Within months of his debut at the Globe, he was described by the left-leaning Boston Phoenix as "the region's pre-eminent spokesman for the Conservative Nation," and a columnist who had "quickly established himself as a must-read."

[3] In 2000, Jacoby was suspended by the Globe for four months without pay for what the paper called his "serious journalistic misconduct" in failing to provide sources for a Fourth of July column on the fate of the signers of the Declaration of Independence.

The Globe "avoided calling the column a work of plagiarism but stated that Jacoby should have alerted readers to similar accounts published elsewhere over the years.

"[4] On CNN's Reliable Sources, veteran journalists Bernard Kalb and Howard Kurtz concluded that "Jeff Jacoby got shafted by the Boston Globe.

[8] Jacoby acknowledged having "made a mistake" in not including a disclaimer that the material in the column had been recycled but called the critical reaction of the Globe ombudsman, Jack Thomas, "disgraceful and nonsensical.

[citation needed] The suspension came two years after the forced resignations of Globe columnists Mike Barnicle and Patricia Smith, who were caught fabricating stories and quotes.

Boston University professor Tobe Berkovitz hypothesized that the scandals surrounding those two columnists had influenced the Globe's decision to suspend Jacoby.

[citation needed] Jacoby claimed that as the only conservative columnist on the otherwise liberal Globe op-ed pages, he was held to a higher standard.