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The night they raided...

>AY, JANUARY 24, 1969

NIGHT EDITOR: RON LANDSMAN


A march on the draft

By HENRY GRIX
THE TWO year old newspapers containing
reports on the seizure of an allegedly obscene
experimental film from Cinema Guild have al-
ready yellowed.
But no campus event since has stirred and
united faculty and student interests quite so
much as the Ann Arbor police censorship of
Flaming Creatures - at least no event until the
threatened "raid" against University Activities
Center's Dionysus in 69.
Unlike "Dionysus", however, Flaming Crea-
tures was admittedly a hot item. It had been
banned in New York state and had to be sent
to Ann Arbor by freight to .avoid problems
with the post office.
A special showing of the film before the
Cinema Guild advisory board convinced the
board that "Creatures," had "redeeming social
value," and should be shown.
However; Ann Arbor police Lt. Eugene
Staudenmeier "declared it was obscene be-
cause of my previous experience." Staudenmeier
apparently tipped off by an anonymous phone
call, had confiscated the film at about 7:40 p.m.
on Jan. 18 after it had been showing for about
20 minutes. That night the aroused audience
trailed the police to city hall and sat-in until
midnight.
BUT THE UNIVERSITY kept its cool. Be-
fore the showing, Richard L. Cutler, then vice-
president for student affairs, had warned the

Cinema Guild members "You know you're re-
sponsible for anything that happens tomorrow
and the University isn't."
And the University kept its distance from
the issue during the entire year of court bat-
tles. Although the Civil Liberties Board of the
Faculty Assembly quickly came out against the
police action, although University President
Harlan Hatcher voiced defense of Cinema
Guild's academic freedom, although several fa-
culty members urged University support for the
four Cinema Guild officers arraigned and tried
for a misdemeanor, the University remained
concerned but aloof.
FOR MONTHS THE TRIAL dragged on.
A New York critic's testimony explaining the
merits of the film was ruled "immaterial." The
court costs sent the Guild into debt, and it had
to launch a fund drive and hike its prices from
50 cents to 75 cents for a showing. Then the
trial was postponed.
Finally, in early December, 1967, the trial
began, But it ended one month later as Mary
Barkey, one of the defendents, pleaded guilty.
She was fined $235 for disturbing the peace, and
the charges against the others were dropped,
Unwilling to go through the tedious legal rang-
ling and string of appeals the case might have
involved, Miss Barkey seemingly opted o u t
for a light sentence.
The Cinema Guild case had a letdown fin-
ish; nothing about censorship was settled.
And the officers of UAC are getting worried.

THE PROPOSAL before the Senate to
abolish the draft and create a volun-
Veer army should be enacted into law.'
Legislation i n t r o d u c e d Wednesday
would end conscription except during
national emergencies, when the President-
would have to ask Congress to reauthor-
ize the draft. Military manpower needs,
would be met through volunteers. To in-
duce volunteers, enlisted men's pay would
be increased $100 a month, costing the
government an additional $3.7 billion a
year.
Nine senators ranging in ideology from
Goldwater to McGovern are sponsoring
the bill, and that range indicates how
myriad and divergent are the reasons for
supporting the proposal. Chief among
thei is the feeling that abolition of the
draft would be a major victory for the
liberties of the individual.
OF ALL THE recent encroachments on
civil liberties, none is so dangerous as
the peacetime draft which America has
suffered throughout the Cold War. Not
only is it a naked expression of govern-
ment coercion, but by 'its continued
existence it has sapped resistance and
promulgated the 'perilous assumption that
the government has a right to two years
of a man's life. In a time of reaction, with
individual liberties threatened from all
sides, any limitation of the government's
coercive power must be applauded, but
especially the destruction of this most
insidious power.
Furthermore, according to some studies
Including one commissioned by the in-
st itute for Defense Analyses, elminating
the draft would increase the efficiency
of military administration.
And while the bill before the Senate
dollar diplomacv
THANKS TO THE Ann Arbor Police De-
partment, Dionysius in 69 has become
a minor cause celebre, a status which cer-
tainly won't hurt its box office. Could Lt.
Staudenmaler have an economic interest
in the play?
-T. COPI
Editorial Staff
MARK LEVIN, Editor
-STEPHEN WILDSTROM URBAN LEHNER
Managing Editor Editorial Director
DAVID.KNOKE Executive Editor
WALLACE IMMEN ......... ... . .News Editor
CAROLYN MIEGEL.....Associate Managing Editor
DANIEL OKRENT................. Feature Editor
PAT O'DONOHUE..................... News Editor
WALTER SHAPIRO......Associate Editorial Director
HOWARD KOHN ...,... Associate Editorial Director
AVIVA KEMPNER ........ .....Personnel Director
NEAL BRUSS....................Magazine Edito?
ALISON SYMROSKI.......Associate Magazine Editor
ANN MUNSTER...............Contributing Editor
ANDY SACKS................ ..Photo Editor
Sports Staff

would perpetuate selective service regis-
tration and allow conscription in time of
emergency, it would still end the draft-
ing of men during peacetime. Moreover,
it would force the President to obtain
Congressional assent before making a
major commitment of fighting men.
MANY FEAR a volunteer, professional
army would mean incipient Prus-
sianism. They predict the further limit-
ing of civilian control over the military,
the perpetuation of a large standing
army, and the strengthening of militarist
attitudes in the armed services. In mo-
ments of paranoia, they shudder at the
thoughthof a military coup d'etat, made
possible by the provision of a ready force
of manpower committed to the political
viewpoint of the military.
But the real danger of a professional
army lies in the creation of an officer
class with a vested interest in the con-
tinuation of certain defense policies.
That situation, unfortunately, already
exists and is partially responsible for
such tragic mistakes as the Vietnamese
war and such expensive ones as continued
spending on bombers in an age domi-
nated by missiles. But elimination of the
draft would neither strengthen nor
weaken the position of that officer class;
it would only affect the method of pro-
curing enlisted men.
OF THE ENLISTED men now serving,
only 15 per cent are draftees. In
peacetime, that figure is 'undoubtedly far
lower. Even allowing for those who volun-
ther knowing that otherwise they will be
drafted, the percentage of military man-
power affected by the bill would be small.
In other words, the present army, consist-
ing of 85 per cent volunteers, would sim-
ply become an entirely volunteer army.
And enlisted men, whether draftees or
volunteers, must obey military orders or
risk court martial and dishonorable dis-
charge. Changing the form of procure-
ment would not increase the authority
of the officers or the manipulability of
the soldiers.
By relying solely on volunteers, the
armed services would perhaps be com-
posed of ,enlisted men whose political
feelings were more authoritarian and
militarist. But since the lobbying power
of the average private is negligible, that
increased militarism is unlikely to have
any effect.
The Senate legislation deserves support
as a significant step in preserving indi-
vidual freedom. And Prussianism, while
too prevalent now, will not be increased
by ia volunteer army. President Nixon is
said to favor the bill, but only after a
significant reduction of tensions in Viet-
nam. In this interpretation, the bill was
introduced now only as a symbol of con-
cern. Perhaps overwhelming public sup-
port can translate that symbol into law.
-URBAN LEHNER
Editorial Director

I

rDionysus

69: An

orgy for censors

By JIM HECK
WHEN UNIVERSITY Activities
Center officers decided last
fall to schedule "Dionysus in 69"
as part of this year's Creative Arts
Festival they had no idea it would
turn into the hot potato it has
become.
Although their intentions were
pure, they failed to foresee how
aroused Puritanical citizens might
become at efforts on behalf of
culture.
Richard Shekner, director of
the play, shared in this naivete.
Shekner admittedthe was "ex-
cited" in taking the production
to several college communities

where he expected it would be re-
viewed favorably.
But state universities are gen-
erally not places where the avant-
garde can be successfully exploited
today.
Not only have Ann Arbor police,
upset by the play's nude scenes,
hinted they may raid the produc-
tion here Sunday night, but the
play was banned from Minnesota
campus last night after being per-
formed without any of the nudity
that has been the major concern
of the play's critics.
MINNESOTA STUDENTS-not
the administration-made the de-
cision to ban the play. They were
upset because members of the au-

Letters to the Editor

'Paradise' later
To the Editor:
ALL REFERENCES to possible
obscenity action concerning
Dionysius in 69 throw back to
Flaming Creaturesy when just last
month there occurred in these
very environs-yea, in the very
Michigan Union Ballroom -, a
much more pertinent point of
reference.
The Living Theatre invaded,
and, having seen "Dionysius" in
New York, I can say the Per-
formance Group's production com-
pared to Living Theatre is like
Snow White compared to Virginia
Woolf. There is no total exposure
for anyone in "Dionysius," while at
the Living Theatre celebrations
here Dec. 10 and 11 there was joy-
ous and sensual nudity by the
cast and the audience, as the play
developed (Paradise Now). It mys-
tifies me that we had no trouble
securing the production in the
Union ballroom, sinceI read in
The Daily that approval must be
given- by the Union and League
boards for all productions, and
I'm sure that had they know the
involvement Living Theatre de-
mands as an experience, we would
never have been able to put on
the show there.
AND' THEREIN, PERHAPS, lies
the reason why there was no hint
of harrassment by Staudenmeier
and his thugs-they just didn't
know about it, until it was too late.
One plainclothesed cop appeared
midway during "Paradise," but
saw that taking police action on
1,000 "soul-grokking" celebrants
would have been disastrous.
Judging Py Living Theatre's ex-
perlences at busts in Philadelphia
and other places, any legal action
(especially such mild stuff as
"Dionysius") would never hold

up in court anyway. Perhaps, in
retrospect, we were the ones who
blew it, for we had to rely.on ad-
vertising to get publicity. But it
was more fun. It's just too bad
that all the people who show up
Sunday expecting to witness or
take part in an orgy are going to
be sorely disappointed.
--Ken Kelley, '71
Jan. 23
Contraband culture
To the Editor:
THE ULTIMATE FATE of con-
traband marijuana seized by
the Ann Arbor Police has long
been a subject of considerable cur-
iosity. And surely the zeal with
which Lt. Staudenmaier and his
force confiscated.and re-screened
Flaming Creatures cannot p as s
unnoticed. (I imagine a smoke-
filled basement, deep beneath City
Hall. The rookies stare, mouths
hanging open in simple amaze-
ment, the sergeant giggles, puff-
ing nervously on an Old Gold, an
elderly j u d g e reminds the au-
dience, "Quiet down! This is ser-
ious business." . .).
In a letter published- in T h e
Daily (Jan. 23) Miss Ellen Frank
lamented the planned prosecution
of Dionysius in 69 and condemned
our self-appointed guardians of
public morality, Lt. Staudenmaier
and the boys Downtown. But I
say there is no cause for alarm.
Dionysius in 69 (like the Living
Theater and Marat/Sade) cannot
be presented in the basement of
the stationhouse.
-Robert Spertus, Grad
Jan. 23

dience, not the cast, stripped dur-
ing the production.
The play, a modern version of
"The Bacchae," a Greek tragedy
by Euripides, has played off Off-
Broadvay since June. When it
opened it received a surprising
amount of acceptance. Clyde Bar-
nes of the New York Times led
those praising it. And although he
didn't hail the play, Stanley Kauf-
man, writing for the New Repub-
lic, accepted it "as legitimate
theatre."
The birth and death scenes of
the play are now done entirely
in the nude. Shekner explains the
cast agreed by contract to per-
form fuly clothed at Minnesota
on the insistence of the students
there; he justified the contract
artistically "on an experimental
basis."
Originally there was no nudity
in the play. But shortly after it
opened in New York, Roman Po-
lanski; director of Rosemary's
Baby, talked Shekner into "either
doing it all in the nude" or
changing the script.
THE PLAY was performed with
little incident at the University of
Colorado, the first college campus
toh host the production. Shekner
says the response was "truly an
aesthetic one." However, there
were demands by legislators and
faculty to have the play banned.
"My impression of the Minne-
sota campus," Shekner explains,
"is a double one. They wouldn't
let us play there in the nude but
scheduled right next to us was
the 'Wide World of Sex.' It was
advertised with full color pictures
of vaginas distorted by syphyllis."
The sex-education series was a
two-day program on homosexuals,
disease and the "Art of Love."
"I call this a double standard,"
Shekner says. "They accept 'nud-
ity only if it is diseased and
frightening."
The play here is scheduled for
Sunday and Monday night. Shek-
ner has promised he will "sacri-
fice no artistic integrity" in pro-
ducing the play at the University.
He is backed by many individ-
uals in UAC who have privately
said they will take a court battle
as far as possible if police raid
the production.
"If we're raided," Shekner ex-
plains, "we'll go to court. We
have lawyers and I hope the Un-
iversity will assist."
THIS IS CAVALIER, but un-
fortunately not very realistic. The
University probably won't assist
the production in a court battle.
The UAC Board of Directors will
probably also back down, which
leaves the battle to Shekner and
a few students.
UAC has sold out Sunday's per(

of

41

Eormance and by this afternoon
will probably sell all of the tick-
ets for Monday's performance.
"Some UAC officers conscientious-
ly attribute the increase in ticked
demand to the "cultural, aesthe-
tic" worth of the play.
But, plainly, students here will
now flood the productions out of
curiosity, to see Lt. Staudenmeir
play the censor and the fool or to
gratify their desire -to sin.
WHETHER A BATTLE will
come at all is still uncertain.
Hopefully, C o u n t y Prosecutor
William Delhey ,has already

realized the hopelessness of pro-
secuting the play. But 4his deci-
sion will not be based on legal ex-
pertise alone. The action will un-
doubtedly be influenced by the
.pressure of legislators and "con-
cerned citizens" demanding t h e
play be banned.
If the battle doescome, it
should be only a matter of time
before the play returns to the
stage. Recent Supreme C o u r t
decisions and the fact that the
production has been running suc-
cessfully since June are reasons
enough to believe there is no real
basis for legal prosecution.

DAVID WElR......... ...........Sports Editor
DOUG HELLER............Associate Sporto Editor
BOB EES.............ssocateSports EditorN o
BIBLLE LEVIS........... Associate Sports EditorN o C
DAVID DUBOFF..............Contributing Editor
Business Staff IF THE NAVY
RANDY RISSMAN, Business Manager Lloyd Bucher,E
KEN KRAUS........ Associate Business Manager and places him in
DAVE PFEFFER............ . Advertising Manager surrender, will he
JEFF BROWN.........x.;Senior Circulation Manager served in North K
JANE LUXON................. Personnel Manager
MARTI PARKER................Finance Manager
anguage and

omment

court-martials Cmdr.
skipper of the Pueblo,
the brig for his 'craven
be credited with time
orean prisons?
-MAYNARD

STEPHEN WlLDSTROM-m'
Exitsag1igt
IMMEDIATELY AFTER the election of Richard Nixon as President,
many commentators expressed hope tat the expected excesses of
the Nixon administration would in some measure be counter acted by
a healthy spirit of opposition in the Democratic-controlled Senate.
Yesterday's 73-16 vote by the Senate: to confirm Walter Hickel as
Nixon's secretary of the interior dashes all such hope.
Both before and during confirmation hearings by the Senate In-
terior and Insular Affairs Committee, reams of evidence were produced
to demonstrate that the former Alaska governor had neither a deep
interest in not more than a shallow understanding of conservation.
It was shown that Hickel was far more interested in enrlching
domestic oil producers than in protecting the Eskimoes from starvation
and extermination.
THE COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN, Sen. Henry Jackson (D-Washing-
ton) cited a tremendous amount of mail, almost all of it opposing
Hickel, received by the committee which rarely hears from constituents.
But none of this swayed the members of the committee, who voted
14-3 to recommend confirmation, nor the Senate membership at large.
It is understandable that no Republican who valued his career in
the party could afford to cross his President on confirmation of a
cabinet member.
But the motivations of the Democratic majority members are less
easy to evaluate. Obviously, they were not acting in response to a
groundswell of popular opinion supporting Hickel. It has long been
suspected that big business, which for the most part has no particular
interest in conservation, owns a number of Senators, but it seems un-
likely that they own all but 16. Certainly, by his past actions in the
name of consumer interests and conservation, one would not suspect
that Michigan's Philip Hart was bought by business interests. Yet Hart
voted with the majority for confirmation.
THE ONLY EXPLANATION is that most of the Democratic sen-

40 f

the crisis"ofthe intellectuals

The author is a member of the
Radical Caucus and has been a -
tive in that group's efforts to
abolish course requirements.
By BRUCE LEVINE
IN THE WEDNESDAY (Jan. 22)
issue of The Daily, President
Fleming reviewed the "pros and
cons" of the distribution require-
ments, and in doing so illustrated
a, profound misunderstanding of
the issues involved. Arguments
which he sees ranged against the
Radical Caucus position included
the importance of knowing a for-
eign language and the need for
specialists (e.g., lawyers, doctors)
to meet prescribed standards in
their fields.

able lawyer or doctor. Here, some
mix of student and faculty decis-
ion-making for the setting of re-
quirements seems reasonable. It
is, however, absurd to assume that
faculty have 'either the wisdom
or the right to decide for students
which courses they must take in
order to be duly-accredited "well-
rounded human beings."
INDEED, IF WE ARE interested
in fostering in students real in-
telleptual expansion, distribution
requirements seems the least ef-
fective method. The real crisis of
the modern intellectual is his dif-
ficulty in asserting his own po-
sition against t h e prescribed.
What makes us narrow is far less

bution requirements and the stu-
dent drive to do so are crucial
here.
And this President Fleming
does understand: "t h e ultimate
question is who decides whether
the requirements shall remain."
He admits that "the students do
have a legitimate role to play in
such a decision. They are the ma-
jor clientele for the courses .. .
there is unquestionably wide-
spread opposition among students
to the requirements . "
THEREFORE President Fleming
advocates students "being heard."
Also, he thinks we should be per-
mitted to "hear faculty debates on
the Cihiju+ Rii+ e +frthe rd.

students will accept that kind of
arrangement. We don't think so.
Neither, judging by the timing and
tone of his letter, does President
Fleming. "In a rational commu-
nity," he warns, "one would sup-
pose that an appropriate debate
could be carried on in which the
merits of the issue would be ex-
plored." Anyway, he adds, what's
the rush. ". . . The problem does
not have such an earthshaking
urgency that there is no time to
consider it."
HOWEVER, THE LSA faculty
has been considering and reject-
ing the proposed abolition of the
requirements for eight consecutive
..-nr 'Wh " hnicar- a iarn

about us. At the forum Tuesday,
not a single faculty member would
move to convert that talk-fest into
a decision-making body. Finally,
the special LSA meeting scheduled
for next week specifically excludes
the requirements question from its
agenda. All this is probably be-
cause the faculty agrees with Pres-
ident Fleming - that "the prob-
lem does not have such earthshak-
ing urgency .
DIALOGUE IS A useful tool.'
And for some months students
have been using the dialogue to
tell the faculty we don't recognize
their right to impose distribution
requirements on us. The faculty
ha-- hpn nmna r, nan r1 A *n 4+ . n

*I