Kempton’s interest in journalism was sparked by living in the same town as America’s most famous journalist, H.L. Mencken

James Murray Kempton ( 191797 ) was born in Baltimore into what he liked to call “shabby gentility’ His interest in journalism was sparked by living in the same town as America ’s most famous journalist, H.L. Mencken .

A new collection of his journalism from 1935 to 1997 confirms that his politics were difficult to categorise.

He was a repository of second thoughts, and of following the evidence where it led.

He saw some combat and would have been killed had a bullet not been deflected from his chest by a cartridge clip.

After the war, Kempton resumed his labour reporting for the New York Post under the tutelage of anti-New Deal reporter Victor Riesel .

He later wrote for Newsday , edited the New Republic and won the Pulitzer Prize in 1985 .

Murray Kempton admired Dashiell Hammett's stand in refusing to give government names of Civil Rights Congress .

In today ’s world of sixty-second pundits and fiercely competitive zero -sum tribalism, there is very little room for his brand of honesty, mercy, and second thoughts.