Writing and Submitting a Letter to the Editor
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Getting Started
When you are writing a letter to the editor, your first move is to find online the submission guidelines for letters to the editor of the the newspaper, magazine, website, or other media outlet to which you want to submit your work.
If you start from a search engine, you can often quickly find these online by doing a web search for the name of the media outlet followed by "letter to the editor submission guidelines". If a web search doesn't turn them up directly, try going to the home page on their website and looking at some sections where they are often found. Check for an Opinions section first. It might be called something different like "Valley Voices", "Social Commentary", "From Our Readers", or something else. If you don't quickly find a section titled Opinions, read through all the section names to see if it is listed under an alternate heading.
If you can't locate submission guidelines online, you can go to the Contact page on the website to find out how to ask. Again, this might be called something different like "Get in Touch", "About", etc. Select the email address or phone number listed that seems most likely to fit, and send an email or call to ask the media outlet where you can find their op-ed submission guidelines.
Click here for an example of guidelines on how to submit your LTE.
To maximize your chances of getting your letter published, pay attention to the preferred word count, how to submit it, and any other style guidelines or instructions. Depending on whether or not their readership is primarily online or readers of their print publications, they may have a policy on including links that you should be aware of.
Letters to the editor are usually written in response to a news story, column, or something else published by the media outlet to which you are writing. If you can refer to a specific news story, column, or refer to some other recent item published by that media outlet in your piece, it is a good idea to do so. Remember, they are in a business that depends on readership or viewership. If your piece gets your reader to click on another page on their website, that benefits them.
Be prepared to back up any factual assertions with a credible reference if requested, but do not include a formal list of formatted references. You can mention the source of your factual assertion in the body of your letter. For example, "A report published in 2018 by the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers entitled "The Trial Penalty" points out that fewer than 3% of criminal cases in state and federal courts are decided by juries."
Time is of the essence! Letters referring to recently published material are more likely to be published than letters referring to something from long ago or not referring to anything published by the media outlet at all. It behooves you to compose your letter and submit it as soon as practical after the item to which you are responding was published.
More Resources
- Writing a letter to the editor (LTE) of your local paper (.pdf) from Families Against Mandatory Minimums
- Letters to the Editor: How to Write Them and Why They Work from the ACLU
- How to Write a Letter to the Editor that Gets Published and Read from Getting Attention
Examples
- Civil liberties are being threatened, Southern Maryland News, 12 October 2021
- A case for jury nullification, Idaho Press, 7 June 2019
- Plaintiffs in Denver jury-nullification case wrongly criticized for others’ behavior, The Denver Post, 3 August 2017
- Jury suggestion is ‘shortsighted’, Florida Today, 6 July 2017
- Having judges settle disputes not answer, Daily Journal, 3 July 2017
- Don’t forget jury’s power to rule on moral grounds, Livingston Daily, 24 September 2015
