Government Dept. to Vote On Kissinger Post Today

The Government Department will decide tonight whether it will continue to reserve a professorship for presidential adviser Henry A. Kissinger '50.

James Q. Wilson, chairman of the Government Department, yesterday refused to disclose if Kissinger has informed the Department whether he plans to return to Harvard in the near future.

Wilson had said last week that Kissinger must inform the Department of his intentions before tonight's meeting. If Kissinger declines to return, the Department will begin looking for a new professor to fill his post.

Asked yesterday if he had heard anything from Kissinger, Wilson said, "I want to tell my colleagues the news first. There's no point in my being evasive; I'm just not saying anything."

Kissinger's White House office refused to answer queries yesterday about the presidential adviser's plans.

Kissinger himself hinted to newsmen a week ago that he had decided not to go back to Harvard. Asked if he planned to return to Cambridge, Kissinger said, "What makes you think I would want to go back?" Kissinger criticized the Harvard Administration for "taking six months to get them to agree on anything."

Official Resignation

Kissinger officially resigned his professorship in January 1971--24 months after he joined the Nixon Administration--because of a Faculty rule restricting leaves of absence to two years.

But prior to his formal resignation, Kissinger and the Government Department worked out a special arrangement which reserved a chair in the Department for him until the conclusion of President Nixon's first term in office.

Wilson set tonight's Government Department meeting--the first since Nixon's second term began--as the deadline for Kissinger's decision. Wilson said last week that if Kissinger asked to return to Harvard, the Government Department "would be delighted" to have him back.