Seventy-Sixth Year EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN UNDER AUTHORITY OF BOARD IN CONTROL OF STUDENT PUBLICATIONS The l Where Opinions Are Free. 420 MAYNARD ST.. ANN ARBOR, Mica. Trtita WI? Pr 40MANR v. ANAdBR IC NEWS PHONE: 764-0552 - Editorials printed in The Michigan Daily express the individual opinions of staff writers or the editors. This must be noted in all reprints. WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 26, 1966 NIGHT EDITOR: CHARLOTTE A. WOLTER Membership Committee: Will Panhel Act ? TONIGHT Panhellenic Association will finally; after two delays and months" of discussion, vote on the issue of a Panhellenic Membership Committee. This committee, if established, would in- vestigate and combat discrimination in sorority membership selection, benefit- ting both Panhel and the University. It would mark a definite commitment' on the part of Panhel to combat discrim- ination. Although, under the guidance of its liberal and effective president, Laura Fitch, Panhel has passed several resolu- tions urging cooperation with the pres- ent Student Government Council mem- bership committee in its quest for soror- ity membership documents, the ideal and goal of nondiscrimination has never been officially a part of the Panhel constitu- tion. If the proposal is passed tonight, how- ever, a new bylaw establishing a Panhel policy of nondiscrimination will be added to the constitution. EVEN IF THE PRESENT Panhel fails to make the membership committee a strong and effective body, the new bylaw would provide a framework for future, action. It would, hopefully, prevent a complete retracing of the slow steps taken by Panhel in the past year, the tenuous discussions of autonomy and loyalty to the national organization, the repetitious, although admirable, exhortations on the evils of discrimination. In other words, by making a commit- ment to nondiscrimination, the proposal would demonstrate the good faith of the sorority system (which is under question in many places) and would provide a legal basis for further action by (hope- fully) more liberal Panhellenics in the future. IN ADDITION, a Panhellenic member- ship committee would be of great bene- fit to the University if it worked toward the elimination of discriminatory prac- tices. This is especially true in view of the failure on the part of the University itself to exert pressure on the sororities to end discrimination. The SGC membership committee has performed little more than perfunctory action in the past year. An incompetent chairman and lack of pressure from the Office of Student Affairs has resulted in a committee that has collected docu- ments, and nothing more. The commit- tee seems more afraid to offend the sor- orities. than to fail in its function of fighting discrimination. Pressure from the administration has also been lacking. Whether this is due to the current $55 million fund drive (soror- ity alumnae are big contributors) to lack of concern or to respect for student au- tonomy is mere speculation. But what- ever the cause, it is clear that if any ac- tion is to be taken, it must; come from within the sorority system itself. THE VOTE TONIGHT will determine whether the sorority system is will- ing to take this action and to assume the responsibility it implies. If the mem- bership proposal fails, it will be because sorority actives themselves refuse to sup- port it, since the national alumnae orga- nizations have been surprisingly tolerant in their reactions to the issue. x Only one who has attended a Panhel- lenic presidents' council meeting could realize how much conservatism on the issue of membership selection as well as all other issues, exists in the University sorority-system today. Although the bene- fits of a membership committee seem ob- vious, Miss Fitch reports that the vote will be very close and that the proposal may fail. IF IT DOES FAIL, itkwill mark a lack of foresight on the part of sorority presi- dents, a lack of commitment to non- discrimination in the Greek system and a serious setback to the improvement of membership selection in Panhellenic and to the struggle for nondiscrimination at the University. -CAROLE KAPLAN IT IS, as its announcement states, an attempt to "trans- cend the limits of the 'knowledge factory'," but it is less a universi- ty than it is free, for it is de- cidedly not an institution. The university has traditionally had among its goals a certain academ- ic rigor which has to be institu- tionalized.' Of course it is emphatically "out" to be institutionalized these days, so that, even if you are, you don't admit to it. The Stu- dent Non - violent Coordinating Committee, a product of spontan- eous student revolt against the Establishment in the South, has experienced since its inception hot internal debate over how not to bureaucratize. SNCC has managed to strike a precarious compromise between dissipation through anarchy and ossification through institution- alization. Their formula seems to be a matter of organizing where they have to, but never institu- tionalizing. It now looks as though SNCC has had a fatal adversary in time. Such organizational devices as pickets sit-ins and voter regis- tration have succumbed to insti- tutionalization and fewer and few- er new ideas are popping up. This is nevertheless understandable. It took creativity to crack the prob-, lem of Southern intransigence; it Just takes hard work to follow through. SO THE MANTLE has fallen to Students for a Democratic So- ciety, which doesn't even admit to organizing (except in Newark and Cleveland, which is something else again), let alone bureaucratizing, SDS knows it is against insti- tutions and non-participation by the poor, but it hasn't really de- cided what it is for, except free- dom and values (undefined) so ree U' that it doesnt really need any or- ganization-yet. Universities have a series of goals and institutionalized means of achieving them, but the Free University's aims can best be de- scribed under the heading of creative intellectual discourse. Such discourse is aimed at dis- covering and defining some new social values that today's intelli- gent students can substitute for the old ones they found so stultify- ing. Arising in the anarchic tradi- tion of SDS and SNCC, and strongly reinforced by the anti- organization philosophy of Paul Goodman, the Free University can perhaps effect some valuable explorations of alternative social values and ideals. GIVEN THIS raison d'etre for the Free University, its organiza- tion, or rather lack of it, makes some sense. It is next to impos- sible to institutionalize creativity. The federal government, sensing both the importance of basic 'sci- entific advance and the random- ness of the creative expression that produces new breakthroughs and establishes whole new branch- es of endeavor, attempts to buy creativity in its research spon- sorship. It succeeds much more than it deserves largely because it is will- ing (and has the resources) to spend 99 per cent of its basic research budget on worthless work in order to get one per cent orig- inality. This may be inefficient, but if you're going to be as strict- ly institutionalized and bureauc- ratized as the federal government, it's the only way to do it. This university, and most oth- ers, have institutionalized other goals tied to a more rational eval- uation and incentive structure. Scholarship, and its more recent offpsring knowledge, have be- Michigan MAD By ROBERT JOHNSTON, come the goals and criteria for success, and, as universities have prospered (relatively), they have come to do such a good job in dealing with these commodities that they have earned the label "factory" for their efficiency. AND, AS THIS development be- comes more and more obvious, we now have the Free Univer- sity, which claims to go beyond the "limits of the knowledge fac- tory." (Scholarship is measured by its thoroughness in dealing with a small body of knowledge. Knowledge, as used here, refers to the tremendously larger bodies of knowledge now being dealt with in at least the research-oriented disciplines.) The standard university has, in any case, hardly dealt with the value-judgments which the de- votees of the Free University are interested in, and even less well- equipped to formulate new values. A great deal of freedom from any sort of social control is needed for such experimentation, for values are basic to any social sys- tem, and deviations are seen as destructive and even treasonous, so universities have tested their freedom in more irrelevant ways. In recent years two trends have heightened the tensions which have produced the Free Univer- sity. First, a U.S. society 'has tended to become more and more structured through attempts to impose certain minimum stand- ards of health, decency, income and housing (and in their wake the prevailing social values as through the draft) on society, the creative fringe groups have more and more sought refuge from the, omnipotent social bulldozer in the universities. ON THE OTHER hand, the uni- versities are themselves becom- ing more and more structured in attempting to cope with both the knowledge explosion and the baby boom and thus start setting up their own series of standards which aren't very acceptable to these people either. This squeeze play has produced the Free Uni- versity. Whether or not it succeeds is not particularly important, since many similar attempts will be made here and elsewhere to find a place in the system for the crea- tive value experimentation it is' an expression of. What is vitally important is that one of these attempts does succeed, for if we do end up structuring and rationalizing our society to the point where there is no roon left for seminal sourcesrof crea- tive, and adaptive and productive change, then' we will really be in trouble. Ossification will quickly take over. There is no reason the Univer- sity itself cannot provide much more encouragement for such bas- ic intellectual discussion than it does. Rarely are the avant-garde, found in any university, whether in creative writing, political writ- ing, art, design or music. While this university's music school has had the most fruitful spin-off effects, that is a func- tion of its size and technical ex- cellence, which manages to bring together a critical one per cent mass (which isn't to deprecate the non-avant garde 99 per cent, only to say that they fulfill a different role). And how many times can one cite the ONCE Festival as evidence of the avant- garde explosion in Ann Arbor? CHARACTERISTICALLY, avant- garde "communities" in any giv- en field form around one strong personality who is in effect the leader of a "movement" or school in the art world of films, paint- ing, dance or whatever. It is dif- ficult to fit such people into a university because they are such prima donnas, but if an admin- istrator can be attracted who is able to deal with them, they can be given some space and money to set up their own little institute and do what they want in their own way. In the intellectual world of the avant-garde, it is the provision of the intellectual environment that is crucial. Here the attrac- tion of one or two men, again with plenty of autonomy, must be buttressed by the provisions of outlets for conversation and writ- ing. The University Press could sub- sidize their work, and the Uni- versity could indirectly subsidize a radical journal. (Ive always thought that someone at the Men- tal Health Research Institute should start a small radical news- paper. The Daily is too big and fat and has too many other things to do to be really avant-garde any more.) There is no reason the Univer- sity can't do much more to make Ann Arbor a center for creativity and social self-examination. That there should be a strongly felt need for a Free University is trag- ic. THE LEAST President Hatcher could do is send President Berg- man a large anonymous check. He might have to take some time figuring out to do with it, but that wouldn't hurt; it might even help. as a Creative Outlet AV Vie a:China 's Historical Perspective Goals Conference: A Planned Start By DAVID KNOKE THE WAR in Viet Nam has come to another cross-roads. The peace drive has apparently failed and Americans are ang- ered because Hanoi has not re- sponded to what they consider a show of good will. North Viet Nam has not been bombed for over a month, but the clamor among the war-hawks for an ever- increasing widening of the war grows daily more strident. By bits and pieces a pattern of activity is preparing the war the- atre for another escalation. While ministers and pacifists and the native left continue to raise their unheeded voices in a wilderness of apathy or superpatriotic war hysteria, China sends MIG fight- ers into, North Viet Nam, Saigon bombs the Ho Chi Minh Trail across the Laotian border, Secre- tary of State Dean Rusk calls on European nations to actively back the United States with troops and Secretary of Defense McNamara considers building up U.S. forces in Thailand andtinsti- tuting the first college-student draft in 13 years. What this all means, barring a miraculous cease-fire or the in- stant solution of mutual nuclear suicide, is that the United States has committed itself once again to an Asian land war in a chapter of what might well be titled "The Ever-Continuing Story of the Con- tainment of China." AMERICAN citizens outside the policy-making level of the gov- ernment are pretty much in the dark as to why American boys are fighting and dying in the Annamese jungles. American di- plomatic and military strategists, when they do throw a sop to the public,husually explain that we are fighting because we are there to honor our commitments. What- ever ostensible reasons are given about establishing democratic self-determination for the free- dom-loving peoples of SouthViet Nam, it is clear that the war in Viet Nam is being fought neither for nor about Viet Nam. Viet Nam as a battlefield is an accident of history. The first head-on clash between the U.S. and Red China came in Korea. China was an embryo land pow- er, swelled by the new regime's successes against Chiang Kai- shek, and she was beaten badly by the U.S.-led United Nations "police force." A second head-on collision between' China and the United States is impending in Viet Nam. It could just as well have been Thailand, India, Formosa or Korea again. Viet Nam has aroused Ameri- cans' emotions-both pro and con -to such an intensity that they are caught up in the immediacy' of the conflict and fail to see the historical context out of which Sino-American antagonism has developed. VIET NAM is just a staging- ground, a passing land-mark in a power-struggle that has been brewing for the last century and a half. Very few persons on eith- er side apparently see that the strategic issue is not South Viet Nam's sovereignty; yet American policy is being implemented with the idea that if South Viet Nam is preserved intact, the rest of the Southeast Asian dominoes will not fall. This viewpoint is equiv- alent to not seeing the forest for, the trees. What is really at stake-and Viet Nam is just the beginning, and only a military beginning at that-is the question of which "Great Power" will be supreme- militarily ,economically and cul- turally-in Asia. THE U.S., as the inheritor of the "white man's burden" from the French, English and Dutch, and Red China, champion of the newly-emerged "colored" peoples' nationalism, are the contenders. Soviet Russia, in her unique posi- tion of being both a western and an oriental nation, is taking a non-active but quietly interested position of saboteur and scaven- ger. American diplomatic p o li c y makes the mistake of assuming that this "Asian problem" has just recently appeared and is pri- marily the fault of the Commu- nist leadership of China. This was the attitude of the late Sec- retary of State John Foster Dulles. Containment of Communism be- came the goal of the Marshall Plan in Europe and various al- liances in Asia. Very few admin- istrators of this policy have ever stopped to question if America has the military manpower, eco- nomic resources or diplomatic backing to play policeman to the world. Embittered parents whose sons have died in Viet Nam and wor- ried students who fear the same may happen to them often advo- cate one of two simplistic solu- tions to the dilemma: withdraw the troops and leave Asia to the Asians or all-out nuclear devasta- tion of China before she develops her own nuclear deterrents. Neith- er solution, too often paroted aft- er similar positions by prominent national leaders, takes into ac- count the origins of the confron- tation nor the consequences of a simplistic resolution. Whatever the present form of her hatred, China's antagonism against Western imperialism is deeply rooted in a past filled with exploitation, shame and degrada- \tion. All the former major pow- ers, the U.S. especially, with the "Open Door" license to abuse trade and hospitality, had a hand in the estrangement of Chi- na's affections. Either through di- rect occupation or through sup- port of unpopular right-wing dic- tatorships (Diem in Viet Nam, Chiang in ^China), the West has never -really attempted to un- derstand and respect the self-de- termination of Oriental nations. ANYONE who saw the Felix Greene movie, "China!" could not help coming away impressed by the diversity of influences that have molded the Chinese charac- ter over 3000 years of unbroken, civilization. Torrents and trickles of every religion, art form, mor- ality and folk-custom pervade the Chinese cultural heritage. What is rooted in the Chinese character, and backed up by an unconceivably huge manpower, is a belief in China's "manifest des- tiny' 'to rule or hold influence over Southeast Asia. Americans, in their paranoic horror of any- thing remotely tinted with "Com- munist," decry this "aggression," too often forgetting our own re- cent national belief in the "mani- fest destiny" of the U.S. to reign sovereign from ocean to ocean. 'Viet Nam is a point in case; up until the 1880's when France wrested Indo-China from a weak- ened Chinese monarchy, South- east Asia° was a Chinese trade market. Amaury de Riencourtde- scribes Viet Nam's culture as bas- ically a "moonlight civilization" patterned after the more mature Chinese civilization. China today feels Viet Nam historically be- longs with China, notthe West. Today the leadership of main- land China is Communist-affiliat- ed, but an international, mono- lithic Communist ogre that de- cours countries and innocent peo- ples is a figment of American fear. The methods of government may be Communistic in form, but hatred is too endemic to account for her present actions except as particularly Chinese in origin and Chinese in aim. Short of nuclear war, the best thing, the U.S. can do is try to contain the militant Chinese Communist expansion and hope that eventually the old revolu- tionaries will be replaced by a benign "managerial class" that will be soft on capitalism, as Rus- sia seems to be evolving now. The U.S. is going to have to learn to live with the Chinese, but any solution that calls for dominance through fear of one by the other is essentially unstable. What is needed is an entirely new approach-one based on the spirit of cooperation rather than watchful co-existence. China once trusted the Western nations, and to her horror they all turned ,.into "white devils" en- trenched in her backyard. She will not be that trusting again; it is up to the U.S. to make the first move in a reappraisal of policy and to make that move in a sincere effort to reconcile past misunderstandings and to mutu- ally create a more habitable world. 0i YESTERDAY'S ANN ARBOR Area Goals Conference was a well-organized and potentially instrumental mechanism for viewing this rapidly changing communi- ty. The conference kept back-patting and "let's preserve the fine character of our town" speeches to a minimum, and in-, cluded some thought-provoking discus- sion between officials and citizens. The combination of speakers' expertise and audience questions worked well. The per- spective provided by planners and edu- cators from the !county and the Univer- sity added to a more objective view of. the town's planning operations. ' But the long-range effect of the con- ference will depend on the willingness of, both officials and citizens to continue such self-examination until Ann Arbor has a concrete set of goals with which to chart its future. FOR THAT REASON the most hopeful aspect of the conference was the rec- ognition on the part of many conferees of the necessity and even more the dif- ficulty of 1) setting forth the goals of the community and 2) revitalizing the planning attitudes of Ann Arbor gov- ernment. The two are closely related. One con- ference which we attended began to hit on the real problem of deciding what we want to make of this community rather than relinquishing the right to decide through hesitation. The goals they accepted would constitute a good take- off point for the city's administrators and planners: -Emphasizing the cultural and edu- cational aspects of the community in planning its living space; -Cooperating with surrounding com- munities toj save the Huron River from pollution and to utilize its banks for needed recreational facilities; -Selectively supporting industrial en- essary before such home rule about, and comesI -Supporting the establishment of a boundary commission to mediate annexa- tion problems. Communications between groups ap- peared to be unlikely unless a citizen's council composed of representatives of various groups represented could be es- tablished. The council would be effective in coordinating action involving the groups in line with the goals established at the conference. THESE ARE SUGGESTIONS, and, if the opinions of some experts present at the conference are to be accepted, badly needed ones. While the high level of sophistication in the Ann Arbor planning department projects was unquestioned, the lack of long range planning was criticized. Be- cause goals such as these have not been discussed at length by either the City Council or the planning commission, or the planning department, no long range "Master Plan" has been developed. And while some of Ann Arbor's plan- ners have spoken critically of such plans in the past, several communities have undertaken such programs and found them valuable. A master plan would not have to be an inflexible dream scheme, but rather a series of standards which would reflect the policy of the city on how it wants to effect the environment through zoning and land use programs. Finally, additional metropolitan plan- ning was stressed, to be accomplished through cooperation with ad hoc region- al bodies which have already been set up. Until state law endows these bodies with additional power, their decisions will still be subject to local political hassles. But the success of the Huron Valley Watershed Commission attests to their possible effectiveness. DY BRTNGING THESE issues to the , Ii Letters:Students and The Decision-Making Process To the Editor: FOR THE LAST nine months, the Student Government Council Bookstore Committee has been attempting to achieve the impos- sible. The members, all students, have tried to influence the de- cision making process of the Uni- versity. The issue involved, how- ever, is more significant and far- reaching than whether or not to have a University discount book- store. The issue, involves whether students, acting in a responsible, adult manner can influence the decision-making process. It is sad to conclude, the answer appears they cannot. There is little doubt as to the committee's responsibility. The students compiled a 20 page re- port documenting the history of past attempts, the present situa- tion in Ann Arbor and other uni- versities, the need for a discount bookstore and the rationale and plans for its establishment. Sur- veys were conducted of other uni- versities, architects were consult- ed and publishing houses were contacted. Furthermore, the de- mand for a bookstore received un- precedented campus wide support: ignored.. And far the wiser for they now realize students have little place in the decision mak- ing process of the University. STUDENTS trying to further student ends are faced with two alternatives-work within the sys- tem or work outside. The former involves "responsible student par- ticipation," in other words, let- ters, requests, conferences, peti- tions, etc. The latter involves more violent and visible methods-pick- ets, sit-ins, strikes, anything to embarrass the University. Ad- ministrators tell us "work with us, be responsible, be rational and you will achieve your goals." They lied. In the first place, administra- tors are unwilling to work with students. Consider last semester's efforts to communicate with Vice- President for Business and Fi- nance Wilbur K. Pierpont about low-cost student housing. Only a threatened march and sleep-in re- sulted in communication. And with the bookstore campaign, eight out of eight Regents turn- ed down invitations to discuss the proposal. students were. They had no means' to communicate, other than by written reports, with those who made the decisions. The efforts of the entire campaign have re- sulted in absolutely nothing. Not only was the bookstore proposal rejected, but the archaic 1929 Re- gents ruling forbidding the estab- lishment of mercantile organiza- tions still stands. GETTING to the gut level of University policies, the admin- istration does only that which they are forced to do. The concept of "Is this right? Should it be done?" is forgotten and instead is re- placed with "Must I do it?" The, guiding policy of this administra- tion is: Do only that which you are forced to do. The argument that issues are too involved and complex holds little sway with me. I know this university could do something to lower living costs. But they don't. They aren't forc- ed to so why upset the status quo? If one accepts this power poli- tic portrayal of the University, where then do students fit in? It would be onnimisi n +vp ha The Ark To the Editor: SINCE I OFTEN share the hon- or of occupying the same edi- torial page of The Daily as Miss Joyce Winslow, it is with no little embarrassment that I read her article in Tuesday's paper. With Miss Winslow's impressionistic piece of reporting on The Ark coffee house, The Daily sinks to a new low. To the, many volunteers who helped create The Ark, who are helping to operate it, Miss Wins- low's comments are not only crude, but cruel. And they are even more than cruel because the alterna- tives she appears to champion are so tawdry. Just for the record, The Ark is an ecumenical attempt to get people out of their splendid iso- lation, to give them a place to come and see, listen, tallk, togeth- er. We are trying to provide more than "camp" entertainment and good food at low prices. If Miss Winslow is offended by the menu, she might try buying the same quality elsewhere-finding it ca-topped tables as wood, Joan Baez's lovely voice as a "wail," and Jerry Badanes' reading of poetry as "electrifying," is just so much self-conscious cant. I'll bet (and know) she didn't pass Creative Writing 223 with that boatload of undifferentiated ob- servation, imprecise verbs, inac- curate adjectives. Finally, Miss Winslow isn't quite sure what it is she actually wants. As far as the not-so- cute "divine inspiration" busi- ness, neither I, nor I believe, Miss Winslow, has the inside track in that area to give a definite yes or no. I'm made to believe at one point that she'd like the glitter of Webber's, but an another I'm told that the menu needs "lust." Then she adds, "and swinging LIVE music," like a good hippie. Why then did she fail to include mention of the folk-rock group- The Spikedrivers-who played one set Saturday night? Very strange. To taks Miss Winslow's slick squib seriously, to take it as cri- ticism, would be nothing less than a blueprint for chaos--we couldn't have begun to create The Ark from her suggestions, we wouldn't a -1