It can, in fact, be life threatening.
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), a national group that keeps track of how journalists are treated around the world (there is a similar Canadian organization), investigated and reported more than 700 attacks against journalists in 101 countries during 1995.
Searching for truth can get one killed.
I'm writing this several days after the nation's celebration of Memorial Day, a day to honor those who made the ultimate national sacrifice and lost their lives for liberty and justice for all.
This year, President Clinton made a specific and special appeal to recognize as fallen heroes those whose lives were taken by accident or suicide.
Memorial Day 1996 marks a special year in the celebration of those who died in defense of democracy; it is the first year the nation publicly includes journalists in its mournful memories.
Perhaps it is fitting that this column will not be published until the week of Independence Day because those journalists remembered on Memorial Day put their lives on the line for an idea and an ideal that is celebrated on Independence Day.
``The only people who go into war zones unarmed are medics and journalists,'' First Lady Hillary Clinton told the crowd that attended the May 21 dedication of the new Freedom Forum memorial for journalists in Arlington, Va.
``Journalists put their fragile lives in the line of fire for a single idea, to get the truth,'' Mrs. Clinton said. ``Why? Because while a reporter may be no match for a mob or a bullet, what he or she reports has the power to turn back an entire army, to transform lives, to sustain a democracy.''
I don't know if Mrs. Clinton writes her own speeches, but no one in journalism could have stated the case more eloquently.
Perhaps Thomas Jefferson captured the ideal: ``To preserve the freedom of the human mind . . . and freedom of the press, every spirit should be ready to devote itself to martyrdom.''
The memorial in Arlington is the project of the Freedom Forum, a nonprofit foundation begun by USAToday and its entrepreneurial former editor Al Neuhardt, now chairman of the forum.
The 24-foot high spiraling glass prism, erected at a cost of $500,000 and weighing about five tons, records the names of 934 journalists from around the world who have died pursuing the news.
Panels in the spiral record the journalists' names, news organizations and the location of their deaths. They are listed in chronological order by the year of death.
Not all the journalists died in war zones. A number of them were murdered in apparent retaliation for stories they had written; in fact, Kati Morton, the chairwoman of the board for the CPJ, says that ``homicide is now the leading cause of job-related death for reporters, editors and broadcasters around the world.''
That may be difficult for Americans to believe, but Omar Behouchet, an Algerian journalist whose life has been threatened by extremists in his country, told the dedication crowd at the memorial, ``In my country the journalist is hunted, murdered, thrown into prison and censored.''
CPJ verified that 24 Algerian journalists were murdered in 1995, the worst record among the nations studied.
The Freedom Forum, cooperating with CPJ, reviews all the cases of journalists' deaths it hears of and plans for an annual rededication of the memorial as more names are added to it.
At Freedom Forum headquarters, the last name listed as verified for inclusion on the memorial is Nathaniel C. Nash, the New York Times writer who died in the plane crash in Bosnia that took the life of then Commerce Secretary Ron Brown. Nash's name is one of more than 40 that have been verified for inclusion since the memorial was built. The new names will be added annually.
The memorial is located in what is called Freedom Park, a 1.6-acre height in Arlington, overlooking the nation's capital.
Among those journalists remembered is Ernie Pyle, the popular Pulitzer Prize winning Scripps-Howard writer who was shot by a sniper on the Japanese island of Ie Shima near Okinawa as the war in the Pacific ground to its end in 1945.
The memorial includes Don Bolles, an Arizona Republic reporter who died in June, 1976, after his legs and right arm were blown off by a car bomb planted to silence his reporting on corruption in land dealings.
Bolles' son, David, joined Mrs. Clinton in laying a memorial wreath at the base of the spiral during dedication ceremonies.
The first name on the list is James M. Lingan, a general in George Washington's army during the Revolutionary War who became a newspaper editor in the early 1800s. Lingan upset local politicians. Among other things, he opposed going to war with Britain in what became known as the War of 1812. An angry mob kicked Lingan to death in Baltimore in 1812.
Some readers may have seen the tiny photo in USAToday that accompanied Tom Squitieri's May 22, 1996, story under the headline, ``Hillary Clinton dedicates memorial to journalists.''
The photo, taken by Associated Press photographer Joe Marquette, is a close-up of the new memorial. Among the seven names in Marquette's picture is inscribed, ``Paul D. Savanuck, Stars and Stripes, USA, in Vietnam.''
Savanuck is one of three Stars and Stripes journalists enshrined in the new memorial. He was killed April 18, 1969, in a battle between North Vietnamese and an American armored unit. The 23-year-old Savanuck had been on the job for two weeks.
Ernie Peeler, another Stars and Stripes journalist, was killed July 9, 1950, when North Koreans overran the American outpost from which he was observing a bombing. Peeler was 38 when he died. He had served in World War II as an Army information officer.
Gregor Duncan worked for Stars and Stripes out of Europe when he was killed in Italy in 1944. A graphic artist, Duncan was gathering material for drawings and en route to the Italian front when he was hit by shell fragments. He had been a political cartoonist for the San Francisco Call Bulletin.
Freedom Park, with its glistening glass memorial to
these
warriors armed only with questions, will be officially opened on
Independence
Day.