Ad Board Votes to Warn Law School Protesters

The Administrative Board of Harvard Law School slapped the so-called Griswold Eight with a warning last week, declining to impose a harsher punishment on the students who held a sit-in outside the offices of Dean Robert C. Clark.

The warning will be placed in the students' files and removed from their records when they graduate, barring any further infractions of Law School or University rules.

However, as an expression of its deep concern that "such conduct impedes rather than promotes progress in building a community," the board has asked the registrar to insert a statement about "sit-in protest" in the Law School Catalog.

The proposed statement will say that in the case of this protest the "principal reason that the sanction was not more severe was that it was the first instance [of this kind] in many years in which formal charges had been brought."

John C. Bonifaz, a third-year law student, called the decision a "real student victory," but said the proposed amendment to the catalog has outraged the student community.

He said that the proposed amendment meant that the Law School intended to treat sit-ins more harshly in future, a message he said was "wholly inconsistent with any notion of precedent in the law."

"I don't think that student are going to accept this in any real way," he said.

The Ad Board reached its decision Friday, after listening to arguments from both sides in a two-day, nine-hour hearing open to a limited audience of Law School students and faculty.

The eight students held the sit-in on April 6and 7 to protest the lack of women and minorityprofessors.

The eight-member Ad Board had the option ofissuing a warning, reprimand or suspension. theboard voted 5-3 to issue a warning to thestudents, rather than a reprimand.

In an eight-page report, the Ad Board detailedits reasons for limiting the sanction to awarning.

The board concluded that while there had beenseveral student protests that could have beenconsidered "disruptive" in recent years, chargeshad not been brought against any of the studentsinvolved. Because those students had not beenpunished, the board said it would beinappropriate" to impose more severe discipline onthe Griswold Eight.

The report also noted that the "Confrontationalnature" of some of the students' actions was notpremeditated and that the students expressedregret to staff members for any distress they mayhave caused them shortly after the event.

Second-year law student Lucy H. Koh, one of thestudents involved, said that while in some waysshe thought the decision was a "positive gesture"she was "not totally happy with the way everythingwent."

Commenting on the hearing, which was pepperedwith jokes about the law, she said, "I'm not goingto continue the charade that it was allnon-adversarial and funny, because it wasn't.

The eight students held the sit-in on April 6and 7 to protest the lack of women and minorityprofessors.

The eight-member Ad Board had the option ofissuing a warning, reprimand or suspension. theboard voted 5-3 to issue a warning to thestudents, rather than a reprimand.

In an eight-page report, the Ad Board detailedits reasons for limiting the sanction to awarning.

The board concluded that while there had beenseveral student protests that could have beenconsidered "disruptive" in recent years, chargeshad not been brought against any of the studentsinvolved. Because those students had not beenpunished, the board said it would beinappropriate" to impose more severe discipline onthe Griswold Eight.

The report also noted that the "Confrontationalnature" of some of the students' actions was notpremeditated and that the students expressedregret to staff members for any distress they mayhave caused them shortly after the event.

Second-year law student Lucy H. Koh, one of thestudents involved, said that while in some waysshe thought the decision was a "positive gesture"she was "not totally happy with the way everythingwent."

Commenting on the hearing, which was pepperedwith jokes about the law, she said, "I'm not goingto continue the charade that it was allnon-adversarial and funny, because it wasn't.