SALUTE TO THOSE WHO WROTE LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

This is the wording of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion,
or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of
speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to
assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of
grievances."

We who are a part of the newspaper industry think it is particularly
significant that freedom of speech and freedom of the press are
included in the very first amendment to the Constitution. It means to
us that our Founding Fathers viewed these - and the other freedoms
mentioned - as especially essential for our form of government to work
as they envisioned it.

Throughout my newspaper career, I have believed that the First
Amendment reference to freedom of the press works only if those of us
who have a press let you use ours. It is important that our views of
Davidson County, North Carolina and the rest of the world aren't the
only ones dispensed. If we don't "loan" our press to you, the ideals
as expressed in the First Amendment can't possibly be met.

Having 26 local guest columnists who can express themselves freely on
The Dispatch's Opinion Page - on any subject of their choosing - is
one way we can share our printing press for the free expression of
ideas.

But the most obvious way we do this is with letters to the editor. We
have only a few general restrictions about printing them such as
length, frequency, no poetry and no anonymous letters.

I know those whose letters have appeared on this page will attest that
we don't censor any letters holding views contrary to those we've
expressed in editorials or columns. That's because we serve you best
if you can get a wide range of opinions from editorials, national
columnists, local guest columnists and letter-writers.

During 2001, I compiled a list of those whose letters were printed on
the Opinion Page in the letters to the editor columns. There were a
total of 690 of you who used the First Amendment and expressed your
opinions for our other readers to consider. We're pleased that 99 of
you enjoyed exercising that First Amendment right so much that you did
it more than once. The numbers that follow some of the names identify
those with multiple submissions.

Names of the 2001 letter-writers are listed here in alphabetical order
in hopes that some of you may be encouraged to join their ranks this
year. If your name isn't listed here - it should be. This is a way for
us to thank the letter-writers for their contribution to furthering
the ideal of freedom of the press.

We are most appreciative to all of you who wrote to us in 2001 and
look forward to printing your letters to the editor in 2002.

[Note: our newshawk has reduced the list to the PUB LTE writers listed at
http://www.mapinc.org/lte/ ]

Ray Carlson (2)

Cassaundra H. Edwards (2)

Redford Givens

Charles F. Lambeth Jr

Robert Sharpe

Annette Varner