The Powers That Be was published by Alfred A. Knopf in 1979. Halberstam profiles four media empires — the CBS television network under William Paley, the Washington Post under the Grahams, Time Inc. under Henry Luce, and the Los Angeles Times under the Chandler family — tracing each from its origins through its ascent to national influence.
The book’s argument is that these organizations accumulated a form of power that the American political system was not designed to accommodate. They did not merely report the news; they determined what counted as news, which voices were heard, and which narratives prevailed. Paley decided what America watched. Luce decided what America read. The Grahams decided what Washington talked about. The Chandlers decided what the West Coast cared about. Together, they constituted an unelected, unaccountable establishment whose influence rivaled that of the elected government.
Halberstam’s portraits of the founders and their successors are characteristic: dense, psychologically acute, and structured around the tension between institutional power and individual character. Paley’s combination of aesthetic taste and ruthless ambition; Katharine Graham’s transformation from a diffident society wife to the publisher who confronted Richard Nixon; Luce’s ideological conviction that America was destined to lead the world; Otis Chandler’s rebellion against his family’s reactionary politics — each story is a microcosm of how American power actually works.
Collecting The Powers That Be
First edition (Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1979): Cloth binding, dust jacket.
Market values:
- First edition, fine/fine: $40–$100
- Very good/very good: $15–$40
- Signed: $80–$200