'Good Night, and Good Luck' Focuses on First Amendment Case

The First Amendment can always use another ally.  Some of its best friends put themselves at risk a half century ago when an Air Force lieutenant battled desperately to clear his name.

While the name Milo Radulovich may not be immediately familiar the controversy surrounding him was a turning point in American history, says Michigan author Mike Ranville, who describes the remarkable events in his book "To Strike at a King."

And the case has become the focus of  “Good Night, and Good Luck,” an intelligent film garnering rave reviews around the nation.

The story begins in 1953 when Joseph McCarthy, the junior senator from Wisconsin, shattered lives and trampled individual freedoms in his rampage against communists.  Radulovich, a reserve Air Force weather officer in Dexter, Michigan, was being discharged because his father and sister were accused of being communist sympathizers.

Officials even took issue with a family member’s newspaper subscription. 

The senior Radulovich, an immigrant only fluent in Serbian, kept up on events in his native Yugoslavia by reading publications from back home.  One of the papers was associated with the American Slav Congress, which had been designated as communist by the U.S. attorney general.

The lieutenant decided to fight the charges and demanded an Air Force hearing. He needed legal assistance, but any attorney helping Radulovich ran the risk of also being labeled a subversive. Eventually Charles Lockwood, a semi-retired lawyer and former Detroit College of Law professor, came to his aid.

Lockwood decided to fight the case in the media. He contacted Russell Harris of the Detroit News, who explained the situation to his readers. Among them was a young attorney named Ken Sanborn, who remembered Radulovich from their days in the Aviation Cadet Program at Michigan State College (now Michigan State University).

The politically conservative Sanborn, a first lieutenant in the Air Force Reserve, risked everything to defend his old classmate. Like Lockwood, he accepted no fee.

"Ken Sanborn deserved a medal,"  Radulovich said years later.

Despite such heroic legal services, the hearing’s outcome was predetermined, and the Air Force stripped Radulovich of his commission. Again, the Detroit News told the tale. This time, a famous broadcast journalist happened to read the story. It was Edward R. Murrow, host of the popular "See it Now" program on CBS. The show focused on "the little picture" explaining a news event through its impact on one person.

For months Murrow and his partner, Fred Friendly, had debated how to address McCarthy’s witch hunt. Some even criticized Murrow for having waited too long.  The curious Murrow prowled many out-of-town dailies and his prolific reading eventually paid off. One day Friendly encountered Murrow at the elevator. Murrow pulled a crumpled newspaper article from his overcoat and thrust it at Friendly, saying “this could be the little picture for your McCarthy story.”

A camera crew was dispatched to Michigan. By the next day, the centerpiece interview with Radulovich was done, and the footage was powerful. The young lieutenant, his wife and their neighbors spoke with passion.

As the Oct. 20, 1953 broadcast drew near, CBS was unwilling to promote the show. Convinced it was a landmark effort, Friendly and Murrow dipped into their pockets and spent $1,500 for an ad in the New York Times.

It was money well spent. Supporters flooded switchboards after watching “The Case Against Lt. Milo Radulovich, A0589839.” Most viewers agreed with Murrow that “the son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, even though that iniquity be proved beyond all doubt, which in this case it was not.”

The little picture had shown the big picture of a nation ignoring individual liberties and declaring guilt by association. The image of this innocent man and his immigrant father focused America on the evils of McCarthyism.

Radulovich was reinstated shortly after the broadcast. Several months later, the March 9, 1954 installment of “See It Now” consisted almost entirely of McCarthy film clips. The effect was devastating, as McCarthy’s own words and pictures illustrated his tyranny. By year’s end, the U.S. censured him.

Friendly said, “We never could have done the McCarthy program without the Milo Radulovich program.”

Freedom has always depended on patriots – whether it was the Founding Fathers deciding to strike at the king of England or the crew at CBS using a new medium in a new way.  Both clashes proved that the power of the pen and the spoken word can still have an impact in the marketplace of ideas.

Murrow grasped the power of TV when he said: “this instrument can teach, it can illuminate; yes it can even inspire.  But it can do so only to the extent that humans are determined to use it to those ends.  Otherwise it is merely wires and lights in a box.  There is a great and perhaps decisive battle to be fought against ignorance, intolerance and indifference.  This weapon of television could be useful.”

The battle described by Murrow continues to this day.  Ranville’s book and “Good Night, and Good Luck” both chronicle the importance of a vibrant First Amendment.  With freedom of expression in their arsenal, patriots retain an effective tool as they defend our liberties from the apathy of a distracted society.  While they tackle this noble but difficult assignment, the Radulovich case is a legal and media milestone worth remembering.