4r Aidglgau Balf scanty-FifthYe- EDITED AND MANAGED BY STCDENTS OP THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN UNDER AUTHORITY Op &OARD IN CONTROL OF STtTmENT PUDLICATIONS "O P N e 420 MAYNARD ST., ANN ARBOR, MIcH. NEWS PHONE: 764-0552 y .U '7' L y i L a.*! 4!y . Ydw yl/nY' hr . v ~ti4,:s..:, ~w _ LETTERS TO THE EDITOR: The Residential College: Where Are the Critics? Editorials printed in The Michigan Daily express the individual opinions of staff writers or the editors. This must be noted in all reprints. FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 1964 NJiHT ii lT OR )1: +Jx11RiY ()U01)MAN Screen of Respectability Shields Apartment Project JT'S TIME that the community realize exactly what is happening between lo- cal forces opposing the South University 18-story apartment building, presently represented by the Ann Arbor Property Owners' Association, and the owners of that building. Such a smoke screen of re- spectability has gone up around the issue that the unflattering absurdities have been pretty well concealed. The Ann Arbor Property Owners' As- sociation was formed "to provide an or- ganization for the clearing of ideas and the solving of problems common to all such property owners." Commercial prop- erty owners, that is. Several "coincidences" have surrounded the existence of this organization, "coin- cidences" which local businessmen and city officials have been reluctant to speak about. And yet these "coincidences" form an extremely interesting pattern. FIRST STEP in the chain of "coinci- dences" is the timing of the formation of the association. It was incorporated in Lansing on October 2, 1964. And when did concern about the high-rise apart- ment building reach its peak in Ann Arbor? Some time around the end of September or the beginning of October is a tempting estimate. The second interesting "coincidence" is the subject with which the association BRITAIN'S NEW prime minister, Harold Wilson, heads a Labor Party with a five-seat edge in Parliament. Should half a dozen members of his party vote against him or just not be present to support him on a vote of confidence new elections would probably have to be called-elections which could easily put- Wilson out of office. But Wilson is going ahead full speed with controversial programs to nation- alize the steel industry, abolish the death penalty and more closely supervise big business, among other things. LYNDON JOHNSON, elected President in his own right, heads a Democratic Party with a two-thirds majority in both houses of Congress. He was elected by the largest populary plurality in history. He is assured of keeping his office for four years. Does he dare push as hard? -E HERSTEIN has exclusively concerned itself. The above statement of purpose sounds rath- er altruistic. Perhaps another quote from the association's incorporation papers would be more accurate: the association is formed in order to "advance and pro- mote the commercial and civic interests" of property owners. Considering that the association has done little since Octo- ber 2 but worry about the 18-story apart- ment building, the first interest seems the more germane of the two. Why then did the association bother to mention "civic interest?" As a rationale for the third "coincidence," naturally. And that "coincidence" was that the association's only action since forma- tion has been to attack the South 'U' apartment building and to act as the community's disseminator of doubt re- garding its practicality and the possible success. The "coincidence" here is that when association members decided to get moral about building codes, they did so concerning the only project in the area which they admittedly felt to be a threat to their economic security. Of all the technically illegal buildings in Ann Ar- bor, the association just happened to pick this one to attack and bring before the Department of Building and En- gineering Safety. THERE AREN'T a great variety of con- clusions about the real purposee of the property owners' association which can be reached upon observation of these facts. Specifically, there is only one: that the Ann Arbor Property Owners' Asso- ciation is simply "out to get" the apart- ment building in any way possible. This, and not any vague references to serving the community's good by improving its buildings, is the reason why R. C. Weaver Co., Inc. and Towne Realty Co., Inc. are now before the Housing Appeals Board. It takes only simple observation, re- quiring only an honest observer, to see that. the selfish interests of a relatively small number of local businessmen are obstructing a building which will aid a great number of local citizens and stu- dents. Local citizens must realize that what is now occupying their Housing Appeals Board is not a legitimate complaint. It is a blocking tactic, the only intent of which is to further inconvenience the builders. Once this is realized, the illusion of re- spectability which has surrounded the entire complaint falls away and the mat- ter appears as the ridiculous farce it is. -LEONARD PRATT 17 'lip 7 f 'I 45 " 3. flr t r F . , ,' t "WNtI~ WAY To T AE NVMNST REAMA1J TODAY AND TOMORROW: Election Confirms Predictions To the Editor: IN THE DAILY of Thursday, Oc- tober 29, 1964, Jeffrey Good- man wrote an editorial about my policy of publicizing the whole planning procedure for the Resi- dential College. Aside from a cer- tain mild skepticism on the part of the Residential College Plan- ning Committee, which was yet tolerant enough to go along with me, I have received no comments whatsoever. I can explain this absence of response on several hypotheses: 1) no one reads Daily editorials, 2) if they read them, they pay no heed, 3) Thuma is a fool and we shall sit by and let him cut his own throat, 4) it's a good idea and there's no need to comment. Nevertheless, I thought it might help if I myself explained a little about what I had in mind. SOMEONE, I think Churchill, has said something to the effect that democracy is a sorry system, but no one yet has thought of a better. I agree. In the University, I have struggled with the problems inherent in a democratic system for years, but still think it is worth the struggle. Insofar as the notion is relevant to the Residen- tial College, may I say that it would be far easier and more ex- peditious if I sat down and, oc- casionally consulting with a few others, -set the specifications for the residence halls, the classrooms and the curriculum. The result might, by accident, be a huge suc- cess. On the other hand, it might prove dismal failure, not only be- cause of my ineptitude,' but also because of the resulting non- cooperation by almost everyone else in the University. Since, ob- viously. I want the Residential College to be a reasonable suc- cess, and since I have a certain modesty about my own capabili- ties, I am convinced that I need widespread participation f r o m both faculty and administration in planning the Residential Col- lege. Under current procedures com- munication is slow. Actions of the Faculty Planning Committee and the Student Advisory Committee, I am obligated to communicate to the faculty, to the Dean and Exe- cutive Committee of the College, to the administrative officers, and through them to the Regents. I could, of course, send the minutes of both of our committees around to all these bodies, but the process is slow, expensive and does not reach those who are not in the system. Since we have at hand a very rapid and widely distributed means of communication, The Daily, why not use it? * * * THERE ARE, of course, dangers. The reporting may be inaccurate and misleading. My own criticism of The Daily has been as loud as anyone else's on this point. At the moment, however, I have a great deal of confidence in the ability and integrity of the three mem- bers of The Daily staff with whom I have come in close contact-Neil Berkson,. Kenneth Winter and Jeffrey Goodman. Their reporting, thus far, on the Residential Col- lege I think has been excellent. They have been scrupulous in clearing with me before publica- tion. It is further true that reports on the early planning stages may well be confusing. It must be and will be made clear that the deci- sions are tentative and both the Faculty Planning Committee and the Student Advisory Committee reserve the right to change their collective minds. Furthermore, no final decisions will be made with- out prior report. Presently I see no exceptions to this, except those decisions which involve the ap- pointment of people to positions in the Residential College opera- tion. The reasons for this, I think, are obvious. There is the additional possibil- ity that people will become fed up with the Residential College be- cause of the continuing publicity. If this develops I can only hope that people will say so. * * FINALLY, I hope people with- in the hierarchy will temporarily suspend their usual demand for prior notification of anything which is to appear in the public press. May I repeat, no final de- cisions will be made until every- one who is legitimately involved has had an opportunity to express himself. Finally, I hope everyone who is interested in the Residen- tial College will read The. Daily articles and not just the headlines. If anyone has ideas or criticisms I hope he will either call me, write me, or, preferably, write The Daily. If the general conclusion is that Thuma is an ass, it is much better for the University if this comes to public notice, rather than to remain the knowledge of only a select few, -Burton D. Thuma, Associate Dean of the Literary college Director, Residential College 4 Panhel By WALTER LIPPMANN THE RETURNS have confirmed m a most remarkable way the findings of the national polls, par- ticularly the Harris and the Gal- lop. They reported that Johnson and Humphrey would win by a majority in the range between 60 and 70 per cent of the votes cast, and that this would give them a landslide majority in the electorial college. The returns confirm also the predictions of the leading anti- Goldwater Republicans, notably Governors Rockefeller and Scran- ton, who warned their party that the nomination of Goldwater would be a devastating blow to the Republican Party in the leading Republican states of the East and Middle West. At the same time the returns prove the falsity of the claim, which has been put forward since the Roosevelt days, that there is a great, silent latent majority of "conservative" Republicans who will emerge as soon as the Repub- lican Party turns its back on "me- tooism" and offers them "a choice." THE JOHNSON MAJORITY is indisputable proof that the pre- ponderant mass of the American voters are in the center, inside the two extremes, and that the reason the Democrats win is that Ken- nedy and Johnson have worked carefully and deliberately to make the Democratic Party represent the center. This surely is the primary man- date of the 1964 election, a man- date to both parties to seek their strength and define their issues I I 4 'THE VISIT': Hollywood Fails with Minor Modern Classic within, not against, the prevailing consensus. Senator Goldwater took the Republican Party down to a catastrophic' defeat because he made himself the leader, or at least the rallying point, of an extremist rebellion against the will of the great majority of Ameri- cans. The will of the majority has prevailed over him. The election is a resounding vote of confidence in the capacity of President Johnson to represent the will of the great majority. The campaign did not produce a pre- view of what his administration will do about the myriad of spe- cific programs, and this was for- tunate. For the real business of the campaign was not to map out a course for the future. It was to beat and crush a rebellion against the established and accepted line of domestic and foreign policy which was laid down in the gen- eration which followed the great depression and the second world war. * * * SO ON the day after election it is too early, and in fact beside the point, to attempt to read into the returns an outline of the poli- tics of the Johnson administra- tion. It is too early also to attempt to read ,into the Republican dis- aster a prescription for the party's salvation and survival. But the first lesson for the Republicans is clear-that they will not prosper if they surrender, as they did at .San Francisco, and do not stand. up for their own beliefs. The re- turns, which leave the Republican Party with virtually nothing more than a handful of states, won by racist votes, is a squalid and hu- miliating consequence of the San Francisco surrender. What Johnson should do with his victory and what the Repub- licans can do with their defeat is as yet unanswerable: it is rather like trying on the morning after an earthquake to select the cur- tains and the rugs for the houses which will be built when the dam- age has been studied and the dust has settled. (c) 1964, The Washington Post Co. To the Editor: SOME OF THE THINGS report- ed about Panhellenic's new rush proposal strike me as being rather foolish, while others ap- pear as downright idiotic. The statement by Bari Telfer that Panhel wanted all the houses to appear equal is amazing. Why would they want to make them appear equal when they are ob- viously not? What would be gain- ed? Perhaps this is one of the things Miss Telfer refers to as the artificiality of the sorority sys- temn. Rush mixers are probably pretty typical sorority activities, so if they are, as Miss Telfer says, ar- tificial, why try to hide it? The girls who enjoy this sort of thing will enjoy both the mixers and the sorority system, while those who don't will drop rush. In this way the image of the sorority system can be effectively per- pet uated. Or maybe I'm missing the whole point: perhaps the ob- jective of rush is to get as many girls as possible into sororities, whether they'll like it or not. KAY FARNELL says that the rushees get an unfair impression of her house, AOPi, because the house has only 40 girls. How's that again? Does reality have to be unfair simply because it seems unfavorable? What is her alterna- tive suggestion: that each house be allowed to have say 40 actives at the rush mixers? But I guess this fits in with the plan to have the houses appear equal, even if falsely. Mi s Farnell doesn't like the rushees to "hash" the sororities after they leave because they create "rumors" and "unfair ac- cusations" about the houses. Could it bE that such discussions might bring to light unfavorable aspects of a house not seen by all the rushees? Heaven forbid. Also, from what I know about sorority "hash," the creation of rumors and unfair accusations isn't re- stricted to the rushees . . . Turn- about's fair play. Most foolish and ridiculous is the whining the girls from AOPi, ZTA and Phi Sigs are doing about their houses. It can't possibly help their future membership quotas; if they'd take a more positive at- titude toward their houses it would probably help them more than fifty new rush plans. -Thomas Copi, '67 4 4 I Time To Move Forward NOW IT IS TIME to move ahead and deal squarely with the problems fac- ing this country. President Johnson has received a huge majority in both houses of Congress. He is in a position to implement new and imaginative programs, if he desires to do so. Helpful DR. FRED C. SCHWARZ, president of the Christian Anti-Communism Cru- sade, had a remark at his press confer- ence yesterday that may be of interest to the more than 4000 people who packed Hill Auditorium to hear George Lincoln Rockwell last month. Schwarz said he saw an interview on Los Angeles television last week that fea- tured Rockwell. One of the questions was, "Where do you get your financial sup- port?" Rockwell replied, "The universities back me," and then proceeded to rattle off a list of universities whose speaking fees are keeping the American Nazi Party alive. SURELY, there are problems crying out for such approaches. -Problems of equal rights and oppor- tunities which the Negro revolution of the past ten years has posed. -Problems of large, perhaps perman- ent unemployment, and its companion, poverty. -Problems of the farmer, who appears to be engaged in a dying industry. -Problems plaguing our urban areas, including poor transportation, lack of adequate housing and the deterioration of the central city. -Problems of education caused by a huge influx of students with inadequate teachers and physical facilities for them. -Problems in foreign affairs: how to assure that the world does not suffer the terror of nuclear war while, at the same time, retaining the freedom of our coun- try. BUT THE EFFECTIVE solution of these problems calls for an innovating and fresh approach, not hackneyed and half- way measures such as the poverty bill, which the President so proudly pushed through Congress last summer. It is the Democratic Party which must be the innovating party in this country. If President Johnson interprets his role of leader of "all the people" to mean that he must propose meaningless measures with something for everybody in the great new coalition which he has put to- Ltother in hishnp nresildential triumnh. At the Campus Theatre "ESPITE Ingrid Bergman and - Anthony Quinn in the star roles Director Bernhard Wicki's produc- tion of Friedrick Duerrenmatt's "minor modern classic," "The Visit," fails. It is a sad failure, however, another instance of Hollywood's desire to impress its own mold onto an established work of art. Duerrenmatt's story is roughly similar to Twain's "The Man Who Corrupted Hadleyburg." Into pov- erty-stricken Guellen comes Karla Zachanassian, "the richest woman in the world," returning to avenge herself for being runout twenty years before. At that time she'd been disavowed and perjured by her lover-Miller, now the local merchant-and judged a prostitute by the town. "The world made me a .whore; now I will turn the world into a brothel," she says. In return for $2,000,000 she wants Miller's life. As it stands, the film is never- theless interesting and at times reaches a high level of satire and slowly gripping horror. In this respect Miss Bergman's acting of Madame Zachanassian as incar- nation of evil is superb. However, because of this one-sided concen- tration the film fails. Duerren- matt emphasized: "This lady has a sense of humor . . . a rare grace, more, she has a wicked charm ... She has to be rendered as human as possible." DIRECTOR WICKI'S concep- tion of the play, however, seems to be different from Duerenmats. In one of his best scenes-the night before Miller's trial-he does show for a moment the intriguing ambiguity of Madame Zachanas- sian as Bergman and Quinn act eousness. Quinn and Bergman be- come powerful and equal personal- ities involved in a heroic struggle -Duerrenmatt, however, saw a journey into pathos. In a postscript to the play Duer- renmatt wrote: "Nothing could harm this comedy with a tragic end more than a heavy serious- ness." Sadly, this is exactly what Wicki has done. It is a failure in emphasis andnuance, true, but that is the difference between drama and melodrama. The per- vading sense of horror in the film is never balanced by a softer hu- man understanding and seldom by a sense of humor. Miller's hoarse defense: "I am a human being" comes anti-climactically and falls flat; it is almost lost admist all the sound and fury. -Bob Zalisk "'Aul ,.ally, He's Down To A M~ere Stnadow" ..-1'f k I 'BIRTH OF A NATION': Griffith's Classic Is Indigestible Experience At the Cinema Guild SEEING David Wark Griffith's"The Birth of a Nation" almost 50 years after its release is an indigestible experience. It is like trying to remember that singular and absolutely satisfying, once-in-a-lifetime meal eaten in some exotic restaurant in some long-ago time when the days were long, more fun and meaningful. But only an ungracious burp comes to mind. The film industry has so completely and master- fully imbibed Griffith's cinematic techniques and, for that time, daring innovations that we are satiated with a mimicking vocabulary that has turned into stereotypes now more than a generation old. Griffith alone conceived and developed practically every cinema- tic device that we now take for granted. He had been making many short films before he made "Birth of a Nation," the first feature- length movie) in which he developed the close-up shot and the long shot, with both of these innovations logically interplaced with the common medium shot. He had developed the iris, the fade and the dissolve. And, most important, he brought into a high state of perfection the concept of editing a film to achieve a constantly flowing series of images that tell an exciting and fluxing narrative. "I am trying to make the viewer see," he once said. HOWEVER, his genius did not fully reveal itself in his plot and character. The characters have the musty qualities of the worst in Victorian literature and the plot panders to an unsophisticated . trs, 4 s. .1- 4f - _-.4n° " mr a .aif a WE WERE ONE. --R. RAPOPORT j g 3ir~igatu &it