SDS and the Institute

I.

The reception that Secretary McNamara got on Mill Street last Monday was distasteful. It was no "confrontation" between students and policy-maker; it was a futile, embarrasing shouting match.

Students for a Democratic Society planned elaborately, for days in advance, to make sure that it happened. They wanted to disrupt McNamara's visit, to put him on the spot, and, because they were willing to use force, they succeeded.

SDS's rationale for the use of force doesn't stand up to examination. McNamara's unwillingness--or the unwillingness of the Kennedy Institute of Politics--for a debate on Vietnam with Robert Scheer was the crux of SDS's justification. "When a public official reneges on a responsibility," one leader explained, "and when all other avenues are closed, it was necessary to do what we did."

But McNamara cannot be held responsible for speaking out every time an individual or a group demands it. Certainly, he has to explain Vietnam policy and answer its critics. He must do it continually; the burden, in fact, is on him to keep meeting the attacks. But he does have the right to choose his forums.

SDS, then, was unjust. The ensuing demonstration turned into something far more unruly than even it had planned. But the crowd of 800 students that jammed onto Mill St. was not a mob, even though the television reports and the wire service stories made it seem that way. Students were excited, and many of them were angry at each other. Yet they were never out of control. The Secretary was not in physical danger. He could have exchanged quips with the hecklers for as long as he wanted. No one was hurt. No one was arrested. And the little violence that did take place was caused not by SDS, but by a few students who took it upon themselves to 'police' the demonstration.

But the incident, it has been said, affected Harvard's image. Who cares? The important question is not how Harvard looks to the world around it, but what it is and what it will become if demonstration's like last Monday's occur again.

SDS has said that the McNamara visit was an exceptional case and that disruptive protests will hot become the order of the day. They should hold to their promise, because the use of this tactic has disturbing implications for the University. Continued disruptive demonstrations will force the Administration to see that all political protests are policed and restricted more thoroughly. They would turn SDS and the Administration into antagonists, and divide students and Faculty--hot over the basic issues such as the war in Vietnam, but over the tactics of dissent. That is all that has been talked about in the wake of Monday's demonstration and that is all that would be talked about in the future.

The polarization of the Harvard community would be harmful and serve no purpose. It is the responsibility of both SDS and the Administration to see that it does not happen.

II.

The Kennedy Institute of Politics, McNamara's host, must share in the blame for Monday's incident.

Institute officials acted from the beginning as if there was already a polarization of interests in the community, as if SDS' aims were completely incompatible with their own. They assumed, at least, that SDS' demand for a public program was a threat to their desire to encourage informal contact between government officials and the academic community. So they offered no compromise.

They were right, theoretically, in trying to protect the informal seminar program and in resisting anything that might scare public officials away from it. The seminar program will surely be the Institute's unique, most valuable contribution.

But they were wrong in assuming that the officials who take part in it will be reluctant to meet larger groups of students, including students who are sharply critical of them. The Institute ought to be more flexible. It ought to encourage, though not require, the officials who come here to give at least one speech. And it ought to consider sharing the officials, for part of their stay, with student political groups--including SDS, if it's interested.

McNamara's visit is a bad precedent. The Institute's program will really get under way during the rest of the year, with other, less controversial speakers. The seminars in which public figures and students exchange views off-the-record will still be the heart of the program. But the Institute will have a chance to experiment, to involve more undergraduates. It would be the height of foolishness not to take it.