Goodwin controversy intensifies

For famed historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, a recent allegation of plagiarism has opened a decade-old story.

On Friday, only two days after giving a lecture at Penn, Goodwin admitted that she borrowed at least 50 phrases from other sources and used them in one of her books without citing them appropriately.

Last month, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author said she accidentally failed to properly cite some of the information in her 1987 book The Fitzgeralds and the Kennedys from works by other authors, including Lynne McTaggart's Kathleen Kennedy: Her Life and Times.

But now, Goodwin has confessed to The New York Times that the amount she borrowed was much more extensive than what she had previously suggested.

Even before these admissions, some had voiced concern about bringing Goodwin to speak on Wednesday night as part of the Fox Leadership Program's lecture series because of the plagiarism allegations. Now, these criticisms are even sharper.

"This alleged expert on integrity appears to have committed plagiarism and cover-up shamelessly," History Professor Alan Kors said. "I suspect that she knew that this story was going to appear and if she had any honor, she would have cancelled her talk at the University of Pennsylvania on leadership and integrity.

"In her case, it included her publisher buying off someone who she plagiarized," Kors added, referring to Goodwin's settlement with McTaggart.

However, Fox Student Director Marc Siegel said that those responsible for bringing Goodwin to campus stand by their decision, even in spite of recent developments.

"We don't regret bringing her one bit," Siegel said. "It only makes me happier because it shows me that she's trying to correct the mistakes that were made, and she's trying to do everything in her power to straighten things out."

Goodwin said that she and her research assistants are working to find any other improperly cited passages in her works. She is paying her publishing company to destroy its current supply of her book and reprint versions with the passages correctly cited.

Siegel added that Goodwin spoke as a historian, and that she was not presented as a leader, even though her lecture was part of a series about leadership.

"She came and enlightened the audience about Lyndon Johnson, Franklin D. Roosevelt and others," Siegel said. "She did not come to speak of Doris Kearns Goodwin as a leader. Instead, she demonstrated through different political figures challenges we've faced in the past and related them to terrorism we're facing now."

Goodwin did not mention the plagiarism controversy during her lecture, and no one in the audience brought it up during the question-and-answer period that followed her speech.

"I was surprised that the issue did not come up when she was at the University of Pennsylvania speaking about, among other things, integrity, and I was surprised when people were quoted in the DP as praising the audience for not raising the issue," Kors said. "However, all of that was before the new revelation.

"I would hope that in the light of those new revelations, people who defended her will join in criticism of practices that, if engaged in by a Penn undergraduate, would lead to his or her severe punishment," he added.

This new turn of events concerning allegations of plagiarism by Goodwin comes on the heels of the recent discovery that historian Steven Ambrose had borrowed ideas and phrases in his book The Wild Blue from History Professor Thomas Childers' World War II work The Wings of Morning.

History Professor Bruce Kuklick, who denounced Ambrose for his actions, said that he probably would not use Goodwin's books in his future classes, though he has in the past.

"For me, the credibility has been lost," Kuklick said. "She didn't cite her sources the way she should have. She got credit for work that someone else did. That's what I object to."

But Kuklick added that incidents like these do not usually affect public opinion for long and may not tarnish the records of either Goodwin or Ambrose.

"The shelf life of these scandals is very brief for the public," Kuklick said.

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