James R. Schlesinger, the Secretary of Energy, telephoned leading newspapers and warned them not to support "The Progressive". This was probably unnecessary, for the media were supportive of the government's case. Fred Graham, the "New York Times" legal correspondent, predicted that the government would win the case. In an editorial on March 11, 1979, "The Washington Post" wrote that "The Progressive" case, "as a press-versus-government First Amendment contest, is John Mitchell's dream case—the one the Nixon Administration was never lucky enough to get: a real First Amendment loser." The newspaper called on "The Progressive" to "forget about publishing it". In the "Pentagon Papers" case, Professor Alexander Bickel, an expert on the United States Constitution, when asked hypothetically if prior restraint could ever be justified, had told the court that he would draw the line at the hydrogen bomb. Daniel Ellsberg, who had leaked the Pentagon Papers, told Morland that he believed that nuclear weapon designs should be kept secret. Because of the horrific nature of thermonuclear weapons, and the expectation that "The Progressive" would probably lose the case, mainstream media organizations feared that the result would be an erosion of freedom of the press.