New York Times Fails to Buy Wall Street Journal

Give a deep sigh of relief. The Democrat house organ known as the New York Times has failed in its attempt to buy the parent company of the Wall Street Journal, whose op-ed section (though not its news pages) is one of the few conservative voices in Big Media.

The Journal, for some reason using the New Yorker magazine as its source, reported today that Times chairman Arthur Ochs Sulzberger Jr. approached Dow Jones Co. and was turned down.

Sulzberger went to Dow Jones director Roy A. Hammer, who serves as trustee for the Bancroft family, Dow Jones' controlling shareholder, to propose a merger. Hammer rejected the idea, and Sulzberger followed up with a letter suggesting the Times acquire Dow Jones.

Hammer informed Dow Jones chairman and CEO Peter R. Kann but, without consulting the company's board, told Sulzberger again the company wasn't for sale, according to the New Yorker.

Hammer told the Journal that the Times' approach didn't go into details about how the two sides might join forces. "What I told [Sulzberger] was that the controlling stockholders would not be interested in disposing of their controlling interest in Dow Jones and that really was not a matter that required board consultation or approval," Hammer said, adding that the approach targeted the Bancroft family and not at Dow Jones as a company.

"From time to time there have been merger or acquisition inquiries from companies," Brigitte Trafford, a Dow Jones spokeswoman, told the Journal. "They have always been brought to the attention of the Bancroft family trustees and the board of directors. The Bancroft family and the board have always reaffirmed the company's intention to remain independent."

Hammer told the Journal that Sulzberger's "general thinking was that both the New York Times Co. and Dow Jones & Co. were relatively small compared with some of the media giants and that by combining forces in one way or another we would compensate for that size differential."

And the big fat bonus would be getting to muzzle the Journal's editorial writers and columnists. Let's see how the Times would enjoy being wooed by Dow Jones.

Editor's note:
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