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'Student participation'
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NIGHT EDITOR: JUDY SARASOHN
Paying Nixon' s debts
IF THERE IS ONE THING that Republi-
cans understand - it is money.
Richard Nixon, the grocer's son from
Whittier, California, understands the im-
portant interplay between money and
politics better than most. His refusal to
accept HEW Secretary Robert Finch's
recommendation of John Knowles to the
post of the nation's top health officer
shows that even the President will grovel
to the raw forces of money even at the
risk of casting further doubt upon the in-
tegrity of his administration.
Knowles appointment was opposed by
the AMA. There was no apparent reason
for it not wanting Knowles other than as
a means of securing a reaffirmation of its
political strength. To neutralize Finch's
staunch support of Knowles, AMPAC, the
rather seamy lobbying front of the AMA,
enlisted the support of Everett Dirksen, a
Senator whose influence is directly pro-
portional to his gross lack of good judg-
ment.
The AMA contributed to the 1968 Re-
publican campaign to the tune of $2 mil-
lion. This amount is surprisingly little,
one would think, to coerce our nation's
top leaders. But the AMA support w a s
enough to force Richard Nixon to tell his
closest Cabinet aide that his influence is
now virtually nil..
AND SO, Richard Nixon shows us that
his administration will be dedicated to
paying back debts incurred through ek-
ing out a victory -last November. The
debts, unfortunately, are not just finan-
cial - but political as well.
Nixon has backed himself into the cor-
ner on two issues that could cause a rup-
ture in the party on liberal-conservative
lines. Many important Republicans have
shown that they are willing to bolt strong
pressure froni above to vote against Nix-
on's "compromise" Safeguard ABM plan.
Nixon must feel that this loss of liberal
support is necessary to pay for the sup-
port of the nation's wealthy defense es-
tablishment.
Similarly, Nixon's desire to tinker with
the war for a couple more years means
that he must support an unpopular ex-
tension of the surcharge tax to pay for
the war. Liberal members of 'both parties
are more concerned with tax reform and
the surtax bill is almost certain to carry
tax reforms measures to ease the burden
of "those forgotten Americans" Nixon
must now desert in his efforts to keep the
war going.
YET NIXON'S BIGGEST political debts
will be paid to the Southern states that
ensured his victory last fall and that are
needed for re-election in 1972.
Finch had been taking an amazingly
strong stand on forcing Southern school
districts to comply with federal standards
of desegregation. But Nixon feels he must
pay tribute to people like Strom Thur-
mond and ease off the issue of school de-
segregation. This debt seems to override
Nixon's early pledge to black people that
he would act as their President too.
Nixon tells us that we cannot afford a
comprehensive attack on hunger. What
the nation really cannot afford is to pay
his political debts.
-STEVE ANZALONE
E
Letters to the Editor
Speaking out for police restraint
Politics of nuclear sanity
IN THE MIDST of increasingly acri-
monious debate over Safeguard, MIRV,
and other items in this country's arsenal
of death, the question of the purpose of
the whole thing seems to go unexamined.
After all, when great men speak of great
things who are we to question why? But
at the risk of this embarrassment it seems
desirable to think about the problem just
a little bit.1
The argument put forward by the na-
tion's strategists and policy-makers as
well as by those of the Soviet Union is
that of nuclear deterrence. By making
ready weapons capable of inflicting "un-
acceptable" losses on the other side, each
government hopes to prevent a nuclear
attack by the other. If the other side is
really convinced that it will be wiped out
if it launches a first strike attack then
it won't be done, or so runs the argument.
All the new paraphernalia are simply
methods of making the threat of destruc-
tion more convincing.
Explicit in\ this policy, in fact its basic'
force, is the idea that if one country is
fired upon retaliation will follow imme-
diately. If most of us are dead, it is as-
stmed, we will rest easier in the confi-
dence that most of "them" are dead too.
Although there have been a few "traitors"
who have had the audacity to suggest
they will be no happier to know that
their own death is part of an enormous
world-wide death, the country's leaders
have remained loyal to the cause of mas-
sive retaliation.
FIVE Presidents have held firm to this
vindictive formula for world destruc-
tion. Military and civilian strategists con-
tinue their planning on these assump-
tions. Senator Richard Russell, a leading
advocate of the anti-ballistic missile sys-
tem, has even gone so far as to hope that
if only one man and one woman were left
on earth, they would be Americans.
The idea of reciprocal destruction
which underlies our nuclear policy is, as
has been suggested, nothing less than
utter insanity.
One would hope that no sane man
would find justice or confidence in know-
ing that while his own life was being
obliterated the lives of others on the op-
posite side of the world were being ended
in a similar fashion. Yet this is the policy
of this country and the philosophy of its
leaders. While the talk of new means of
annihilation are debated and the pros-
pects for disarmament deferred or de-
stroyed, it should be remembered that
nuclear death, whether from attack or
retaliation, shouldn't give pleasure to
anyone, including those people who take
delight in being vindictive.
-CHRIS STEELE
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To the Editor:
SINCE ANY DECISIVE action
on the part of the police these
days - no matter how necessary
or justified it may be - seems to
draw more criticism than appro-
bation, I would like to make an
effort toward evening the score.
From all the information that I
have been able to gather, from
newspapers and ;people who were
on the scene, it seems that the po-
lice acted with commendable pa-
tience a n d restraint Tuesday
night during the confrontation on
South University. When faced
with a taunting, rockthrowing, ir-
rational mob of any age, this calls
for a great deal of courage-mor-
al and physical.
Since, to my knowledge, no one
informed the police that President
Fleming was going to come outside
to watch the fun and games and,
thereby collect a crowd of his own,
it hardly seems strict justice to
blame them for failing to disting-
uish this group from the others in
the midst of the confusion, es-
pecially since Fleming was prob-
ably "invisible" in the center of
the crowd.
TO THOSE WHO would a s k,
"Do you consider the use of tear
gas, clubs, and rifle butts 'com-
mendable restraint' " I answer,
"under the circumstances, cer-
tainly." If weapons were to be ar-
ranged in a hierarchy of vicious-
ness with invective and bare
hands near the bottom (presum-
ably), I can't think of much on
the levels between them and
nightsticks except throw pillows
and whiffle ball bats.
Letters to the Editor should
be mailed to the Editorial Di-
rector or delivered to Mary
Rafferty in the Student Pub-
lications business office in the
Michigan Daily building. Let-
ters should be typed, double-
spaced and normally should not
exceed 250 words. The Editorial
Directors reserve the right to
edit all letters submitted.
To the Editor:
I AM WRITING to correct some
of the errors in your June 24 re-
port of the Office of Student Af-
fairs Policy Board meeting of the
previous evening. The meeting
ended very late and perhaps you
had no facilities to check the in-
formation with the board mem-
bers. The report is very garbled
and few of the details seem ac-
curate or clearly reflect my recol-
lection of what happened.
The board did uphold the SACH
recommendation that there be no
increase in the monthly rent for
married student housing. However
this recommendation w a s com-
pletely separate from a later (and
not unanimous) vote criticizing
Mr. Feldkamp. The vote on Feld-
kamp was very close (4-3) and
one of the four expressed consid-
erable uncertainty before finally
casting his vote for the motion.;
I VOTED AGAINST the rental
increase and against the motion
criticizing Mr. Feldkamp. My sup-
port for student advisory commit-
tee position on rent increase was
based on their very careful and
well-preparediargument. T h e
Feldkamp motion did not show
any such reasoning and in fact
some of the student members of
Feldkamp's rate review committee,
who were present to discuss the
vote increase, disagreed with the
motion to criticize Feldkamp.
The issues under discussion that
evening were important and com-
plex. A full, clear and accurate
report would help.
-Prof. Sydney E. Bernard
School of Social Work
June 24
Some believe MACE to be in
this category, but it is no longer
in use. Fire hoses are another pos-
sibility, but they, unfortunately,
require' a fire engine to be effec-
tive; and a fire engine is a lovely
target for a fire bomb. Rocks, bot-
tles (broken and otherwise), and
Molotpv cocktails a r e definitely
nastier than anything the police
used. (It is interesting to specu-
late concerning what critics of the
Clarifying OSA report
police would say if the minions of
the law used rocks and fire bombs
to disperse a mob).
In t h i s particular incident I
commend all the law enforcement
agencies involved in the incident.
If the protesters had behaved as
reasonably as the police,, t h e r a
would have been no incident.
-Alan Carlson, '69 '
June 18
The Texas Wedge
By DREW BOGEMA
EVERY NOW AND THEN someone comes along with a set of ideas
that are filled with such inner contradictions, that seem so highly
unrealistic, and so ridiculously silly as to remind one of the perils of
intellectual lethargy that we all fall prey to. This time the devil's pur-
veyor is a reactionary honorably cloaked in the gowns of academia,
namely, Stephen Tonsor, associate professor of history, and the con-
tributor of a lengthy discussion to the pages of the latest National Re-
view. His treatise relates to the proper course of action for universities,
lest student disruption and alienation destroy the force of "sweet rea-
son" and establish "student Maoist dictatorships."
IN ANY CASE, Tonsor's argument proceeds like this: both the
state and the university have suffered a decline in their own institu-
tional authority, while witnessing a startling augmentation in size and
power. Not only has this growth been characterized by a "singular in-
ability to match commitments and resources" - resulting in perennial
impoverishment but also both institutions have lost touch with their
constituencies.
Universities have woefully over-extended their function and ob-
jectives (under liberal orthodoxy) and1 the multiversity must be de-
populated, its goals re-examined. It is clear to Tonsor that the uni-
versity no longer knows its own mind.
Tonsor's primary aim is to foster the return of diversity to educa-
tional vision and purpose, to objective and technique. In order to pro-
vide relevancy to dissatisfied students, the disgraceful homogeneous
nature of American higher education must be transformed into a free
market, one in which ,teaching lays claim to the fundamental priety,
one in which all ties with government are trimmed.
Theresearch and recruitment functions performed by the univer-
sity for defense, big business, and foundations must be eliminated in
order to ensure that the faculty foregoes its greed and devotes the over-
whelming percentage of its energies to the teaching of students.
AT FIRST GLANCE this appears to be a very strange tract coming
from such a devout conservative as Tonsor. With a little verbal mani-
pulation the main propositions of the argument might be changed into
something appropriate for a Ramparts issue two years back.
However, further reading shows that Tonsor steals from both left
and right in order to patch together a coherent argument - regardless
of ideological consistency - in a rare endeavor to diminish the swelling
student power activists on the campus by a co-optation of rhetoric.
State-supported schools, you see, have in the past and continue in
the present to compete unfairly with privately-funded colleges and
"have been the chief force in leveling and homogenizing American ed-
ucation." Student payment of the cost of their own educations, through
a tax upon their future earnings, will guarantee diversity, for It will
return a free market to education,and thus, will make students more
realistic in looking for relevance and quality.
Tonsor apparently hasn't heard of impoverished black youths who
do not possess the financial ability to pay their way through college,
nor of the children of the middle-class Who do not wish to remain under
" the tutelage of their parents in order to meet therising cost for tuition.
INSTEAD OF THE University becoming a sacred retreat from the
rules and regulations of the state, as many envisage, Tonsor holds high
the vision of a neutral institution that would be immune from societal
conflict. You. know, nice, leisurely, and serene, a place where wisdom -
as opposed to sordid passion - reigns.
Thus, the New University cannot partake of societal reconstruction
and transformation of the existing order, for not only would it be in-
consistent with his line of reasoning, but it would also bring on an in-
stitutional function, an" eventual stigma, of a new order.
What kind of teaching would take place remains unclear. For sure,
it would not be of a "totally unstructured, ungraded course of study,
segregated, revolutionary, and socially relevent."
THE. CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER to the existence of higher
education is "the growing wave of irrationality and anti-intellectual-
ism which has caught up large numbers of students and professors."
Radical student power not'only jeopardizes the freedom of speech upon
the campus, but also the freedom of the teacher to conduct his own
classroom in the manner in which he sees fit. (Tonsor is now with the
liberals: this is the same message that Arthur Schlesinger Jr. has taken
to ADA chapters across the land - see, for example, his The Crisis of
Confidence.
Hence (from George Wallace), "the University and the parent so-
ciety have no alternative to repression. These groups cannot be per-
mitted to disrupt and destroy the institutions they so obviously do not
understand."
STUDENT ALIENATION, Tonsor goes on to imply, originates more
from the deadening realization that the AB does not guarantee afflu-
ence, than from a dissatisfaction with societal values and behavior.
What these kids need is the knowledge that a "marketable skill will se-
cure for its holder and his family the dignity of achievement."
The trouble with kids today, Tonsor tells us, is that they seek "rele-
vant orthodoxy rather than agonizing inquiry." Indeed. Faced with the
turmoil of a revolutionary age, "the student wants to know what to
think rather than how to think." Professors are no better, for they have,
over the years, imposed the established orthodoxy of liberalism upon
studentdom, and the ev'ents of the past year are a reaction to that op-
pression.
Unfortunately, Tonsor concludes, things will probably get worse be-
fore they get better, as "what the student wishes is a substitution of
orthodoxies rather than an end to all closed systems."
TONSOR IS DECEIVING US. The wave of student protest, dissent,
and disruption over the past year reveals that students - more than
anything else - want control over their academic destinies and are de-
termined to utilize the little power they have in fostering the growth
through their own institutions of services that meet their real needs. In
addition, they will steadfastly oppose those influences from larger en-
vironments that seek to force, shape, and mold them into democratic
dupes or industrial tools.
From the recent manifestations of student power at the Univer-
sity, it is also clear that Tonsor hysterically opposes this newly organ-
ized power as a threat to the prestige, tradition, and prerogatives of
faculty, and that he will do all in his power to oppose its allegedly ugly
character from gaining any more influence.
Let us suppose Tonsor's ideas were accepted and put into effect. If
the University' and the parent society were to repress objectionable
ideological, groups, say, even in the mildest form (a prohibition upon
their meeting and organization) is Tonsor that much of a fool to be-
lieve the activists would not adopt another cloak to hide their allegedly
evil designs?
Or, even if the revolutionary element were imprisoned or murdered,
does he really believe that this would put an end to the motivation and
ideas that propelled them to quch an unpromising occupation, that
their footsteps would not be filled with scores of revolutionary com-
rades?
Does he really wish to deny the little freedom this society now
enjoys, to only make the revolution that muh more inevitable? If so,
the irony of such fascism will be to place into jeopardy not only the
verbal claptrap of Progressive Labor factions, but also the wondrous
sanctity of Tonsor's own classroom.
TONSOR'S ARGUMENTS concerning the nature of student dis-
satisfaction strip away the logic that forces us to go beyond the allow-
able limits of dissent, and then condemns us because of the act itself.
The logic, for example, of involuntary servitude to the mass murder of
the American military. The logic of a meaningless life behind the walls
of corporate prisons. The logic of bearing witness to a ramnant cnm-.
J-
aw
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'U' financing of police
(The following letter is addressed
to President Fleming).
WE ALUMNAE THINK this is
an ideal time for you the Regents
to stop paying the city p o lI c e
$200,000 a year for their "help."
Students have b e e n trying for
years to "get the cops off campus."
Perhaps you see why, now.
People all over America are
reading that Harvey told you he
"couldn't care less" when you ob-
jected to the clubbing and gassing
going on down your block. He just
ignored you and let his forces go
on attacking everything that mov-
ed, including reporters.
Has power to govern our cam-
pus slipped into the hands of po-
lice while public officials k e e p
busy worrying about the danger of
student power?
Things have indeed grown out
of hand. You and the entire Uni-
versity community now have more
than ample reason to take the city
police off our payroll. As for the
county and state police whom you
can't control, a diet of vicious na-
tionwide antistudent, antiblack
rhetoric has made them bold.
Rather t h a n nourish a growing
police state, what you can do is
get together with Regents and leg-
islators and call off the cops while
your voice still carries any weight.
-Mary Nash
-Susan Elan
The need for community control of police
By THE UADICAL CAUCUS
TME EVENTS OF the past week have
demonstrated the necessity for an
urgent re-evaluation of the power
structure in Ann Arbor, both within
the University and more importantly
within the community at large. The
controversy began when a group of
people decided they wanted to take
over a section of South University.
This may have been the spark to the
issue but it soon became clear after
the police began rioting Tuesday that
people should not be concerning them-
selves with what happens to South
University specifically but rather that
they analyze the events of the past
few days in terms of the role or non-'
role of the people whose positions
have demanded that they assume res-
ponsibility for these injustices.
It would be very easy to put the
blame for the behavior of the police
entirely on the shoulders of Sheriff
Douglas Harvey. There is no doubt
issue-the system, which controls our
lives.
SEVERAL HARD points have to be
made about the politics of Fleming and
Harris. First, Fleming was no hero.
Before the violence started, before the
police charged down South University
west of East University, the police had
control of the street.
A group of students went to Flem-
ing's house and asked him why they
were being kept off campus. He replied
that it wasn't his business and that
the police were acting appropriately.
Ten minutes later when the cops be-
gan gassing people on the campus, a
spent gas shell was brought to him
and people demanded to, know why
they were being gassed.
As they were talking to him they
were gassed on Fleming's front lawn.
Fleming then repeated that it was not
his jurisdiction and that the police
were acting appropriately. It was only
ahnut 45 minutes later, after Flem-
IN FACT, Fleming is not as power-
less as he claims to be. Besides the
political influence of the University,
it pays a sizeable percentage of the
Ann Arbor police budget. Why doesn't
Fleming withhold this money until the
various communities of this city have
control over the police? And why
didn't he do anything before the
police came in? He claims that the
first he knew of any incident was
10:00 p.m. Tuesday night when the
members of the Radical Caucus con-
fronted him. Yet Police Chief Krasny
openly stated that University offic-
ials were informed of police inten-
tions Tuesday afternoon.
Harris ran for mayor on the basis
that electing a good liberal mayor and
the general practice of electing lib-
erals to such positions would ac-
complish thehprogressive goals that
radicals supposedly would never be
able to achieve.
However, when a specific situation
arose, the issue of unchecked police
police charge through the Engin
Arch onto the Diag, a charge which
was unprovoked and which resulted
in vicious clubbings and gassing. ,
THIS IS ONLY one of the many
examples of actions of this sort taken
by the Ann Arbor police.
Third, that Harris has no control
over Harvey in Ann Arbor. If this
is true, they why does the liberal
rhetoric continually maintain t h a t
people who want genuine social change
should reject radicals' call for sys-
tematic institutional change outside
the present structure, and should
elect liberal reformers to the tradi-
tional institutional positions.
If, in fact, Harris as mayor has
no control of police in his town, he
should resign and tell his constituency
that they will have to find other ways
to protect themselves from police than
electing liberals to office; for that
office will compromise all progressive
ideas of the person in the name of
maintaining legitimacy for that of-
contempt for conservative workers and
attempting to put people into office
who will do the thinking for thework-
ers, it is necessary for us to convince
those elements that community con-
trol of police is in their interest and
part of the same fight as worker con-
trol over factories and black control
over ghettoes,
We must make it clear to all seg-
ments of society that they must not
be manipulated into working against
themselves and should fight the op-
pressive, unresponsive system under
whibh we live.
To help people gain control bver
their communities, the Radical Cau-
cus is calling for locally constituted
community control boards. We pro-
pose that Ann Arbor be divided into
districts reflecting the cultural and
racial differences in this ,city.
The residents of each district would
elect a community control board with
authority over police in their district.
Besides the recent controversy, the
Human Relations Commission incident
I