Students. Ethics. Morality. 60 Years Later

It was 1964. UC Berkeley students occupied Sproul Hall. The issue was Free Speech. .

University of California at Berkeley

The Washington Post reports that on Tuesday, Brown University that it would consider divesting from Israeli funds this year.

At Columbia, a statement posted by student groups said protesters have “taken matters into their own hands,” adding that the students plan to remain in Hamilton Hall until Columbia divests financially from Israel. The protesters inside Hamilton Hall, which was taken over Tuesday morning, face charges of trespassing, criminal mischief and third-degree burglary, New York officials said in a news conference Tuesday evening. The New York Police Department is ready to go into the building if the university requests that, Deputy Commissioner Kaz Daughtry said.

More than 100 pro-Palestinian NYU students and faculty members were arrested last week when the NYPD cleared a protest encampment at NYU’s Gould Plaza.

Arrests were made and encampments closed at Cal Poly Humboldt, UNC Chapel Hill, the University of Florida, University of Texas at Austin.

At UC Berkeley, Chancellor Carol T. Christ sent the following email:

Dear Cal alumni and friends:

Since Columbia University students protesting the conflict in Gaza were arrested nearly two weeks ago, a wave of protests and encampments have sprung up on campuses across the country, including at UC Berkeley. How each university is handling the demonstrations varies. 

Berkeley has long experience with nonviolent political protest. Vitally important are the rules that help ensure that protests do not impinge on students’ ability to access educational resources and services. Our response, which is consistent with long-standing practice and with University of California policy, is to not preemptively request the involvement of law enforcement, and only if necessary to protect the community’s physical safety. So far, the encampment has not disrupted operations, and no students have been arrested. As the academic year draws to a close, we will continue to monitor the situation and stay focused on keeping the campus community safe and on uninterrupted teaching, learning, and research. 

 Chancellor Christ, informed by history, has responded to the student protests with the policy statement of the University, which policy does not “preemptively request the involvement of law enforcement.”

Meanwhile, on Capitol Hill, House Speaker Mike Johnson and other GOP members of congress are calling for Columbia’s president’s resignation, for police crackdowns on student demonstrations, and they have now released an outline of a new congressional investigation into how university leaders have dealt with the protests. House Committee on Education and Workforce Chair Virginia Foxx, joined by GOP leadership and committee chairs at a press conference Tuesday, said she's notified the presidents of Yale, UCLA and the University of Michigan to appear before the Education Committee on May 23.

“American universities are officially put on notice that we have come to take our universities back,” Foxx said.

Who is this “we” of whom Congresswoman Foxx speaks? Having seen this autocratic, authoritarian, <call the law and arrest people> reaction before, I am pretty sanguine about the future of this one. 1964, Berkeley, it started when the Dean of Students Katherine Towle released a letter stating that student political organizing was no longer permitted on the campus at the corner of Bancroft and Telegraph Avenues.

Sitting at a table on a state-owned campus to discuss political issues is a constitutional right. So Jack Weinberg, the head of the UC Berkeley chapter of the Congress of Racial Equality (aka CORE), set up a table in front of Sproul Hall. The number of people in Sproul Plaza suddenly grew, and grew.

Someone called the police, and a police car drove onto Sproul Plaza, and the officers came out and arrested Weinberg for violating the University's new rules regarding student political activism. The police officers put Weinberg in the cruiser. And before the car could leave the plaza, several hundred students gathered around it, sat down, and blocked the car from leaving. Then some people got up on top of it. And all night long and into the next day, students got up on the police car and gave speeches calling for free speech on campus. There may have been 7,000 people in Sproul Plaza, witnessing.

That was in October 1964. In December, the University proposed to expel Jack Weinberg and other student members of the Free Speech Movement for their involvement in the October demonstrations. Despite student and faculty requests, the University refused to drop charges against student political leaders.

In response, some 1,500 students occupied the campus administrative building, Sproul Hall, on December 2, 1964. Ultimately, 773 students were arrested for their involvement in the occupation.

That was 1964, 60 years ago. Speaker Johnson and his friends could, should they wish, to learn what Jack Weinberg learned 60 years ago.

It’s the first amendment to the Constitution.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.