Brown Students Face Disciplinary Action

Four students at Brown University last week were charged with disruptive behavior for interrupting a speech by William Casey, director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), with a rendition of "Jabberwocky" by Lewis Carroll. They face penalties ranging from a formal reprimand to dismissal from the university.

The accused students were among a crowd of about 100 protesters who picketed Casey's speech last Thursday and criticized the lecture series on U.S. military and foreign policy as "right-wing and one-sided," an editor of the Brown Daily Herald said yesterday.

The students protested recent Reagan administration proposals that would "ease restrictions on internal spying, tighten federal regulations on classified materials, and lend support to dictatorships, throwing our human rights policy out the window," Stefan Cluver, a junior who faces disciplinary action, said this week.

The newspaper quoted Casey as saying, "The CIA has no interest in spying within the United States; that is solely a function of the Federal Bureau of Investigation."

The speeches are also drawing sharp criticism from faculty and students who disapprove of the lecture series' sponsor, the Olin Foundation, a conservative think-tank, which also provides financial support to the Dartmouth Review, a controversial conservative student weekly.

Students and faculty are concerned about the Olin Foundation's "alleged ties" with the Olin Mathison Chemical Corporation, a major supplier of gunpowder to the U.S. military, Cluver added.

A hearing is scheduled Thursday for the four students who are charged with "violating university rules that forbid behavior which disrupts the basic rights of others at university functions," John Robinson, dean of students, said this week.

Other lecturers in the series include Stansfield Turner, former CIA director, and Samuel Wilson, a retired Lieutenant General.