special
feature
the
sunday
daily
letters
from our
readers
Number 26 Night Editor: Robert Kraftowitz
March 29, 1970
m
Readers debate BAM, strike tactics
Violence
To the Editor:
THE FACULTY of the Univer-
sity is opposed to .violence, de-
struction, and disruption of class-
es. I and some of my students
recognized several of those who
disrupted my class, and I shall
file formal charges against them
with the administrative boards of
their schools and colleges. I call
upon all faculty and students to
identify and charge in the same
way as many as possible of those
who would destroy our University.
We must act decisively now.
-Bernard A. Galler
Professor, Computer and
Communication Sciences.
and Mathematics
March 27 .
Music
To the Editor: '
WE, STUDENTS and faculty of
the School of Music, support the
BAM demands,; and urge the Re-
gents to more fully commit them-
selves to those demands.
Don Goldstick and 170
students and faculty of
the School of Music
March 27
Bedazzled
To the Editor:
. ON THURSDAY, March 26th,
my five students and myself were
"violently" prevented from hold-
ing bur legally contracted class
either in Angell Hall or in my pri-
vate office in Haven Hall. At the
time, we, were to discuss D. H.
Lawrence. We were informed by
the BAM strikers that our class-
room was racist. Such, indeed; the
case may well be.
It strikes me as rather odd, how-
ever, that a showing of Raquel
Wilch's Bedazzld on Friday ev-
ening in Auditorium A of. Angell
Hall which up until 5:00 of
that day had been a racist insti-
tution - was completely sold out.
Yet, the strike as of Saturday was
still officially on.
I wonder what there is about
Raquel Welch - neglecting the
obvious - that makes her less of
-a racist institution th a n D. H.
Lawrence. A n d I wonder about
the values of those same strikers
who "liberated" my students from
racism at t h e University while
ignoring the same racism in Hol-
lywood capitalism."
THE ONLY POSSIBLE expla-
nation for this seeming ' incon-
sistency is t h a t Bedazzled is a
"people's movie" and St. Mawr is
not 'a "people's novel." If this is
so, and I fear it is. the "people"
have exposed a rather embarras-
sing side of their moral and in-
tellectual personality.
-Williain F. Horwath
Teaching Fellow
nepartment of English
March 28 ,
Joyful
To the Editor:
WE, THE undersigned graduate
students of the economics depart-
ment, have been supporting and
will continue to support the BAM
strike. and participate in- it. We
deplore the fact that the intran-
sigence and insensitivity of the
Regents and the administration
have made it necessary for BAM
to call this strike.
We are very pleased that the
strike has been on the whole
peaceful and joyful, creating an
atmosphere within which various
groups of faculty and students
have begun to discuss and work
together toward the creation of a
more relevant and humane com-
munity. While we regret not at-
tending or teaching our classes, we
have derived much more for our
participation in the strike in the
form of a more concrete grasp of
the realities of our University and
society, as well as a better un-
derstanding of ourselves, both of
which should be the prime ob-
jectives of any true educational
experience.
WE HOPE THAT those students
and faculty members who are so
l o u d 1 y deprecating "violence"
would turn their attention to the
real violence in our society, and
their moral indignation to the sys-
tem which generates it.
Theof le Lukusa
M. MacDonald
John McConnell
Victor Mesalles
Craig Monogan
Virginia Morgan
Djamal Mostefai
Dennis Murphy
James O'Toole
C. O'Clelreacain
S. O'Cleireacain
E. Podolske
Liz Rothman
Claude Simard
George Wright
March 28
Brian Abner
Bill Bachmann
Barry Bluestone
Eric Chester
Giacomo Costa
Adama Diallo
Richard England
Paul Gingrich
Rosanne Greene
Alice Gorin
Louis Hawkins
Barry Herman
Roger Koenker
Sheila Larkin
LSA Student Govt.
To the Editor:
THE LSA student government
unanimously supports the BAM
demands and encourages literary
school students and faculty to ob-
serve the strike until the BAM
leaders see fit to call it off. Fur-
thermore, we urge the individual
departments to seriously analyze
their budgets and commit funds
to implement the resolution adopt-
ed Friday by the faculty.
The LSA Student Gov't.
Executive Council
Disruptive tactics
To the Editor:
I AM SORRY to see the current
strike taking the turn it has. As
the leaders have chosen to adopt
tactics of force, they have destroy-
ed their only basis for rational
support. In asserting that the
BAM demands should be adopted, -
they must assume that man is a
moral agent, responsible for his
own actions. But by using disrup-
tive tactics to force people to join
the strike by preventing classes
from being held, they deny the
moral responsibility of anyone who
doesn't happen to agree with
them. And if some people are not
morally responsible for their ac-
tions, then the only way to get
them to act as you feel they should
is by physical means: inducements
or brute force. At this stage you
have denied the uniqueness of
man, you have denied that he is
responsible for doing what is right.
I personally disagree with this
stand: I believe man is a moral
agent, responsible for his actions.
Thus I am able to say that our
society should be changed so as
to acknowledge in, action that all
men are fully human. Therefore
I also oppose the use of force, in
any form, to enforce one person's
value system on another. And I
am sorry to see a dangerous spiral
of increasing use of force develop-
ing. If it continues, this eventual-
ly leads to the destruction of the
University, as a place where any-
one can treat anyone else as a
human being.
-Dennis Darch, 71
March 26
Convocation
To the Editor;
WHILE I WAS attending the
Honors Convocation on Friday
with , my J'daughter, a senior at
the University, my other daughter
(a -junior) was marching outside
in the picket line. I hoped that the
address given by Dr. Hubbard
would be relevant to what was
happening. It was, but how many
of us make the connection? He
did not acknowledge that the stu-
dents inside symbolized competence
and that the students picketing
represented compassion, yet he
emphasized that what's vitally
needed is not one or the other,
but the combination of compe-
tence and compassion.
My generation and the larger
community is constantly accused
of lack of compassion; our de-
fence is often to ridicule students
-to express contempt for their
motives as well as their tactics.
But I've listened to as many voices
as possible, and everybody in Ann
Arbor is afraid of violence, and
everybody blames the violence on
someone else.
The college administration is so
(justifiably) afraid of riot that it
calls on a jumpy police force which
may precipitate more trouble than
it stops. The Black Students Move-
ment and its white supporters fear
outbursts; they are blamed for
most disturbances-like the un-
sponsored disturbance of the Con-
vocation by 20 or so white stu-
dents who, I suspect, were not
moved by compassion, but prob-
ably by their own adolescent
hang-ups.
IN AN AGE when enormously
complex problems are not going
to be solved by incompetents,
there's something terribly frustrat
ing about closed classrooms: the
above-mentioned adolescents don't
care, but I've talked to many
bright, dedicated students who re-
luctantly gave up classes they
needed( and even enjoyed!) be-
cause they, like almost everyone I
heard, thought 'BAM demands
were reasonable.4
I don't like to be in crowds, even
at a football game. But since be-
cause I have two daughters here
this is in a sense my University,
and since if there's going to be
a group action in what I consider
a reasonable and just cause, it is
in constant danger of disruption
by violence unless non-violents
keep order, I joined the picket line
Monday morning. I'd read the 6-
page pamphlet on the BAM-Re-
gent controversy, and I was pre-
pared to take orders from BAM, or
to leave. It was an act of compas-
sion, but not of complete com-
petence, for many of my questions
are unanswered.
THIS IS NOT the only big issue
(although certainly one of the
most urgent) the University is
facing, but if it is viewed as only
one of a continuing series of strik-
es, how can it have any chance of
success? Is this (the fear of end-
less student confrontation on end-
less issues) the reason the Regents
have refused to meet with BAM
leadership? Are there other rea-
sons why a meeting on some polit-
ically viable level can't work?
What channels are there for stu-
dent grievances, and why haven't
they been successfully used?
In, budgeting so much here in
the University, so much through-
out the country, for national de-
fense, we perpetrate the violence
we seek to avoid. There must be a
way to re-order our priorities; to
train leaders who'll work for the
renewal we so desperately need in
the inner city, and in the larger
community.
-(Mrs.) Anne H. Bradley
March 24
Reject strike
To the Editor:
THE REGENTS HAVE many
sympathizers among the students
at the University. T h e present
tension on campus has polarized
many people. We who try to de-
fend the 'system' are hard pressed
to defend a system that closes its
doors to continued communica-
tion. We have learned that many
conflicts today are caused from
a failure to communicate. Al-
though there have been disrup-
tions (caused by a minority of
blacks and whites), the majority
of blacks are sincerely trying to
work within the system. Please
listen to them. They want the
University to help train b 1 a c k
leaders (doctors, lawyers, busi-
nessmen) for the black commun-
ity.
Please listen to them. We are
all tired of conflict - but we
can't run away either. Those of
us who continue to go ,to class do
not reject BAM's demands, but
reject the strike as a meaningful
effort to communicate. We who
reject the strike suggest further
direct negotiations. We believe
that the system is always open--
do not fail us for we want to work
within the system - we still have
faith.
-Carlos A. Jesurun, '70
March 26
Reconsider
To the Editor:
IF THE REGENTS and Presi-
dent Fleming continue their rigid-
ly unreceptive attitude toward the
BAM demands, they are, in effect,
forcing the strikers to either aban-
don demands which they (and I)
believe to be just or to resort to
more and more desperate meas-
ures. I sincerely hope that the Re-
gents will reconsider, and that
even if they don't, the strikers will
not turn violent. But there are
limits to human endurance. If
there is violence, who will ulti-
mately be responsible for it? The
fastest way to pacify an opponent
is to give serious attention to his
grievances. If the Regents and
President Fleming remain unat-
tentive and irrationally rigid, then
they will have made themselves
the ultimate cause of whatever
happens.
There may be valid reasons why
the BAM demands cannot be met
in their entirety by the Univer-
sity. If there are, we would all like
to hear them. But if there are not,
then the Regents and President
Fleming warrant severe condem-
nation for their actions.
-Gerald Janecek,, Grad
March 25
SUNY
To the Editor:
ON SUNDAY, Mar. 15 at about
2 p.m., 45 faculty members of the
State University of New York at
Buffalo were arrested in Hayes
Hall on the SUNY Buffalo campus
while engaged in a peaceful sit-in
protesting the maintenance of
hundreds of police on campus
despite a vote of the Faculty Sen-
nate calling for their immediate
removal. Thus far, all of them
have been charged with criminal
trespass, civil contempt, and crim-
inal contempt, the last count car-
rying a possible penalty of one
year in jail and a $1,000 fine. The
order to arrest them in one of our
own buildings, as they met without
interrupting university or admin-
istrative business, proceeded from
an administration which has fail-
ed to justify its actions to the fac-
ulty and students throughout the
two weeks crisis preceeding their
arrests.
We need money for their de-
fense fund. When some of the fac-
ulty are unjustly arrested, all of
the faculty stand unjustly accused.
Please send contributions to:
Friends of the Hayes Hall 45, De-
fense Fund, 131 High Park Blvd.,
Buffalo, N.Y. 14226.
H. R. Wolf
Secretary of the Friends
of the Hayes
Hall 45 Defense Fund
March 20 ,
;t
A
Al
"... ME LIE?
.. .An officer and a gentleman? ..."
Community reaction to the strike
'A*
Relevance
To the Editor:
The following is a copy of a
letter sent to Darryl Gorman,
spokesman for BAM:
THE STAFF OF the Washtenaw
County Office of Economic Op-
portunity (WOEO) has today dis-
cussed the demands of the Black
Action Movement at the Univer-
sity, seeking to determine if the
agency's comment would be appro-
priate to BAM's position. We have
decided to offer our support of
those demands.
As you know, WOEO is involved
with the problems of the p o o r
minority in the ,county. Our ef-
forts have sought to engage the
co-operation of, among others, the
University, since it has long been
our belief that the University has
a definite obligation to the com-
munity of which it is a part that it
cannot in good conscience over-
look.
Equally important as the com-
mitment to a goal of a ten per
cent black student enrollment at
the University is the realization of
the supportive services that must
accompany that enrollment. It is
our belief that, without comment-
ing on the superiority or inferior-
ity of preparation of the anticipat-
ed incoming Black students, it is,
evident that they and the Univer-
sity think in many ways on dif-
ferent 'wavelengths". Both t h e
University and the students, there-
fore, need mutual orientation.
THE OBSERVATION by many
of the staff that the University
does not seem to prepare its grad-
uates adequately for the problems
they will face once they leave
leads us to seriously doubt the
value of the University's curri-
culum. We feel that the University
must seek out agencies like ours
in the community to initiate its
own involvement in community
needs with the vast resources it
has at its disposal.
It is clear to us that in many'
most important aspects the Uni-
versity has failed to meet ade-
quate standards of relevance and
participation in its community.
Your set of demands to penetrate
the academic vacuum in which
the University has so far func-
tioned (and has been allowed to
function) is certainly worthy of
our strongest support, which we
offer today.
-(Mrs.) Joan Adams Hogan
Chairman, WOEO
Board of Directors
-Beverly M. Poindexter
Executive Director
for the staff
March 27
Ecumenical Center
To the Editor:
WE, THE UNDERSIGNED staff
of the Ecumenical Campus Center,
support the goals of the Black Ac-,
tion Movement as desirable and as
essential to the proper role of the
Tniversity at this historie neriod:
such a reordering of priorities to
commit itself to achieving mini-
mally the goals of the BAM.
We also believe that even the
high goals of justice and equality
are preliminary goals in the strug-
gle for opportunity for e v e r y
human being to live with dignity.
We believe violence directed
against persons destroys the v e r y
dignity it seeks to make possible.
Overt, destructive violence has
been used against blacks in the
U.S. for centuries and is in part
the cause of today's crisis. Equally,
we recognize that economic and
social control and repression are
just as certainly a form of violence
and can result in the confronta-
tions we now increasingly exper-
ience in our country. We therefore
reject violence by any participants
in this struggle and urge all con-
cerned to reject its use in this
current crisis.
WHILE WE AFFIRM support
for the goals of the BAM at the
University and urge the Univer-
sity community to accept them as
minimum goals to be implemented
even though it requires major re-
ordering of priorities, we also af-
firm our belief in the integrity and
leadership of President Fleming
who, we believe, has exerted great
skill in taking the university for-
ward to an increasing recogni-
tion of its appropriate role as lead-
er in the struggle for a just socie-
ty.
-Paul R. Dotson
Shirley Lewis
John Peter
Hassan Sharifi-
William B. Lutz
March 27
Hillel
To the Editor:
WE, THE EXECUTIVE Board
and Director of the Hillel Founda-
tion support the strike of the BAM.
We believe that justice requires
satisfaction from the Board of Re-
gents on student demands for ade-
quate scholarship funds, support-
ive services and student recruit-
ment of Black students. Our sole
disagreement with the BAM de-
mands is on the issue of the
10 per cent quota. We would
hope that the day would come
when every Black high school
graduate in the State will have the
opportunity to attend the Uni-
versity.
However, we are opposed to es-
tablishing a quota of any sort -
even a minimum quota of 10 per
cent. Some argue that this is not
a quota because of the words "not
less than". This is faulty logio.
"Not less than" 10 per cent Black
students implies that 10 per cent
is an acceptable number in the dis-
charge of its duty by the Uni-
versity to the Black community,
based upon population of Blacks
in the State. Once the 10 per
cent figure is achieved the Uni-
versity then must discharge its
duty towards the nther 90 ner cent
Tokenism
To the Editor:
The following is a copy of a
letter sent to the Regents.
SINCE TAKING OFFICE on the
State Board of Education, I have
tried to convince the educational
lead, rship of the state that the
importance of blacks and other
minority groups in universities
should not be discounted and that
significant increases in the en-
rollments of minority groups
should be made immediately.
Following the periods of social
unrest in the 1960's climaxed by
the holocaust in Detroit, most of
the major universities and col-
leges in large urban centers in-
creased the enrollment of low in-
come students. But token admis-
sions made at that time do not
meet demands now made-for ap-
propriate representation.
Furthermore, significant legis-
lation appropriations have n 0 t
been allotted to finance increased
enrollment short of internal re-
ordering of institutional priorities.
Consequently the University is fac-
ed with demands of determined
black students for a 10 per cent
representation at a time when the
needs of blacks at the University
are not deemed serious enough to
warrant administrative commit-
ment.
NEVERTHELESS, I deem these
demands proper and indeed quite
modest. Black students, in making
these demands, are acting to avert
social disaster and are paving the
way for a sharp acceleration of
erowth in skills and knowledge in
the black community.
The Regents should, if neces-
sary. seek financial help f r o m
public, private and internal sourc-
es to achieve the goal of these de-
mands.
The inability of the University to
act positively in this situation re-
flects the inevitable difficulties
encountered by social institutions
which are founded with the inher-
ent, if not stated, purpose of sys-
tematically excluding minority
members of society.
-Rev. Dr. Charles E. Morton
Member, State
Board of Education
March 27
Vital demands
To the Editor:
IN VIEW OF the fact that black
students at the University dili-
gently compiled essential demands,
and carefully presented their de-
mands to the administrative heads
of the University; and given
the non-committal denials, apathy,
and unhealthy ambiguities, we, re-
sponsible blacks of the state of
Michigan, are forced to conclude
that the University is not respon-
sive to blacks on campus, and are
subsequently unfeeling to the
needs of all blacks.
The demands presented by DAM
- - . .- - - - e.n.. nn - - V7 *e
4i'
1THE AMEICiA co.eA
507 W6
AOT
tOO0JT TAL4C
[T AtUVMGQE"
U~
?E+r AHEThCAtJ Eop('
A L))~)ONL2a&Vf
48001
C
M'*T TAGK
Vi
v O~-7O)
RI4T0J
7lf1 AMCR(CMN)aUOfJ ARE
PW UP WI1h CIWVG 6CT.
W0L6IOO T 1AL4<
AMOT 1ISMAJYM4CkF.
WA)AT
TAW-
IOKU Lt.6
ABOOT?
a p Jx