Ethics in America was a ten-part television series in which panels of leading politicians, lawyers, journalists, doctors, business people, and philosophers discussed the ethical

Ethics

Ethics, also known as moral philosophy, is a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality—that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc.Major branches of ethics include:...

 issues of hypothetical scenarios in politics, the media, medicine, law, and other areas. The panels were moderated by law professors from leading law schools. The show aired from 1988 to 1989.

The series was developed and hosted by former CBS News

CBS News

CBS News is the news division of American television and radio network CBS. The current chairman is Jeff Fager who is also the executive producer of 60 Minutes, while the current president of CBS News is David Rhodes. CBS News' flagship program is the CBS Evening News, hosted by the network's main...

 president Fred Friendly and produced by Columbia University

Columbia University

Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

 Seminars on Media and Society (later renamed Fred Friendly Seminars). It was funded in part by the Annenberg/CPB Project. The executive producer was Cynthia McFadden

Cynthia McFadden

Cynthia McFadden is an anchor and correspondent for ABC News who currently co-anchors Nightline and Primetime.-Education:...

. The series was originally broadcast on PBS

Public Broadcasting Service

The Public Broadcasting Service is an American non-profit public broadcasting television network with 354 member TV stations in the United States which hold collective ownership. Its headquarters is in Arlington, Virginia....

. In 2006, Fred Friendly Seminars produced a new series, Ethics in America II, which also aired on PBS.

Episodes

The original series included ten one-hour episodes:

• Anatomy of a Hostile Takeover (Ethics in Business)
• Do Unto Others (Personal Ethics)
• Does Doctor Know Best? (Ethics in Medicine)
• The Human Experiment (Ethics in Scientific Research)
• The Politics of Privacy (Ethics in Journalism)
• Public Trust, Private Interests (Ethics in Government)
• To Defend a Killer (Ethics in Criminal Law)
• Truth on Trial (Ethics in Civil Law)
• Under Orders, Under Fire (Ethics in the Military, Part I)
• Under Orders, Under Fire (Ethics in the Military, Part II)

Panelists

Panelists who appeared on the series included:

• Floyd Abrams
  Floyd Abrams
  Floyd Abrams is an American attorney at Cahill Gordon & Reindel. He is an expert on constitutional law, and many arguments in the briefs he has written before the United States Supreme Court have been adopted as United States Constitutional interpretative law as it relates to the First Amendment...
  
  , American attorney and expert in Constitutional law
  Constitutional law
  Constitutional law is the body of law which defines the relationship of different entities within a state, namely, the executive, the legislature and the judiciary....
  
  
• R. W. Apple, Jr.
  R. W. Apple, Jr.
  Raymond Walter Apple, Jr. , known to all as "Johnny", but bylined as R.W. Apple Jr, was an associate editor at The New York Times, where he wrote on a variety of subjects, most notably politics, travel, and food....
  
  , associate editor at The New York Times
  The New York Times
  The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
  
  
• Joseph A. Califano, Jr.
  Joseph A. Califano, Jr.
  Joseph Anthony Califano, Jr. is Founder and Chairman of The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University, an independent non-profit research center affiliated with Columbia University in New York City...
  
  , former general counsel of the U.S. Army, special assistant to the Secretary of Defense, and Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare, among other government posts
• Stanley M. Chesley
  Stanley M. Chesley
  Stanley M. Chesley is an Ohio trial lawyer and the husband of federal judge Susan J. Dlott.Chesley, the son of Ukrainian immigrants, was graduated from University of Cincinnati and University of Cincinnati Law School. He first came to fame as a plaintiffs' lawyer in litigation arising from the...
  
  , Ohio trial lawyer
• Vincent T. DeVita
  Vincent T. DeVita
  Vincent T. DeVita, Jr., MD is an internationally recognized pioneer physician in the field of oncology.DeVita earned his Bachelor of Science degree from the College of William and Mary in 1957. He was awarded his MD degree with distinction from the George Washington University School of Medicine in...
  
  , pioneer physician in the field of oncology
• Geraldine Ferraro
  Geraldine Ferraro
  Geraldine Anne Ferraro was an American attorney, a Democratic Party politician, and a member of the United States House of Representatives. She was the first female Vice Presidential candidate representing a major American political party....
  
  , member of the United States House of Representatives
  United States House of Representatives
  The United States House of Representatives is one of the two Houses of the United States Congress, the bicameral legislature which also includes the Senate.The composition and powers of the House are established in Article One of the Constitution...
  
   from the state of New York
• Barney Frank
  Barney Frank
  Barney Frank is the U.S. Representative for . A member of the Democratic Party, he is the former chairman of the House Financial Services Committee and is considered the most prominent gay politician in the United States.Born and raised in New Jersey, Frank graduated from Harvard College and...
  
  , member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Massachusetts
• Newt Gingrich
  Newt Gingrich
  Newton Leroy "Newt" Gingrich is a U.S. Republican Party politician who served as the House Minority Whip from 1989 to 1995 and as the 58th Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1995 to 1999....
  
  , member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Georgia, and Speaker of the House from 1995 to 1999
• Rudy Giuliani
  Rudy Giuliani
  Rudolph William Louis "Rudy" Giuliani KBE is an American lawyer, businessman, and politician from New York. He served as Mayor of New York City from 1994 to 2001....
  
  , American lawyer, businessman and politician
• James Goldsmith
  James Goldsmith
  Sir James Michael "Jimmy" Goldsmith was an Anglo-French billionaire financier and tycoon. Towards the end of his life, he became a magazine publisher and a politician. In 1994, he was elected to represent France as a Member of the European Parliament and he subsequently founded the short-lived...
  
  , British billionaire, businessman and founder of the short-lived Referendum Party in Britain
• Ellen Goodman
  Ellen Goodman
  Ellen Goodman is an American journalist and Pulitzer Prize-winning syndicated columnist.- Career :Goodman worked as a researcher and reporter for Newsweek magazine between 1963 and 1965, and has worked as an associate editor at the Boston Globe since 1967.In 1998, Goodman received the Elijah...
  
  , American journalist and Pulitzer Prize-winning syndicated columnist
• Katharine Graham
  Katharine Graham
  Katharine Meyer Graham was an American publisher. She led her family's newspaper, The Washington Post, for more than two decades, overseeing its most famous period, the Watergate coverage that eventually led to the resignation of President Richard Nixon...
  
  , publisher of The Washington Post
  The Washington Post
  The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
  
  
• Jeff Greenfield
  Jeff Greenfield
  Jeff Greenfield is an American television journalist and author.-Biography:He was born in New York City to parents Benjamin and Helen. He grew up in Manhattan and graduated from the Bronx High School of Science in 1960. He obtained a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in...
  
  , television journalist and author
• Peter Jennings
  Peter Jennings
  Peter Charles Archibald Ewart Jennings, CM was a Canadian American journalist and news anchor. He was the sole anchor of ABC's World News Tonight from 1983 until his death in 2005 of complications from lung cancer...
  
  , television news anchor
• Jeane Kirkpatrick
  Jeane Kirkpatrick
  Jeane Jordan Kirkpatrick was an American ambassador and an ardent anticommunist. After serving as Ronald Reagan's foreign policy adviser in his 1980 campaign and later in his Cabinet, the longtime Democrat-turned-Republican was nominated as the U.S...
  
  , American ambassador and former foreign policy adviser to president Ronald Reagan
• C. Everett Koop
  C. Everett Koop
  Charles Everett Koop, MD is an American pediatric surgeon and public health administrator. He was a vice admiral in the Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, and served as thirteenth Surgeon General of the United States under President Ronald Reagan from 1982 to 1989.-Early years:Koop was born...
  
  , former U.S. Surgeon General
• Arthur L. Liman
  Arthur L. Liman
  Arthur Lawrence Liman was a partner at the New York law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, and was well known for his public service.-Life and career:...
  
  , lawyer and partner at the New York law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison
  Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison
  Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP is a law firm headquartered on Sixth Avenue in New York City. The firm has well-noted expertise in its corporate, personal representation, entertainment law and litigation practices, having long been a leader among national litigation firms...
  
  
• Robert R. Merhige, Jr.
  Robert R. Merhige, Jr.
  Robert R. Merhige Jr. , was a federal judge for the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia who is known for his rulings on desegregation in the 1970s....
  
  , federal judge for the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia
• Robert C. Maynard
  Robert C. Maynard
  Robert Clyve Maynard was an American journalist, and newspaper publisher and editor, former owner of The Oakland Tribune and co-founder of the Robert C. Maynard Institute for Journalism Education in Oakland, California....
  
  , journalist
• Marilyn Hall Patel
  Marilyn Hall Patel
  Marilyn Hall Patel is an active judge presiding in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. She was Chief District Judge of that jurisdiction from 1997 until 2004, and heard several notable cases during that time....
  
  , judge presiding in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California
• T. Boone Pickens, oil businessman
• Arnold S. Relman
  Arnold S. Relman
  Arnold Seymour Relman M.D. is a professor of medicine, social medicine and emeritus at Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts. He is a former editor of the New England Journal of Medicine and writes extensively on medical publishing and reform of the U.S...
  
  , professor emeritus of medicine and social medicine at Harvard Medical School and editor of the New England Journal of Medicine
  New England Journal of Medicine
  The New England Journal of Medicine is an English-language peer-reviewed medical journal published by the Massachusetts Medical Society. It describes itself as the oldest continuously published medical journal in the world.-History:...
  
  
• Alan K. Simpson
  Alan K. Simpson
  Alan Kooi Simpson is an American politician who served from 1979 to 1997 as a United States Senator from Wyoming as a member of the Republican Party. His father, Milward L. Simpson, was also a member of the U.S...
  
  , U.S. senator from Wyoming
• Antonin Scalia
  Antonin Scalia
  Antonin Gregory Scalia is an American jurist who serves as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. As the longest-serving justice on the Court, Scalia is the Senior Associate Justice...
  
  , U.S. Supreme Court justice
• Brent Scowcroft
  Brent Scowcroft
  Brent Scowcroft, KBE was the United States National Security Advisor under Presidents Gerald Ford and George H. W. Bush and a Lieutenant General in the United States Air Force. He also served as Military Assistant to President Richard Nixon and as Deputy Assistant to the President for National...
  
  , U.S. National Security Advisor under Presidents Gerald Ford and George H. W. Bush
• Louis Stokes
  Louis Stokes
  Louis Stokes is a Democratic politician from Ohio. He served in the United States House of Representatives....
  
  , member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Ohio
• Lester Thurow
  Lester Thurow
  Lester Carl Thurow is a former dean of the MIT Sloan School of Management and author of books on economic topics. Thurow was born in Livingston, Montana.-Education:...
  
  , dean of the MIT Sloan School of Management
  MIT Sloan School of Management
  The MIT Sloan School of Management is the business school of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in Cambridge, Massachusetts....
  
   and author of numerous bestsellers on economic topics
• Mike Wallace
  Mike Wallace (journalist)
  Myron Leon "Mike" Wallace is an American journalist, former game show host, actor and media personality. During his 60+ year career, he has interviewed a wide range of prominent newsmakers....
  
  , television journalist
• Faye Wattleton
  Faye Wattleton
  Faye Wattleton is the first African-American and youngest President ever elected to Planned Parenthood . Currently, she serves as the President of the Center for the Advancement of Women, and also serves on the board of trustees at Columbia University...
  
  , the first African-American and youngest President ever elected to Planned Parenthood
  Planned Parenthood
  Planned Parenthood Federation of America , commonly shortened to Planned Parenthood, is the U.S. affiliate of the International Planned Parenthood Federation and one of its larger members. PPFA is a non-profit organization providing reproductive health and maternal and child health services. The...
  
  
• William C. Westmoreland, commander of American military operations in the Vietnam War from 1964 to 1968 and U.S. Army Chief of Staff from 1968 to 1972
• Tim Wirth
  Tim Wirth
  Timothy Endicott Wirth is a former United States Senator from Colorado. Wirth, a Democrat, was a member of the House from 1975 to 1987 and was elected to the Senate in 1986, serving one term there before stepping down. He was Under Secretary of State for Global Affairs during the Clinton...
  
  , U.S. Senator from Colorado

Awards

The series received a number of awards, including:

• 1989 Houston International Film Festival "Worldfest Houston" – Silver Award for the episode "Politics, Privacy, and the Press"
• 1989 International Association of Audio Visual Communicators – Special Achievement award to "Cindy" in Talent
• 1989 International Film and TV Festival of New York – Finalist Award for the episodes "To Defend a Killer" and "Under Orders, Under Fire Part I"
• 1989 National Educational Film and Video Festival – Bronze Apple Award for the episode "To Defend a Killer"
• 1990 Ohio State Award for the episode "Under Orders, Under Fire"

External links

• Fredfriendly.org List of episodes, with descriptions and a lists of panelists
• Teacher resources on Ethics in Americafrom The Annenberg Foundation