Harvard's Discriminating Choice

The selection of General Colin L. Powell as principal Commencement Day speaker this year is a discouraging demonstration that Harvard lacks the moral backbone to support official policy with action.

Powell has opposed President Bill Clinton's efforts to end the ban on gays and lesbians in the military. Though he has predicated his opposition on the claim that ending the ban would disrupt morale and discipline in the armed forces, his argument is an attempt to justify a policy that sanctions bigotry.

Powell's concerns may be legitimate. But problems with morale and discipline would result from the homophobic attitudes of the officers, not from the homosexuals themselves. Powell should support efforts to change these attitudes. Instead, he favors rewarding bigots by allowing their to attitudes to dictate policy.

Powell's support for discrimination against gays and lesbians makes him a morally unacceptable choice for Commencement speaker.

The issue is not whether Powell has the right to support the ban on homosexuals in the military. He does. Nor is the issue whether the University had the right to invite him to speak here. It did. But the issue is whether Harvard should have selected a speaker whose defense of discrimination directly contradicts the University's official support for equal opportunity.

Of course Harvard has no obligation--moral or otherwise--to invite a speaker whose views are consistent with University policy. Additionally, it is probably impossible to find a speaker whose opinions do not offend some part of the Harvard community. Legitimate differences in opinion should not prevent a person from speaking at Commencement.

But Powell's opposition to allowing gays and lesbians to serve in the armed forces is more than a policy difference. It is a civil rights issue.

The exclusion of acknowledged gays and lesbians from military service is a reprehensible and inexcusable violation of their rights. It is an embarrassing reflection on America's commitment to equal opportunity that the policy persists.

President Neil L. Rudenstine and the University have rightfully denounced the military policy. But Harvard is already on morally unstable ground, having failed to sever its ties with the Reserve Officers Training Corps three years after the Faculty Council recommended that it do so to protest the military's discriminatory policy.

The selection of Powell as Commencement speaker confirms what observers of the ROTC debate have long suspected: Harvard believes that mere statements of policy are an acceptable substitute for action.

Powell's speech comes at an especially inauspicious time for advocates of equal rights. Within six weeks after Commencement Day, President Clinton is scheduled to issue a final policy decision regarding gays and lesbians in the military.

It would be arrogant to assume that the prestige Powell will gain by delivering a Harvard Commencement address will have any effect on Clinton's policy. The issue is much more a moral one than a practical one: Harvard displays tremendous hypocrisy by claiming to oppose bigotry and then inviting an apologists for bigots to speak at Commencement.

There are those who might argue that rejecting Powell would amount to empty symbolism. Harvard's opinion is unlikely to have any effect on policy decisions of the U.S. government.

But following this logic, voting in a national election is also empty symbolism, since the ballot of one person is unlikely to affect the results. It is a worn-out cliche that individual voices must be raised in order to produce a collective yell.

Of course, Harvard would be neglecting our educational needs if it failed to expose us to diverse opinions, even those opinions it finds unacceptable. But if the goal is to foster debate and enhance our education, Powell's presence would be more appropriate at an Institute of Politics forum discussion that at Commencement.

Rudenstine correctly argues that Powell has amassed impressive accomplishments and is a "thoughtful and eloquent speaker."

Powell's fame for his conduct during the Persian Gulf War might have made him an appropriate Commencement speaker in 1991. Today, though, he is defined as much by his support for discrimination as he is by his past accomplishments.

On Commencement Day, when Powell talks about his experiences as the nation's first Black chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, his inspiring words will sound hollow to anyone who believes that gays and lesbians deserve the same opportunities that Powell has had.

I do not mean to imply that, as an African American, Powell has a special obligation to support equal rights for homosexuals. The moral obligation to oppose bigotry and discrimination does not come from his race, but from the fact that he is an American.

Nor do I mean to suggest that by shirking that obligation, Powell forfeits his right to speak and be heard. This is not a free speech issue. Powell's right to speak at Harvard is undeniable. But that does not mean the University is obligated to invite him.

By selecting Powell as Commencement speaker, the University necessarily rejected other candidates. No one would argue that Harvard is violating those candidates' right to free speech. Nor would it have been an act of censorship if the University had decided not to invite Powell.

Surely, there are other people Harvard could have invited, eloquent speakers who--like Powell--have played important roles in world affairs. The selection of Powell is an act of moral cowardice that mocks Harvard's policy of non-discrimination.