Quinnipiac University Presents Fred Friendly First Amendment Award to Charles Gibson of ‘ABC’s World News’

NEW YORK, June 10 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — Quinnipiac University presented its 15th annual Fred Friendly First Amendment Award to Charles Gibson, anchor of “ABC’s World News,” during a luncheon ceremony today at The Metropolitan Club.

Named after the legendary former CBS News president, the Fred Friendly First Amendment Award acknowledges one of the most basic constitutional rights and honors those who have shown courage and forthrightness in preserving that right.

“Charlie respects his audience,” said Ruth Friendly, Friendly’s widow who presented the award to Gibson with Quinnipiac President John L. Lahey. “He never talks down to his audience. He makes other people care because he cares. Speak to his colleagues – his staff and they will tell you that he is interested in everything and everyone and assumes that his audience is filled with curious, caring people. Charlie sets the tone for the organization… In a medium where flash is overrated, Charlie is a journalist of substance and he pursues his craft with an innate sense of good taste.”

“….I loved the Fred Friendly seminars when he conceived of them and then brought them to public television,” Gibson said. “I loved watching the best of minds wrestling with hypothetical situations posed by expert moderators-and they always taught me a great deal. John McCain and Barack Obama have agreed in principle to a series of town meetings. I’d love for one of them to be a Fred Friendly seminar. Let Arthur Miller of the NYU Law School posit a situation with terrorism at its center, juxtaposing individual rights with the need for national security. I would venture to say it might be a useful way to judge the candidates side by side.”

Gibson joins past recipients: Dan Rather, Lesley Stahl, Bill Moyers, Ted Koppel, Tom Brokaw, Jim Lehrer, Robert MacNeil, Don Hewitt, Peter Jennings, Mike Wallace, Christiane Amanpour, Tom Bettag, Tim Russert, Bob Schieffer and Steve Kroft.

In addition, Quinnipiac presented Floyd Abrams with the Fred Friendly Lifetime Achievement Award for his work in constitutional law.

Quinnipiac is a private, coeducational, nonsectarian institution located 90 minutes north of New York City and two hours from Boston. The university enrolls 5,400 full-time undergraduate and 2,000 graduate students in more than 51 undergraduate and 19 graduate programs of study in its School of Business, School of Communications, School of Health Sciences, School of Law, College of Liberal Arts, Division of Education and College of Professional Studies. Quinnipiac consistently ranks among the top universities with master’s programs in the Northern region in U.S. News & World Report’s America’s Best Colleges. Quinnipiac also is recognized in Princeton Review’s The Best 366 Colleges. For more information, please visit http://www.quinnipiac.edu/.

Quinnipiac University

CONTACT: John W. Morgan, associate vice president for public relationsof Quinnipiac University, +1-203-582-5359, John.Morgan@quinnipiac.edu

Web Site: http://www.quinnipiac.edu/