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Seventy-Sixth Year
EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
UNDER AUTHORITY OF BOARD IN CONTROL OF STUDENT PUBLICATIONS
Where Opinions Are Free. 420 MAYNARD ST., ANN ARBOR, MICH. NEWS PHONE: 764-0552
T ir W Pre l,
Editorials printed in The Michigan Daily express the individual opinions of staff writers
or the editors. This must be noted in all reprints.
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 1965 NIGHT EDITOR: BRUCE WASSERSTEIN
The University Should Give
Its Students A Chance
"YOU PEOPLE assembled here today True we must fulfill the University's
are the cream of your high schools, requirements in academics to earn the
you were chosen to come to the Univer- right to have a degree from here, but
sity because you have the capabilities why must these requirements consume
which this University deems necessary to my valuable time which I feel could be
occupy one of its many sought after put to better use?
seats. Good luck and enjoy your next four The major reasons I'm against these
years at the University." assignments is the mental effect they
The above is the basic context of the have on the students. Education is
welcome all new entering students receive something that I feel should be held in
at the University before the opening of awe. It should be sought after, not run
classes. from. What intellectual person could
After the address a whole new world truly enjoy doing these time consuming
appears-the intellectual world, a world exercises? Rather than helping the stu-
filled with questions, and hopefully peo- dents, this work stifles them.
ple to answer those questions; a world In setting up the basic requirements for
filled with the desire to learn and the graduation the University has thrown me
drive, behind that learning, to accomplish --a person totally unscientific-into a
something. class with premed students. I can see no
reason under the sun for the University
THEN COMES the first day of class, to think that it is necessary for me to
From this point on that world becomes know chemistry as well as someone who
stifled, submerged and in many instances is majoring in it. Why not give me some
finally crushed. But why and how? sort of general science course, a course
Why? Because the administrators have where I can learn about science and not
not conveyed their confidence in the stu- be forced to compete with future scien-
dent body to the faculty. Or, if they have, tists?
due to reasons beyond me the faculty
has failed to listen to them. LAST YEAR I took Psychology 100. I
Why? Because in its desire to set up memorized some very important parts
a standard for all University graduates of the brain and nerve cells. I did not
(giving them a much needed well-rounded learn a thing about basic psychology be-
education), they forget to take one of cause I was too busy memorizing all these
the student's main characteristics into other facts. Today I don't know a thing
consideration, that being that his spe- about psychology, have forgotten the
cial interests and special abilities, and things I had rote memorized-but I do
his ability to excel in a different area remember that I hated the subject.
from other students.
Why? Because some faculty are not I had a political science course last
satisfied with having their students meet semester. We studied foreign govern-
the standards of the University and set ments, how they work, etc. We were given
up their own standards (which are often a lengthy list of required readings on the
ridiculous) which they force on their subject, all very dull and boring to me.
students. I read those books to pass the course, but
On my first day of class this year I I had in the back of my mind while
received what I would like to term busy reading all those books the thought that
work from three of my five instructors. there must be some better or at least
By busy work I mean tasks that anyone more interesting books written on the
at any university could perform. Being same subject which I could have thor-
just a tool of my instructors' desires, I oughly enjoyed and also learned from. I
performed these assignments. But in the had no opportunity to read those books.
back of my mind I could hear the words Freshmen are the most impressionable
of my welcoming address. If these words people in the world. They have the most
were true, and if I was given a seat at the drive, desire and ambition. But after be-
University under the assumption that I ing submitted to the trifles of the Uni-
am academically special, why were these versity's system, both by the adminis-
assignments given? tration and the faculty, students lose
this drive and ambition. In its place
THE OBVIOUS PURPOSE of these as- grows a desire to finish their college edu-
signments is to get the student to do cation in the quickest, and easiest way
the required work. To this I answer why possible, forgetting all about previous
should there be any required work? We exalted goals.
are here of our own free choice, in fact
we even pay to come here. We should WE ARE ALWAYS being told we must
to a great degree be allowed to learn grow up, accept responsibilities, be-
what we want when we want. come students. We will, if we're given a
fair chance.--
Second class postage paid at Ann Arbor, Mich. -LYNN A. METZGER
Published daily Tuesday through Sunday morning.-
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Why Not?
Heyns and the Prospects for Berkeley
By JEFFREY GOODMAN
INDICATIONS ARE that Berke-
ley's new chancellor, Roger W.
Heyns, will do everything in his
power to ward off recurrences of
last year's student demonstrations.
The impression one gets is that
Heyns will be receptive and un-
derstanding at the least and prob-
ably often conciliatory with re-
spect to "student problems" on the
University of California's biggest
campus. Probably, he will be will-
ing to convince intransigent re-
gents and administrators to give
a little in areas where inflamed
discontent s e e m s imminent.
"Speech," at least, will be "Free."
So it would seem Berkeley is in
for a considerably better year, ex-
cept that "free speech" was de-
cidedly not the basic issue there.
The people who led the Free
Speech Movement are well aware
of this-even though the press and
most of the nation think the prob-
lem has, very simply, been solved
-and there is little reason to
think they will not renew their ef-
forts.
The essential issue which spark-
ed and fed last year's demonstra-
tions was who controls the univer-
sity-students and faculty who are
interested in getting and giving
an education or the particular
moral, social and political needs
which the dominant corporate in-
terests, requiring a means of so-
cial control, have translated into
values and priorities and built
into the structure, functions and
purposes of educational adminis-
tration.
IN THIS RESPECT, the reason
there have been successful disturb-
ances at Berkeley and not here'
is that the operation of Berke-
ley's campus according to these
corporate needs and values has
been significantly less disguised,
less well justified, more blatant.
To the extent that it is possible
to manipulate in such a manner,
Heyns promises to be as valuable
a man for the California regents
as he was here.
The unaccounted-for parameter
is the perceptivity and degree of
ideological sophistication of those
whose interests are operated
against-the students. The more
capable they turn out to be at de-
fining their recurrent discontents
in terms of structure and author-
ity, the less will Heyns or any
other administrator be able to buy
them off by granting concessions.
For the existing relationship be-
tween administration and stu-
dents-faculty will necessitate that
concessions be given, from the one
source whose vested interest is in
maintaining control of education
and therefore of socialization to
those who are to be educated (or
those who actually do the educat-
ing) and therefore to be socialized.
The result of such a structural
arrangement is unavoidably Cali-
fornia President Clark Kerr's in-
famous paradigm in which the ad-
ministration manages a factory
where faculty (plus buildings,
textbooks, departments and the
other institutional arrangements)
are essentially tools for processing
the industry's raw materials -
students.
MORE SPECIFICALLY, the con-
sequence is that one conception
of how education should proceed
is institutionalized and a quite
different conception is vaguely de-
sired by those who really want to
educate themselves and/or be edu-
cated. The pattern which is im-
posed is speeded-up and compact-
ed where instead there is need for
leisure and a lack of boundaries
which are irrelevant to what is
being learned and freedom from
the pressures of grading and ter-
minating courses and from the
constraints of specified numbers of
credit hours for work which var-
ies vastly in its meaning to the
students involved.
The imposed pattern is disjoint-
ed and is unnaturally subdivided
into departments and subjects
to facilitate easy accounting and
record-keeping. Having divisions
and terminations provides closure
-or at least does not encourage
the discovery and construction of
far-ranging relationships. It ac-
customs the young minds to an
orderliness which becomes compul-
sive and which militates against
real social or individual imag-
inativeness and a real capacity for
understanding basic alternatives.
If the phenomenological world has
been neatly categorized, it is nat-
ural also for the student to cate-
gorize pei'sonal and social truth-
and the truth which predominates
inevitably has the edge for being
categorized as good.
Further, the imposed pattern
makes learning vaguely irrelevant
to the student's real concerns
about himself and the world
around him. It is rare that the ex-
periences which make college-go-
ing significant come from the aca-
demic offerings of the university
(yet countless faculty and admin-
istrators implore students to post-
pone their demonstrating and
their extra-curricular activities
and concentrate on what they are
"really here for").
Where course material should
somehow be related to the actual
and whole world the student ex-
periences, where it should be flex-
ible with respect to his concerns,
where it should comment on those
concerns and open new possibili-
ties-instead such material is pre-
digested, fragmented, pre-planned
for specific time limits and frus-
tratingly "objective," impersonal
and "academic."
IT IS CLEAR that the student
should develop his own sense of
responsibility and formulate values
and priorities on the basis of ex-
ploration and experimentation,
and the institution should at least
bless his gropings if it does not
actually provide opportunities.
For these possibilities to be real-
ized, however, those rules and
agencies relating to student needs
must be set up to follow the direc-
tion of students. Instead, students
are innocuously listened to only
as "consultants," the rules are
passed on by non-students to guide
and limit behavior and certain
activities are ruled out, a priori,
as "inappropriate."
The point is not that the uni-
versities are run incompetently;
rather, for the purposes of the eco-
nomic, political and moral insti-
tutions in whose interests the uni-
versities are operated, for the pur-
poses of maintaining social con-
trol over the procedures by which
the young are made to function
well or poorly for the social sys-
tem-for these purposes the uni-
versities are run quite well. Es-.
sentially, the freedom of students
to explore ideas and values for
themselves and their society is not
conducive to the ability of others
to predict and control what they
will come up with.
ROGER HEYNS has been offer-
ed the chancellorship at Berkeley
precisely because the California
regents expect he will be able to
do a far better job of preserving
such a system than the old chan-
cellor, Edward Strong, could. The
essential thing here, for those
who expect great liberalizations
from Heyns, is that virtually what-
ever reforms are introduced ito
the system, when all is said and
done the whole purpose is to pre-
serve the system.
The whole purpose is to en-
hance the control of the institu-
tion by those corporate interests
which depend on the institution
turning out a certain kind of
product in a certain way, to en-
hance that control by making it
more subtle, more superficially re-
sponsive, less open to revolution-
ary challenge.
In this respect, the work of
liberal administrators like Roger
Heyns is essentially dangerous, for
if education (whether at Berkeley
or at this University) is to be at
all constructive and creative, there
must be a pervasive and basic re-
organization of institutional struc-
tures and power relationships.
That organization must follow
from the necessary and basic req-
uisites of the immediate educa-
tional process itself: maximum
freedom to create, to explore, to
experiment, to follow one's ownl
ideas and interests in an atmos-
phere which is at once permissive
and at the same time provides
reasonable, intelligent, tolerant
men to answer the questions which
are asked. The only structures
which can competently serve such
processes must themselves be max-
imally flexible with respect to
authority, norms and functioning
and must be decidedly in the con-
trol of those who are undergoing
the processes.
As long as higher education is
not organized, internally and with
respect to the outside world, on
the basic premise that students
and faculty are the university,
the social system as a whole will
stagnate, for those classes which
control the primary social mech-
anisms for inculcating values and
priorities also control and limit
the future of the whole system.
As long as the procdures es-
tablished are directed toward mak-
ing men responsible to the needs
of distant (and monopolistic)
agencies and do not afford oppor-
tunities to establish new proced-
ures and new arrangements ac-
cording to the desires and needs
of those who are immediately
concerned, the whole system will
not only stagnate but will also
deny the possibilities of human
creation and human expression.
WHAT WOULD BE required of
Heyns, therefore, is a willingness
to use the power he has been
granted to dismantle the whole
structural arrangement which he
serves and is served by-a willing-
ness to remove his university from
external control and place the
power of making its decisions in
the hands of the people for whom
it ostensibly exists.
Such a task is not limited in
scope to a university-it unavoid-
ably affects all other institu-
tions and their relationships to
each other-and unfortunately it
cannot be accomplished by the
methods in which Heyns and men
like him (Clark Kerr, Lyndot
Johnson, Harlan Hatcher) operate.
Instead of an approach which
seeks to ignore basic differences
in needs and goals and establish
a smoothly-working order on
whatever superficial and immedi-
ate agreements can be found, any
meaningful change must be
wrought through a fearless insist-
ence that basic disagreements be
faced and that the battle be en-
gaged on the basis of those dif-
ferences.
Only when both antagonists face
each other with full acceptance of
their differences, only when mu-
tual respect has been established
because both are unashamedly
standing for what they must, only
then will the kind of confronta-
tion begin which alone can pro-
duce that creative tension from
which real solutions flow.
WHAT, THEN, for Berkeley in
the coming year? Will Roger Heyns
succeed in smothering the basic
and real discontents of students
there in a blanket of concessions
which, despite their seeming pro-
fundity, must be innocuous rela-
tive to the fundamental differ-
ences? Or do a sufficient number
of those who led last year's dem-
onstrations possess a sufficiently
deep and sophisticated ideology, a
sufficient commitment, a suffi-
cient following to force a real
confrontation upon Heyns and
perhaps upon the rest of the na-
tion?
If my guess is right, Roger
Heyns is in for more than he ex-
pects.
4
4
The Student Activist: Means and End
By CHARLOTTE WOLTER
1[NACCEPTABLE though it may .
be to some, the thesis of our
society is being challenged by a
visionary and vigorous anti-thesis.
This is not an anti-thesis in the
classical, Marxiantsense, one
which will resolve itself into the
synthesis of a socialistic state. It
is, rather, a difference of process
and the nature of the human
interactions that eventually form
the structures and substance of so-
ciety.
It has been called radicalism,
activism, the New Left, yet each
of these is inadequate to describe
a philosophy that emphasizes
process, a specific process which
must precede the formation of
arv just social structure.
A comparison of this philosophy
with the liberalism of today, the
ideology and the system toat it
opioses, can most accurately de-
sr'ribe it.
F REEDOM for the liberal :s, in
theory, the freedom to act in one's
own interest, and the only con-
straint is that one's actions do not
impose on freedom for others. In
practice, this becomes only a self-
serving freedom, an ego-centered
freedom. The absence of a moral
imperative concerning the well-
being of others makes this free-
dom without responsibility.
This concept of freedom divorces
the liberal from any sense of re-
spect for the assertions of others.
While he may encourage all free
expression, he is not satisfied un-
less he can assure that his ex-
pectations will be fulfilled. If he
is not dominant, or a dominant
force in society, he does not feel
a part of that society or respon-
sible to it.
To dominate in this society, the
individual must achieve, must be
able to show some tangible evi-
dence of success. A utilitarian
ideal of efficiency, influence and
power becomes important.
The organization of society, as
it has developed up to now, is
therefore based largely on strictly
economic (utilitarian) relation-
ships-those processes by which
goods and services are most effi-
ciently produced and distributed.
A community is defined, then, by
the sum of the services and eco-
nomic transactions that are its
daily function.
THE OBJECTIONS of the radi-
cal philosophy to this system stem
from the realization that this
sort of freedom is self-defeating.
It is freedom without responsibil-
ity. It eventually imprisons the
individual in patterns and insti-
tutions which serve only the eco-
nomic needs which encouraged
their formation.
The radical would say that the
community must serve more than
the basic economic needs. It must
also provide, as Prof. William A.
Williams would describe it, "hu-
mane, human associations."
The radical community, which
is organized on non-economic
premises, gives its citizens the
ability'to experiment and exper-
ience as they wish; , ather than
necessitating sublimation and vi-
carious involvement.
THIS FREEDOM should extend
through and beyond the years of
education, to be applied to the
society as a whole. It necessitates
that the individual have econom-
ic freedom, tolerance and con-
cern from the society, and contin-
uing opportunities to develop his
capacities. The . socialization to
which the.individual must be sub-
jected in order to function prop-
erly within the utilitarian ethic
reflected by present social insti-
tutions would not only be neces-
sary-it would be antithetical to
the basic premises on which the
radical society were organized.
The key concept is that only
through the formation of an
"equitable, ethical, creative com-
munity" can man be truly free. A
community organized on this bas-
ic assumption'results naturally in
the desire to participate, be con-
cerned with, become involved in
the affairs of others. When men
have had opportunities to fully
realize themselves, to develop self-
knowledge, their inclination to-
wards sociableness is far more
spontaneous and meaningful than
when a "groupness" has been im-
posed on them, without the oppor-
tunities for personal development
and therefore with the individuals
involved having no significant bas-
is upon which to relate to others.
Specific structures and institu-
tions are only implied in this
philosophy.
The society envisioned as an
end product would be basically an-
archic. Structures and institutions
would be informal and could be
altered or destroyed to fulfill the
wishes and needs of their constit-
uents instead of eventually be-,
coming self-perpetuating. Their
functions would be to serve those
needs of their constituents rather
than to direct or control, and
they would be governed democrat-
ically instead of hierarchically by
inaccessible managers.
THIS is the ideology held by
those who participate in the dem-
onstrations of dissatisfaction with
society which have characterized
the last five years. Beginning with
the civil rights movement and
extending to criticism of Ameri-
can foreign policy or the multiver-
sity, demonstration has become a
legitimate, if still discouraged,
means of expressing dissatisfac-
tion.
The student activist of today is
the representative of this ideology
who attracts the most attention
and creates the most confusion.
His reaction to society is particu-
larly violent, because he is at a
point in life when he expects ex-
perimentation and doubt and gets,
instead, attempts to destroy his
capacity to conceive of "inappro-
priate" values or ways of life as
possibly rewarding for himself.
He is revolted by the values and
arrangements of society and by,
the influence they have on his
life. He is free, in the liberals'
sense, to join any of the institu-
tions of society, but he does not
feel they have anything satisfy-
ing to offer, and he does not have
a voice in their operation or even
their existence. For these reasons
he suffers the malady of aliena-
tion, and he reacts to it by re-
jecting the society.
IN ITS STRICTEST terms,
ideology is both means and end.
Therefore, activism for the stu-
dent involves much more than the
picket line. Though many would
attribute activism to mere "adoles-
cent rebellion" or "mischief," it
must be emphasized that there is
a definite end, a more ideal and
egalitarian concept of society,
however incomplete and unreal-
ized it may seem, which the stu-
dent wishes to transform into a
reality.
South Carolina at Work
a
SENATOR Stephen Young (D-
Ohio) professes shock and
amazement after reading certain
deliverances of Rep.. L. Mendel
Rivers, of South Carolina, who
advocates instant escalation of
the war in Viet Nam to any ex-
tent necessary to impose the will
of the United States on all Asia.
The Senator is amazed by the
willingness to bomb not only
Hanoi, but Peking also if that is
necessary to bring to heel "god-
less Communism."
The Senator is shocked that the
proponent of this course should
be the chairman of an important
House committee, that of Armed
Services. It is enough to shake the
Senator's faith in the principle of
chairmanship by seniority.
While Senator Young's shock
may be justified, his amazement
is not; for there is nothing novel
here. The production of chevaliers
mounted upon galloping night-
mares has been a specialty of
South Carolina since her earliest
days. The archetype of the group
is unquestionably Robert Barn-
well, forgotten now, but who
flourished prodigiously between
Nullification and Secession.
IS IT SOME miasma from the
cypress swamps that makes South
Carolina consistently fecund of
this type? Whatever the reason,
it has been her curious fate for
nearly two hundred years to place
before the country, along with-
often coupled with-such appari-
tions as Pitchfork Ben Tillman and
Cole Blease.
Normally, they are even less ef-
fective than a James Byrnes or
a Strom Thurmond, but in mo-
ments of severe stress, when the
whole country veers toward hys-
teria, they may be as deadly as
Barnwell was.
What Senator Young observes
is nothing unprecedented. It is
just South Carolina on the ram-
page again.
-THE NEW REPUBLIC
Population Explosion And Anti-Population
Explosion
Is the 'U' Going To Skip Town?
To the Editor:
ROBERT JOHNSTON wrote in
Friday's Daily that, "since the
University is the faculty, students
and administrators that are here,
they ought to be concerned about
the fact that were this confron-
tation with the University that
supposedly exists to occur, they
would find nothing there to con-
a nonviolent protest against the
nonexistence of the fraudulent
university) I telephoned the cash-
ier's window in the Administration
Bldg. I informed the voice on the
other end that I wanted my tui-
tion back immediately before the
University cut out. I warned the
voice that I would not endure any
slippery press releases or bureau-
the State Police if they ever
alienated me this way again.
Then I sank into my chair,
clutched my Teddy Bear to my
heart, and thought how great it
would be to be back in prep
school.
-James Schutze, '68
,, __ _r".~Y.