President Decries Fear Atmosphere

A university cannot be created or maintained in an atmosphere of fear and restriction, President Pusey told a luncheon meeting of the National Press Club yesterday in Washington.

"The free spirit that produces the new insight and the step forward quickly dies under such circumstances," he said, and then went on to explain the reason behind Harvard's handling of recent charges against four faculty members.

"We feel no uncertainty about Harvard's nor many other universities' attitude toward communism. Harvard wants no part of it. Nor do the others. Inasmuch as communism seeks to control and dictate to men's minds, communism is any true university's inevitable enemy," Pusey declared.

The speech, entitled Freedom Loyalty and the American University," was part of Pusey's recently stated campaign to bring the case of the university before the public.

"For the past year and a half universities have been accorded unusual attention in the nation's press-more attention, or at least, often a different kind of attention than they would like. Since the picture one might have formed from this discussion seems to me likely to be a distorted one; and since during the past eight months I have been in an especially favored position to become familiar with the inner workings of one of our great American universities, I would like to suggest what a true portrait of a university might be."

Scholar Must Be Free

Pusey explained the mobility of the Harvard community, discussed the mechanism of permanent appointments, and explained some of the basic requirements of a university to the reporters.

"The idea that a scholar must be free to follow his own hunches in pursuing his special studies is not the whim of some modern educator," he said. "It is not primarily a question of 'freedom'. A scholar or scientist has an obligation to investigate and report new ideas in his field, even when his conclusions may be unpopular among the general public or among his own colleagues," Pusey declared.

Hits Terrorization

"The way of a scholar is often a challenging, lonely journey. He usually works alone without much attention or encouragement from others. But it is of the greatest importance that he know--have unequivocal assurance--that whatever he finds and reports . . . will not penalize him as a man. If he sees men around him dismissed from their positions for less than the most serious reasons, because of popular clamor, or on anything less than the most solid proof, it would not be surprising if he were then to shirk his own basic responsibility in the field of learning to press on.

"It is for this reason that every individual case affecting one professor . . . is, in a sense . . . a test of the very idea of the university as we have known it through the centuries," Pusey stated.

Pusey said he knows of no Communists on Harvard's faculty nor of any Communist movement in its student body.

In the past few weeks, the President said, a "little group" favoring Sen. McCarthy had originated on the campus. Pusey said "every effort" has been made to give the group freedom and encouragement as with "any other group that tries to organize with a leader and faculty sponsor."