CBS fought very hard on this because it believed and believes that there's a principle at stake here. The principle is that Dan Rather doesn't work for the police, and that people that speak to Dan Rather understand that he's a journalist and not a police agent.
“The true and solid peace of nations consists not in equality of arms, but in mutual trust alone.”
“Death is no more than passing from one room into another. But there's a difference for me, you know. Because in that other room I shall be able to see.”