CRR Answers Student Charges Of 'Selectivity,' 'Repression'

The Committee on Rights and Responsibilities has been a repeated target of student criticism for its closed hearings and for alleged selectivity resulting in "political repression." The following is the complete text of a petition sent to the Committee during exam period which states the objections of some members of the Cooperative House. The Committee's reply is printed in full below.

January 22, 1970

Dear Sirs:

It is the sentiment of the undersigned majority of the Harvard Cooperative House that the disciplinary actions of Committee on Rights and Responsibilities directed against sixteen students for political activity on November 19, 1969 were an unwarranted exercise of selective punishment, giving an appearance of political repression, whatever the Committee's intention may have been.

That is to say, by selectively eliminating a large segment of the active leadership of SDS the Committee appears to have given students a warning against future involvement in radical politics.

Further, the undersigned abhor the medieval atmosphere and procedures of the hearings conducted by the Committee on Rights and Responsibilities. That Committee's disclaimer does not decrease the repugnance of closed, heavily-guarded trials of which there is no public transcript made available and from which there is no appeal to any higher body. The simple fact that Harvard is a private institution does not exempt it from employing the most rudimentary standards of justice in disciplinary relationships with its students.

Finally, as members of the Harvard community we resent the Committee's order prohibiting the suspended and separated students from appearing in the University community. We believe this prohibition severely limits our rights to free association and our freedom of entry into political dialogue. It is essential to the reputation of the University that its actions can never be construed to limit the free exchange of ideas, however antithetical those ideas may be to its collective political philosophy.

For these reasons, as the majority membership of the Harvard Cooperative House, we petition the Committee on Rights and Responsibilities to reinstate all the students required to withdraw as a result of their political activity until such time as all of the students involved in the November 19 demonstration receive a fair and open trial.

Further, in good conscience, we feel we must invite the three members of our house who are under suspension to remain with us until they are reinstated or until they receive an open hearing that convinces us of the justness of their expulsion.

Sincerely,

signed by 22 students

CRR Replies

January 30, 1970

A number of questions have been raised about the procedures of the Committee on Rights and Responsibilities and especially about issues connected with its decisions affecting students involved in the incident of November 19, 1969. Recently the Committee received a petition signed by 22 students putting several of these questions in written form. The Committee feels it would be useful to make public the substance of its reply, sent to the students on February 1:

The Committee has made every effort to discover on what basis charges were brought against the students participating in the obstructive demonstration on Dean May's office on November 19, 1969, and specifically whether there was any evidence of "selectivity" in making those charges. The Committee satisfied itself that there was no prejudicial selectivity. It examined all the photographic evidence and questioned all witnesses and concluded that charges were brought against everyone whom the Dean's office could identify as having been in the room during the demonstration and as having been an active participant in that demonstration. Those standing closest to the Dean were, obviously, both those most easily identified and those (in most cases) most actively involved in impeding his freedom of movement. In some instances, the Dean was in error and accordingly the Committee dismissed or modified the complaints. Not only did the Committee not single out SDS leaders, the majority of Committee members were unaware, in most cases, at the time of their deliberations, who was and who was not an SDS leader.

The Committee has given and will continue to give to each student appearing before it the right to have a tape recording made of the procedings to which he and his adviser (as well as the Committee) can later freely refer in reconsidering any disciplinary action. We only stipulate that the recording not be for public release.

The Committee believes it is in the best interests of most of the students charged before it that the hearing not be public. We believe that many of the students who have appeared before the Committee would not have done so if the hearing had been public: if the option to make them public had been available to the student, we believe many would have found themselves under considerable pressure from their fellow students to exercise that option and open the hearings to a gallery Furthermore, the Committee of Fifteen last April and May was the object of a serious effort, in which threats of force were made, by a large number of students to disrupt the hearings then in progress. We took seriously those threats then and we take seriously the possibility of disruption today. We hope we are wrong on the present prospects, but in the highly-charged atmosphere surrounding these events we believe it unwise to offer an opportunity for renewed efforts at disruption. However, we hope that the use of security measures will in the near future prove unnecessary.

Most importantly, we think the hearings ought to be private because a private exchange between the student (and his adviser) and the Committee offers the best opportunity for learning about the motives, purposes, and opinions of those who are charged with violating the Resolution on Rights and Responsibilities and for enabling the Committee to form some judgment about the quality and significance of the student's actions. It also offers an opportunity for the student to question the Committee and the complainant and to discuss informally with both a wide range of matters, some only indirectly related to the specific charge. A public hearing-or a hearing made public by means of a verbatim transcript or tape recording-would inhibit many if not all parties to these discussions and lead the Committee (or its hearing panel) to play the role of silent judge, presiding over an adversary contest between complainant and student. In criminal trials, such detachment may be necessary and desirable, but in the affairs of a University, concerned with somehow reconciling political activity with the rules of reasoned discourse and elenientary standards of civility, a court-like atmosphere would be an obstacle, not an asset. And greater formality might well lead to less attention being given to mitigating circumstances.

Finally, we agree that essential fairness and basic standards of justice ought to prevail in these proceedings however they are conducted. The Committee believes it must and does provide a fair hearing to the students involved; our published procedures, considerably more elaborate than those followed by the Administrative Board, are designed to insure this. Every student is given an opportunity to face his accuser, to have an adviser, to know all the evidence against him, to offer any evidence he wishes, to have a recording made, and to ask for reconsideration. The Committee before which he ?s called is composed of persons most of?? ?hom were initially selected by elections field among students and faculty and its ?omposition was approved by a vote of th?? Faculty on September 30, 1969. Thought dismissing charges or granting requeste for reconsideration does not prove the Committee's fairness, the fact that charge have been dismissed and reconsideration have been granted (leading, on occasion to a reduction in disciplinary action should be borne in mind.

The students disciplined for their participation in the November 19, ?? incident have received an opportunity ?or a fair hearing and for reconsideration of the disciplinary decision. No convin??ug argument has been made as to why those decisions should now be reversed Furthermore, no student requested to have the University has ever been per??tted to remain in his House, whether th?? House is on-campus or a Harvard-spon??red cooperative house. One of the pur??ses of severance is to insure that the student leaves the University for some p??iod of time to rethink his relationship to it. Living in a Harvard House, a??nding classes, or using the library facili??s are privileges reserved for members ?? good standing of the University. That a s??ered student may not remain in Harvard on the other hand, does not prevent him rom expressing his political views or from associating with whomever he choose, including University members. We d?? insist, however, that such association s??uld not involve the sustained and signif??ant use of University facilities unless the student has received the permission of the Committee.