Ford: M2M Not Threat to Vogel

The distribution of pamphlets questioning Soc Rel 101 lectures "might be a nuisance, but it is not a violation of academic freedom," Dean Ford said Friday.

An administration official said last week that the pamphlets - written by the Harvard-Radcliffe May 2nd Committee - might have violated Harvard's "unwritten rule" forbidding reproduction of a lecturer's statements without his consent.

Ford said, however, that he and the Soc Rel lecturer - Ezra F. Vogel, lecturer on Sociology - had agreed that the pamphlets had never posed "a threat to his [Vogel's] academic freedom or to the order of his class."

Barney Frank '62, asst. senior tutor in Winthrop House and author of a letter defending the right of students to criticize their teachers, met with Ford on Friday. "I am pleased that the University has, in fact, no objection to the sort of thing May 2nd did," he said afterward.