4B The Michigan Daily - Wednesday, November 6, 1996 DHEu, uTH PRESIDENT Dartmouth students, ac lsad t see provostg- By Katie Wang Daily StaffReporter While the University will welcome back a familiar face to campus in President-select Lee Bollinger, students and faculty at Dartmouth College say they are losing one of their most prized professors and administrators. "The University of Michigan is to be congratulated on an absolutely wonder- ful appointment," Dartmouth President James Freedman said yesterday in a written statement. "Lee Bollinger is an outstanding academic leader and will be one of the most distinguished uni- versity presidents in the country. "We will miss him very much at Dartmouth." Stephen Bosworth, chair of the Dartmouth College Board of Trustees, said he was not surprised to hear of Bollinger's selection and applauded his intellectual and leadership qualities. "I think he is an outstanding and intellectual leader," Bosworth said. "He is very well respected in the world of higher education. "I am pleased for his sake, but I am sad for Dartmouth's sake," he said. Students who have taken Bollinger's class on the First Amendment had noth- ing but praise for him as a teacher and as a friend. "You feel very close to him," said Dartmouth senior Sashi Bach. "He's one of the most popular professors. I don't think I ever hear a bad thing about him." Bach said Bollinger is one of her favorite professors and his class is one of the most popular on campus. Andrew May, a Dartmouth senior and government studies major, said Bollinger seems like an average guy,. but at the same time he is very knowl- edgeable in his field. "He is a very graceful speaker", May said. "I think the general reaction is that students will be dis him." R o l a n d Adams, associ- ate director of Dartmouth's Office of Public Affairs, compli- m e n t e d Bollinger for balancing his roles as a provost and as a professor. "Students in his appointed we lost Studem be disapp we lost h% knowledge of procedural issues," said Mary Childers, director of Dartmouth's office of equal opportunity and affir- mative action. "Bollinger is very thoughtful, pas- sionate, but controlled," she said."H1e 16 clearly ready to be a university pres dent." Childers added that Bollinger and his wife, Jean, a local artist, will also be missed by the community. Adams said Bollinger's listening skills helped ease the development of a new library at Dartmouth. Its will "He effective- ly mediated the poi nteddebate betwe* a traditional and fl. high - tech library," Adams -Andrew May said. Adams said College senior the library was one of Bollinger's pro- jects as Dartmouth provost and that he took several views into consideration while developing it. Bollinger was also praised by mas$ for his strong relations with members of the Dartmouth faculty and administra- tion. "I think his relations with the faculty and administration were good. He is regarded very highly by both," Bosworth said. "(His departure) will be a loss for the institution." Dartmouth it course are wild about it," Adams said. "To be able to teach and to carry the office of provost is quite a tribute to anyone." Those who work under Bollinger's supervision also noted his intellectual abilities and his strong listening skills - two assets they say will greatly ben- efit the University. "I assume the University president should have his combination of wide- ranging intellectual interests and STEPHANIE LEE/The Dartmouth Dartmouth College Provost Lee Bollinger speaks on "Freedom of Speech at the Turn of the Century," on Oct. 2 in the Sandborn Library at Dartmouth College. Bollinger looks at changes ahead Q&A Continued from Page 1B The second thing is, the relationship of the institutions to the states in which they reside. The University of Michigan, it evolves out of the state - it is responsible to the state. Dartmouth, as a private institution, is in a sense a citizen of the state and has responsibilities, but they're far more volun- tary. And then, thirdly, there are important differences between private institutions and public institu- tions, not least of which is that the public institutions must abide by the To m Constitution, the U.S. Constitution. And private institutions need not. work, i Daily: Regent (Deane) Baker (R- Ann Arbor) talked a bit about some love to C reservations he had about you being president. One of the things he said implied that you might have been Da involved in a larger effort to call the regents or fax them about you being president here. Do you have any comments on that at all? Bollinger: No. I don't. Daily: Were you involved in anything of that nature at all? Bollinger: I have not heard the comments of Deane Baker and I really don't want, myself, to comment on it. Daily: How prepared are you to weather other scrutiny that might arise as president'? That's something that sort of inevitably comes up during any administration. Do you con- sider yourself a pretty thick-skinned person? Bollinger: (Laughs.) I understand that these positions often have drawn criticism. I try to be a person who responds to criticism openly and fairly. But I have been, for 1i art a long time, under no illusions that these are positions where everybody is pleased. Daily: Have you talked to some of the members of your family about moving back to Ann Arbor? Are they excited to come back here? Bollinger: I have, and they are. Daily: What are some of the things you do in your spare time? I know you said before that you're a runner. Bollinger: Well, I write books. Besides running, I write books. I very much like outdoor activities, so I like hiking and that sort of thing. And I spend a lot of time, most of my time, work- ing. To me it's not work, it's what I love to do. what I Daily: Do you miss being a straight, focused scholar instead of being an administrator? Bollinger: That too is a compli- - Lee Bollinger cated question. To me, by the way mouth provost my work goes, there's a great com- plementary relationship between my scholarship and the administrative work I do, as well as with teaching. Daily: Would you say you're looking forward to coming back and going to all the Michigan football games and some of the larger-scale stuff you don't get in Hanover (N.H.)? Bollinger: (Laughs.) Yeah. Daily: Is this your dream job? Bollinger: I'm not sure I would put it exactly that way. As I said at the beginning, I'm profoundly honored by the opportunity and extremely excited about undertaking it. Daily: Are you doing anything special tonight to cele- brate the new job? Bollinger: Probably making an accepting phone call. BOLLINGER Continued from Page LB closest to meeting the criteria I devel- oped." Regent Rebecca McGowan (D-Ann Arbor) said any of the four nominees could be successful presidents. She said she reviewed the transcripts from the four interviews and consulted many people about the four finalists before reaching a decision. "Provost Lee Bollinger returned to Michigan clear in his purpose," McGowan said. She said Bollinger seemed "refreshed" by his time at Dartmouth, and would effectively move the University forward. THE INITIAL DIDE After Horning made a motion to name Bollinger president, Baker replied with a litany of reservations. "There's another side of Lee Bollinger that I think the regents should understand," Baker said. "He developed a record which really offended a large cross-section of people that support this university.... Particularly offensive was his trashing of Judge Bork during his hearing in Washington, D.C." In 1987, Bollinger testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee in Washington, D.C., against Bork, a con- servative nominee to the Supreme Court. Bollinger said he disagreed with Bork's belief that free speech does not extend to artistic expression. Along with criticizing the Bork testi- mony, Baker said there was a "very heavy-handed political campaign to put Lee Bollinger in the office of the presi- dency of the University." An unusually large amount of L letters and faxes support- It was ing Bollinger poured in, wonderfu Baker said, indicating that they we this was an organized come tog effort to make-E Bollinger presi- dent. "You are put in a postion of having to sacrifice your individual judgment because of the pressure of such things'" Baker said. Power said he was "saddened" by Baker's remarks. "I must confess that I anticipated that we might have an episode of this sort take place at this meeting," Power said. Regent Shirley. McFee (R-Battle Creek) said she had initial concerns about Bollinger's testimony against Bork. McFee said those early worries were put to rest after reviewing what Bollinger said and talking to "a number of other very conservative Republican thinkers from within the state of Michigan." "He is a listener. He does take under advisement the opinion and viewpoint of all parties," McFee said, before "wholeheartedly" endorsing Bollinger. McGowan attempted to refute Baker's belief that Bollinger was involved with a campaign to attain the presidency. "At the University, we go for facts before we reach conclusions," exactly as I expected that it would," and reiterated that he felt bombarded by Bollinger's outside proponents. "It's a very difficult thing to be a con- servative on a university campus," Baker said. "That's the way the world is." Deitch said that if he and Baker were put in a foxhole together during battle, they "would disagree about a lot of stuff all the time, and it wouldn't get boring." Deitch said Bollinger "will be a spec- tacular president of this university." Newman said her differences with Bollinger did not mirror Baker's. After 1991 LETTER TO THE DAILY JOSH BIGGS/Dafly Dartmouth Provost Lee Bollinger speaks to the University community at a town meeting during a visit to campus on Oct. 24. The following letter was originally published in The Michigan Daily on Oct. 25, 1991: I was very distrubed to read the front page story in the Ann Arbor News, this past Friday, Oct. 18, under the headline, "Law School's View Questioned." According to the story, the regents "noted" at their recent meeting that the "law faculty had given its blessing to a 1988 student speech code" of the University which was later declared unconstitutional by a Federal District Court judge in Detroit. Regent Neal Nielson (R- Brighton) is then quoted as saying that "it didn't stand very far." This statement about the law school's role in the creation of the 1988 student harrassment code is not true and must be corrected. Certainly the code was never presented to the law faculty as a body, nor was any committee of the faculty convened to express a view as to the constitutional- ity or wisdom of the proposed policy. A few members of the faculty indi- vidually asked for advice as the University's Office of Affirmative Action set about the task of creating a student code. I cannot speak for each of them, but I can speak for myself. I was asked to attend a meeting early in the drafting process to discuss what behavior a policy should attempt to regulate and the free speech inter- ests that had to be respected. My posi- tion was then, and remains to this day, the following: The First Amendment clearly permits the University to regu- late some speech behavior. Under Supreme Court precedents, however, it cannot be said with certain- ty where constitutional protection of speech begins. My advice was to use language forbidding only forms of "verbal harrassment" and to build into the code a recognition that the free speech interests increased as one moved from the dormitiories to the classroom and then to areas like the Diag. I expressed the view that the lan- guage proposed and ultimately adopted was dangerously vague, from a First Amendment standpoint. After the code was adopted, the Office of Affirmative Action issued a statement (known as the "yellow" booklet) explaining what behavior would be prohibited under the new code. Neither I nor as far as as I know any other member of the faculty, was ever asked for advice about this docu- ment. In my judgement, the yellow booklet showed such insensitivity to freedom of speech that it unconstitu- tionally tainted the code it purported to interpret. At that point I, along with Terrance Sandalow, asked for a meeting with the University vice president responsible for overcoming and implementing the new code. We informed that individual that in our view, with the publication or the yellow booklet, the code was unconstitutional and should be with- drawn. That advice was not taken. After the litigation against the code began, I personally felt awkward about my responsibilities to the University as an administrator and as a scholar. I decided that it was inappropriate to remain silent about the matter and publicly stated my belief that the code was in violation of the First Amendment. At the time, I also deliv- ered a lecture, which was subsequently published, explaining the views I had taken on the subject of the student codes and the Michigan code in partic- ular. I hope that this statement clarifies for everyone just how incorrect it is to say that the "law faculty... gave its blessing" to the 1988 code. There are many reasons why it is unwise for the University to use its law school as its attorney, but let me sug- gest that, at the very least, when you want the views of members of the law faculty you should speak to them per- sonally or ask to receive their advice in writing. - Lee Bollinger Law School dean truly I that e able to ether" die Goldenberg LSA dean not the issues twice passing the opportunity to state a preference, Newman gave her approval to a Bollinger presi- dency. "I have many differences of opinion with P r o v o s t Bollinger, but the social issues are I've focused on," didates. It delayed the process by three days and prompted one candidate - later identified as LSA DeanEF Goldenberg - to withdraw from co sideration. Goldenberg said the regents served Bollinger well in reaching a group con- sensus. "I thought it was truly wonderful that they were able to come together," Goldenberg said. "They were coming together to support the president. That's - very important." Though apparently pleased with th, conclusion of the search, Horning sg the lawsuit set an unfortunate tone for the final days of the process. "It's upsetting," Horning said. "It takes away from the sparkle of the can- didates." McFee called a newspaper editorial criticizing the quality of the finalists "an enigma with an ironic twist," since the newspapers' case against the search might have impacted the list of finalists. Varner said "it was very unfair... 9 the press to label our candidates as 'B- list,"' and that the four finalists brought with them "extraordinary achievement." THE MEETING'S AFTERMTH Power, a newspaper publisher him- self, entered the meeting with a neon- orange "Observer and Eccent Newspapers" paperboy bag slung ovW his shoulder. He said he couldn't "cram" every important document into his briefcase, and needed the newspa- per bag for overflow. Power said he looks forward to returning to his day job now that the search is over. After the meeting, he said he was "relieved and pleased" that the board has chosen the next presi- dent. There are currently no estimates for when Bollinger will step into the-presi- dency, Harrison said. But interim President Homer Neal has indicated he would like to step down by late June, Bollinger said. Rnliner inicatedpcIthat 1he nlans to Newman said. "Provost Bollinger needs everybody on this board to support him." Vice President for University Relations Walter Harrison said the regents made the right choice by unani- mously supporting one person. "I think it's terrific that they made it unanimous," Harrison said. "I think that after the first round of comments, it was clear that the vast majority supported Lee. I think it was great, but not neces- sary, that it became unanimous." If Bollinger's liberalism makes the University a target for state lawmakers, Horning - a conservative - said he will stand up for the president-designate. "If there's a problem in Lansing because of Lee Bollinger's political views, I'm there to go hand-in-hand and help him any way I can," Horning said. THE LAWSUIT'S LONG SHADOW OFFICIALS Officials also concluded that the open meeting process, enforced by a that the new president will provide a fresh outlook on University issues.