II: The Cold War

(This is the second in a series of editorials discussing Dean's Office and Council proposals for rules relating to undergraduate activities. Yesterday's editorial described the tremendous increase that has taken place since the thirties in Dean's Office regulation of student activities and found four major causes for this increase: 1) the cold war and consequent political tensions, 2) growing concern about organizational bad debts, 3) Increased sensitiveness about public relations, 4) a trend towards closer Harvard-Radcliffe relations which the Dean's Office considers extremely unfortunate. Today's editorial discusses the cold war and rules.)

International tensions since the war have brought under scrutiny freedoms that went unquestioned during the thirties. People now ask how much freedom should be permitted those whom they believe seek to destroy freedom, a questioning which has on occasion caused mass hysteria and endangered individual rights.

This maelstrom of hysteria has never caught up the Dean's Office, and, indeed, Dean Bender's defense of the John Reed Club's right to sponsor a speech at Harvard by Gerhart Eisler was a strong statement of the case for individual liberties and free discussion. But the cold war has not entirely passed the College by, and it has, in fact, helped to shape the limitations on undergraduate activities.

The Dean's Office fears that national political groups of which it disapproves will use the Harvard name as a shield for their activities. Thus The New Student, a magazine published by the Harvard Youth for Democracy, was denied Harvard recognition in January, 1948, on the grounds that 70 percent of its contributions and two-thirds of its circulation came from outside Harvard. This action was taken despite the fact that the magazine was edited entirely by Harvard students. It is unfair to imply that the Faculty Committee on Student Activities refused to recognize the magazine because of its political views, for, as Dean Bender said in reporting the Committee's action, "the best evidence that the Faculty Committee had not been moved in its consideration by the well-known Communist affiliations of the H.Y.D. . . . lies in the record of the Committee. If it had wished to suppress the expression of the ideas of the H.Y.D. it would not have recognized the H.Y.D. in the first place . . ."

But the fact that the Committee was not thinking in terms of suppression does not mean that political considerations were not involved. The point is that before the war The New Student would have been chartered without question, whereas after the war it was closely scrutinized and finally refused recognition. The reason for this change is the cold war, which has lead to a determination on the part of the Dean's Office that outside political groups must not use the Harvard name and Harvard organizations as fronts for their activities.

This determination has also led to other limitations on student freedom than those imposed by the New Student decision. At least in part to prevent outside groups from using Harvard as a front, recognized groups must be composed 100 percent of University members and they must be completely autonomous of any outside groups with which they may be affiliated.

Another instance of limitation of student freedom because of cold war tensions can be found in the case of political rallies. Before the war it was very easy for a Harvard group to hold a rally, and right in the Yard if it wished. Today the Yard is out of bounds for rallies, and considerable Dean's Office and Student Council red tape must be sliced through to hold a rally anywhere else on Harvard property. Part of the Dean's objection to use of the Yard comes from fear of disturbing classes, but this cannot be a serious objection to night time use for rallies.

Rallies habitually provided trouble both before and after the war. But before the war the vocal public reaction was, "Those Harvard boys are at it again." Today the vocal reaction is, "Those Harvard Reds." The Dean's Office doesn't like the sound of the latter. The limitations on rallies are its answer.