It's No Ms-tery, Call Me Mrs.

The Times trips on a title

Mrs. John Zaccaro's vice-presidential candidacy has created a problem for the status-conscious editors of the New York Times: how to refer to a woman who has retained her surname and is known to the whole world as Geraldine Ferraro. To the Times, which attaches the honorifics Mr., Mrs. and Miss to names, the problem could be solved by referring to her as Miss Ferraro. But the candidate, who is the mother of three children, does not feel happy with this appellation and has asked to be called Ms. or Mrs. Ferraro. Because the Times does not permit the use of Ms. in its columns, it is left with no choice but to call her Mrs. Last week William Safire, who ruminates on the origins and proper use of words in his Times column "On Language," took his paper to task. Call her Miss Ferraro, Mrs. Zaccaro or Mrs. Ferraro Zaccaro if you must, said Safire, but Mrs. Ferraro is "a person she is not."

"It breaks my heart to suggest this," Safire continued, "but the time has come for Ms." The Times did not agree. Safire's editors took the unusual step of inserting a box into his column, in which they dismissed Ms. as "business-letter coinage" that is "too contrived for news writing."

The problem does not appear to exist at other major news organizations, which have stopped using honorifics or have succumbed to the use of Ms. The Associated Press prefers to leave it up to the individual involved. "Geraldine Ferraro fits easily into Ms., which is her preference," says Executive Vice President Louis Boccardi. Says Carl Miller, assistant managing news editor for the Denver Post: "It has been our policy for years to use the last name for all public officials, even if they happen to be women."

Even so, referring to a woman simply by her surname still bothers some readers. The Philadelphia Inquirer, which has a new policy eliminating honorifics in most cases, recently received a bundle of letters for referring to Nancy Reagan as "Reagan." Says John V.R. Bull, the paper's ombudsman: "People thought it showed a lack of respect."

Most editors, it seems, now agree with Safire's argument that "it is unacceptable for journalists to dictate to a candidate that she call herself Miss or else use her married name." One way out of this thicket of titles would be for the Times simply to drop the use of honorifics altogether. But that course of action was rejected by News Editor Allan M. Siegal last week. Said he: "Everybody feels, I think unanimously, that that wouldn't sound like the New York Times."