contemporary United States, in light of a string of robberies around Cornell's sleepy Ithaca campus. Similar controversy has erupted.

In March of 2007, The Cornell American's front page featured a knife stabbing the Cornell Daily Sun. Many saw this as making fun of the racially motivated stabbing on Cornell Campus a year prior. While the commonly held misconception on campus was that the American had "set the tone" for the incident, the culprit was himself a leading member of the Cornell Democrats and a writer for the left-leaning publication on campus, Turn Left, making such allegations, in the very least, suspect. In addition,a recruitment advertisement in the paper said "We Don't Stab", again making light of the stabbing of a year ago.

[edit] Eventual Merger

After three years of successful issues the staff of the Cornell American and the Cornell Review decided to merge as one paper under the name of the Cornell Review. The new Review will adopt the American's slogan -- "Limited Government, Traditional Values, America First."

[edit] External links

[edit] "Color of Cornell's Crime" controversy

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