Andrew Coyne resigns as National Post comment editor after paper rejects election column

So anyway… I have resigned as editor of Editorials and Comment for the National Post, effective immediately. I will remain a columnist.

—@acoyne

2. Postmedia executives and I had a professional disagreement. Their view was that the publication of a column by the editorial page editor…

—@acoyne

3. … dissenting from the Post’s endorsement of the Conservatives would have confused readers and embarrassed the paper.

—@acoyne

4. My view was that that was what I was paid to do as a columnist: give my honest opinion on issues of public interest.

—@acoyne

5. I don’t see public disagreement as confusing. I see it as honest. Readers, in my view, are adults & understand that adults can disagree.

—@acoyne

6. The confusion, if any, would have been to have left the impression that the paper’s views were mine, or that my views were the paper’s.

—@acoyne

7. To be clear, the owners and managers of a newspaper have a perfect right to set the paper’s editorial line as they wish.

—@acoyne

8. Likewise they have a perfect right to decide who and what they wish to publish in their pages.

—@acoyne

9. Nobody has a God-given right to be published and the country will get along very well without me telling them how to vote.

—@acoyne

10. My concerns were and are merely a) that there should be no suggestion that I was personally endorsing or voting for the Conservatives.

—@acoyne

11. And b) that I could not do my job as a columnist if I was obliged to stay silent where these conflicted with those of management.

—@acoyne

12. While Postmedia’s intervention was unprecedented in my experience, I could not allow the precedent to stand.

—@acoyne

13. So to protect my reputation and to preserve my editorial freedom as a columnist, I felt it necessary to resign the editorial position.

—@acoyne

Andrew Coyne- Thanks for maintaining your principles in an increasingly controlled corporate media. As ever, much respect. <a href="https://twitter.com/acoyne">@acoyne</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/elxn42?src=hash">#elxn42</a>

&mdash;@ElizabethMay

So 👊 <a href="https://twitter.com/acoyne">@acoyne</a>.

&mdash;@RosieBarton

Andrew Coyne just blew my mind. And though I disagree with him politically, I have all the mad respect for the man. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/cdnpoli?src=hash">#cdnpoli</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Elxn42?src=hash">#Elxn42</a>

&mdash;@KikkiPlanet

I often disagree with Coyne, but he's a true man of principle. <a href="https://t.co/g2Pzqw0idb">https://t.co/g2Pzqw0idb</a>

&mdash;@realchet

for the record, the political parties involved don't matter to me, i respect coyne for choosing honesty, whatever form that may have taken

&mdash;@akurjata

I worked for an editor told to sacrifice editorial integrity/cut staff. He resigned to spare us. He didn't keep his column. Coyne is no hero

&mdash;@jjfantauzzi

are we at the part where Andrew Coyne storms off in a huff and pretends to shut down his Twitter account yet? <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/cdnpoli?src=hash">#cdnpoli</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/elxn42?src=hash">#elxn42</a>

&mdash;@cartogeek

man, who knew the federal election would literally come down to a coyne flip? <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/elxn42?src=hash">#elxn42</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/cdnpoli?src=hash">#cdnpoli</a>

&mdash;@iancmclaren