The Sidney prize honors outstanding journalism that illuminates the great issues of our time. The winner of each monthly award is announced the second Wednesday of each month. Nominations should be submitted by the last day of the previous month. Journalists may nominate their own work or others’.
The 2024 Neilma Sidney Short Story Prize is open to writers nationally and internationally, at all stages of their writing careers. The story must be no more than 3000 words and be loosely themed on the notion of travel. We encourage imaginative, creative and literary interpretations of the theme. Judges, Patrick Lenton, Alice Bishop and Sara Saleh, selected a longlist of eight pieces from more than 500 entries, and chose the winner and two runners-up. We thank them for their hard work and commitment to the integrity of our blind-judging process.
Taking a step back from our daily struggles and anxieties is important at this time of year. Walter Russell Mead’s essay, “The Once and Future Liberalism,” published in the American Interest, encourages us to do just that. He argues that our current political argument is really a conflict between two different kinds of liberalism, the small-state Manchester liberalism of the 1890s and the big-organization managerial state liberalism of today’s Democratic Party.
We also are pleased to announce the winner of the 2024 George Barrett Award: Philippe Sands KC. Sands’ professional career exemplifies the public spirit and activism of our namesake, George Barrett, who advocated for poor people around the world to secure their basic civil and human rights, address legacies of colonialism, and protect the global environment. The award is presented by the Sidney Hillman Foundation in collaboration with the American Constitution Society and will be presented at a ceremony at the ACSC’s national conference in Washington, DC on June 14.
Our 2024 Runner-Up: Maya Srikrishnan and Ashley Clarke, Grist, for their article “Low-Income Taxpayers Are Behind on Their Income Tax Payments.” For more than a year, these reporters searched new avenues to tell the story of low-income taxpayer clinics and the obstacles they faced when seeking information from state governments about their collection policies.
We are delighted to have Venour V Nathan as our 2025 sponsor of the NAS essay prize, which will be awarded for an outstanding essay on a subject connected with Australian or Imperial history. Submissions will be assessed by a panel of judges and the prize will be announced at the Society’s Triennial Council meeting in March 2025.