1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure

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In 1940, following a series of joint conferences begun in 1934, representatives of the American Association of University Professors and of the Association of American Colleges (now the Association of American Colleges and Universities) agreed upon a restatement of principles set forth in the 1925 Conference Statement on Academic Freedom and Tenure. This restatement is known to the profession as the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure.

The 1940 Statement is printed below, followed by Interpretive Comments as developed by representatives  of the American Association of University Professors and the Association of American Colleges in 1969.The governing bodies of the two associations, meeting respectively in November 1989 and January 1990, adopted several changes in language in order to remove gender-specific references from the original text.

Academic freedom is essential to these purposes and applies to both teaching and research. Freedom in research is fundamental to the advancement of truth. Academic freedom in its teaching aspect is fundamental for the protection of the rights of the teacher in teaching and of the student to freedom in learning. It carries with it duties correlative with rights.[1] 2

Tenure is a means to certain ends; specifically: (1) freedom of teaching and research and of extramural activities, and (2) a sufficient degree of economic security to make the profession attractive to men and women of ability. Freedom and economic security, hence, tenure, are indispensable to the success of an institution in fulfilling its obligations to its students and to society.

Academic Freedom

1. Teachers are entitled to full freedom in research and in the publication of the results, subject to the adequate performance of their other academic duties; but research for pecuniary return should be based upon an understanding with the authorities of the institution.
2. Teachers are entitled to freedom in the classroom in discussing their subject, but they should be careful not to introduce into their teaching controversial matter which has no relation to their subject.[2] Limitations of academic freedom because of religious or other aims of the institution should be clearly stated in writing at the time of the appointment.[3]
3. College and university teachers are citizens, members of a learned profession, and officers of an educational institution. When they speak or write as citizens, they should be free from institutional censorship or discipline, but their special position in the community imposes special obligations. As scholars and educational officers, they should remember that the public may judge their profession and their institution by their utterances. Hence they should at all times be accurate, should exercise appropriate restraint, should show respect for the opinions of others, and should make every effort to indicate that they are not speaking for the institution.[4]

Academic Tenure

After the expiration of a probationary period, teachers or investigators should have permanent or continuous tenure, and their service should be terminated only for adequate cause, except in the case of retirement for age, or under extraordinary circumstances because of financial exigencies.

In the interpretation of this principle it is understood that the following represents acceptable academic practice:

1. The precise terms and conditions of every appointment should be stated in writing and be in the possession of both institution and teacher before the appointment is consummated.
2. Beginning with appointment to the rank of full-time instructor or a higher rank,[5] the probationary period should not exceed seven years, including within this period full-time service in all institutions of higher education; but subject to the proviso that when, after a term of probationary service of more than three years in one or more institutions, a teacher is called to another institution, it may be agreed in writing that the new appointment is for a probationary period of not more than four years, even though thereby the person’s total probationary period in the academic profession is extended beyond the normal maximum of seven years.[6] Notice should be given at least one year prior to the expiration of the probationary period if the teacher is not to be continued in service after the expiration of that period.[7]
3. During the probationary period a teacher should have the academic freedom that all other members of the faculty have.[8]
4. Termination for cause of a continuous appointment, or the dismissal for cause of a teacher previous to the expiration of a term appointment, should, if possible, be considered by both a faculty committee and the governing board of the institution. In all cases where the facts are in dispute, the accused teacher should be informed before the hearing in writing of the charges and should have the opportunity to be heard in his or her own defense by all bodies that pass judgment upon the case. The teacher should be permitted to be accompanied by an advisor of his or her own choosing who may act as counsel. There should be a full stenographic record of the hearing available to the parties concerned. In the hearing of charges of incompetence the testimony should include that of teachers and other scholars, either from the teacher’s own or from other institutions. Teachers on continuous appointment who are dismissed for reasons not involving moral turpitude should receive their salaries for at least a year from the date of notification of dismissal whether or not they  are continued in their duties at the institution.[9]
5. Termination of a continuous appointment because of financial exigency should be demonstrably bona fide.

1940 Interpretations

At the conference of representatives of the American Association of University Professors and of the Association of American Colleges on November 7–8, 1940, the following interpretations of the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure were agreed upon:

1. That its operation should not be retroactive.
2. That all tenure claims of teachers appointed prior to the endorsement should be determined in accordance with the principles set forth in the 1925 Conference Statement on Academic Freedom and Tenure.
3. If the administration of a college or university feels that a teacher has not observed the admonitions of paragraph 3 of the section on Academic Freedom and believes that the extramural utterances of the teacher have been such as to raise grave doubts concerning the teacher’s fitness for his or her position, it may proceed to file charges under paragraph 4 of the section on Academic Tenure. In pressing such charges, the administration should remember that teachers are citizens and   should be accorded the freedom of citizens. In such cases the administration must assume full responsibility, and the American Association of University Professors and the Association of American Colleges are free to make an investigation.

1970 Interpretive Comments

Following extensive discussions on the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure with leading educational associations and with individual faculty members and administrators, a joint committee of the AAUP and the Association of American Colleges met during 1969 to reevaluate this key policy statement. On the basis of the comments received, and the discussions that ensued, the joint committee felt the preferable approach was to formulate interpretations of the Statement in terms of the experience gained in  implementing and applying the Statement for over thirty years and of adapting it to current needs.

The committee submitted to the two associations for their consideration the following “Interpretive Comments” These interpretations were adopted by the Council of the American Association of University Professors in April 1970 and endorsed by the Fifty-sixth Annual Meeting as Association policy.

In the thirty years since their promulgation, the principles of the 1940 Statement of Principle on Academic Freedom and Tenure have undergone a substantial amount of refinement. This has evolved through a variety of processes, including customary acceptance, understandings mutually arrived at between institutions and professors or their representatives, investigations and reports by the American Association of University Professors, and formulations of statements by that association either alone or in conjunction with the Association of American Colleges. These comments represent the attempt of the two associations, as the original sponsors of the 1940 Statement, to formulate the most important of these refinements. Their incorporation here as Interpretive Comments is based upon the premise that the 1940 Statement is not a static code but a fundamental document designed to set a framework of norms to guide adaptations to changing times and circumstances.

Also, there have been relevant developments in the law itself reflecting a growing insistence by the courts on due process within the academic community which parallels the essential concepts of the 1940 Statement; particularly relevant is the identification by the Supreme Court of academic freedom as a right protected by the First Amendment. As the Supreme Court said in Keyishian v. Board of Regents, 385 U.S. 589 (1967), “Our Nation is deeply committed to safeguarding academic freedom, which is of transcendent value to all of us and not merely to the teachers concerned. That freedom is therefore a special concern of the First Amendment, which does not tolerate laws that cast a pall of orthodoxy over the classroom.”

The numbers refer to the designated portion of the 1940 Statement on which interpretive comment is made.

1. The Association of American Colleges and the American Association of University Professors have long recognized that membership in the academic profession carries with it special responsibilities. Both associations either separately or jointly have consistently affirmed these responsibilities in major policy statements, providing guidance to professors in their utterances as citizens, in the exercise of their responsibilities to the institution and to students, and in their conduct when resigning from their institution or when undertaking government-sponsored research. Of particular relevance is the Statement on Professional Ethics adopted in 1966 as Association policy. (A revision, adopted in 1987, may be found in AAUP, Policy Documents and Reports, 10th ed. [Washington,  D.C. , 2006], 171–72.)
2. The intent of this statement is not to discourage what is “controversial.” Controversy is at the heart of the free academic inquiry which the entire statement is designed to foster. The passage serves to underscore the need for teachers to avoid persistently intruding material which has no relation to their subject.
3. Most church-related institutions no longer need or desire the departure from the principle of academic freedom implied in the 1940 Statement, and we do not now endorse such a departure.
4. This paragraph is the subject of an interpretation adopted by the sponsors of the 1940 Statement immediately following its endorsement which reads as follows:

   If the administration of a college or university feels that a teacher has not observed the admonitions of paragraph 3 of the section on Academic Freedom and believes that the extramural utterances of the teacher have been such as to raise grave doubts concerning the teacher’s fitness for his or her position, it may proceed to file charges under paragraph 4 of the section on Academic Tenure. In pressing such charges, the administration should remember that teachers are citizens and should be accorded the freedom of citizens. In such cases the administration must assume full responsibility, and the American Association of University Professors and the Association of American Colleges are free to make an investigation.
   Paragraph 3 of the section on Academic Freedom in the 1940 Statement should also be interpreted in keeping with the 1964 Committee A Statement on Extramural Utterances , which states inter alia: “The controlling principle is that a faculty member’s expression of opinion as a citizen cannot constitute grounds for dismissal unless it clearly demonstrates the faculty member’s unfitness for his or her position. Extramural utterances rarely bear upon the faculty member’s fitness for the position. Moreover, a final decision should take into account the faculty member’s entire record as a teacher and scholar.”

   Paragraph 5 of the Statement on Professional Ethics also deals with the nature of the “special obligations” of the teacher. The paragraph reads as follows:

   As members of their community, professors have the rights and obligations of other citizens. Professors measure the urgency of these obligations in the light of their responsibilities to their subject, to their students, to their profession, and to their institution. When they speak or act as private persons, they avoid creating the impression of speaking or acting for their college or university. As citizens engaged in a profession that depends upon freedom for its health and integrity, professors have a particular obligation to promote conditions of free inquiry and to further public understanding of academic freedom.
   Both the protection of academic freedom and the requirements of academic responsibility apply not only to the full-time probationary and the tenured teacher, but also to all others, such as part-time faculty and teaching assistants, who exercise teaching responsibilities.

5. The concept of “rank of full-time instructor or a higher rank” is intended to include any person who teaches a full-time load regardless of the teacher’s specific title. 3
6. In calling for an agreement “in writing” on the amount of credit given for a faculty member’s prior service at other institutions, the Statement furthers the general policy of full understanding by the professor of the terms and conditions of the appointment. It does not necessarily follow that a professor’s tenure rights have been violated because of the absence of a written agreement on this matter. Nonetheless, especially because of the variation in permissible institutional practices, a written understanding concerning these matters at the time of appointment is particularly appropriate and advantageous to both the individual and the institution. 4
7. The effect of this subparagraph is that a decision on tenure, favorable or unfavorable, must be made at least twelve months prior to the completion of the probationary period. If the decision is negative, the appointment for the following year becomes a terminal one. If the decision is affirmative, the provisions in the 1940 Statement with respect to the termination of service of teachers or investigators after the expiration of a probationary period should apply from the date when the favorable decision is made.The general principle of notice contained in this paragraph is developed with greater specificity in the Standards for Notice of Nonreappointment, endorsed by the Fiftieth Annual Meeting of the American Association of University Professors (1964). These standards are:

   Notice of nonreappointment, or of intention not to recommend reappointment to the governing board, should be given in writing in accordance with the following standards:

   1.  Not later than March 1 of the first academic year of service, if the appointment expires at the end of that year; or, if a one-year appointment terminates during an academic year, at least three months in advance of its termination.

   2. Not later than December 15 of the second academic year of service, if the appointment expires at the end of that year; or, if an initial two-year appointment terminates during an academic year, at least six months in advance of its termination.

   3.  At least twelve months before the expiration of an appointment after two or more years in the institution.
   Other obligations, both of institutions and of individuals, are described in the Statement on Recruitment and Resignation of Faculty Members, as endorsed by the Association of American Colleges and the American Association of University Professors in 1961.

8. The freedom of probationary teachers is enhanced by the establishment of a regular procedure for the periodic evaluation and assessment of the teacher’s academic performance during probationary status. Provision should be made for regularized procedures for the consideration of complaints by probationary teachers that their academic freedom has been violated. One suggested procedure to serve these purposes is contained in the Recommended Institutional Regulations on Academic Freedom and Tenure, prepared by the American Association of University Professors.
9. A further specification of the academic due process to which the teacher is entitled under this paragraph is contained in the Statement on Procedural Standards in Faculty Dismissal Proceedings, jointly approved by the American Association of University Professors and the Association of American Colleges in 1958. This interpretive document deals with the issue of suspension, about which the 1940 Statement is silent.The 1958 Statement provides: “Suspension of the faculty member during the proceedings is justified only if immediate harm to the faculty member or others is threatened by the faculty member’s continuance. Unless legal considerations forbid, any such suspension should be with pay.” A suspension which is not followed by either reinstatement or the opportunity for a hearing is in effect a summary dismissal in violation of academic due process.

   The concept of “moral turpitude” identifies the exceptional case in which the professor may be denied a year’s teaching or pay in whole or in part. The statement applies to that kind of behavior which goes beyond simply warranting discharge and is so utterly blameworthy as to make it inappropriate to require the offering of a year’s teaching or pay. The standard is not that the moral sensibilities of persons in the particular community have been affronted. The standard is behavior that would evoke condemnation by the academic community generally.

Endnotes:

1 The word “teacher” as used in this document is understood to include the investigator who is attached to an academic institution without teaching duties. Back to text

2 Boldface numbers in brackets refer to Interpretive Comments that follow. Back to text

3 For a discussion of this question, see the “Report of the Special Committee on Academic Personnel Ineligible for Tenure,” Policy Documents and Reports, 9th ed. (Washington, D.C., 2001), 88–91.Back to text

4 For a more detailed statement on this question, see “On Crediting Prior Service Elsewhere as Part of the Probationary Period,” Policy Documents and Reports, 10th ed. (Washington, D.C., 2006), 55–56. Back to text

Endorsers

The 1940 Statement of Principles has been endorsed by more than 200 scholarly and education groups. You can see them alphabetically, by date, or by discipline.

The Anti-military Bias On Campus
November 23, 2005
By Jerry Coffee

Historically, college campuses have been the lightening rod for anti-military sentiment and violence. This has ranged from peaceful candlelight vigils to the occupation of administrative buildings, from the torching of ROTC facilities to the tragic deaths of students at Kent State during the Vietnam war. Even now there is strife on America’s campuses between academia and the military.

Now pending on the Supreme Court’s docket is the issue of campus recruiting by the military. Some “elite” East Coast universities showed their anti-military bias by banning military recruiters from their campuses alongside corporate recruiters. The Feds said fine, no recruiting, no federal funding. Since most campuses have reasonable nondiscrimination (equal opportunity) requirements for corporations recruiting on them, the American Taliban (aka the ACLU) jumped in and has tried to justify the ban on military recruiters based upon “the military’s discrimination against homosexuals” – a reference to the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, which basically means that homosexuals are welcome to serve in the military so long as they keep their sexual lives private. Many join and do.

Our own University of Hawaii is certainly no exception to this phenomenon.

I recently spent a couple of days on the Manoa campus attending sessions of the four-day symposium on “Literature and Film of the Vietnam War,” a potentially useful and enriching experience sponsored and very effectively organized by the English Department. Presenters included Denby Fawcett of KITV and Tad Bartimus of Hana, both of whom gave excellent teaching examples of how even much of their current writing is informed by their experiences as news correspondents in Vietnam. Unfortunately, they were more the exception than the rule as presenter after presenter drifted into angry and faithless anti-war/anti-military politicization of their presentations, if not by diatribe, then by constant innuendo.

The obvious “darling” of the symposium was Tim O’Brien, the prolific author of several Vietnam-based novels. He is talented and had much to teach in his keynote address, “Thirty Years After.” But, sadly, he frequently couldn’t resist politicizing his material with irrelevant anti-Iraq and anti-Bush rhetoric. And even when he did resist, fawning students or faculty in the audience would draw it out of him with their leading questions to which they already knew his answers.

Gen. Eric Shinseki, U.S. Army (Ret.) spoke one evening to an overflow crowd at the Campus Center. He spoke of his upbringing on Kauai and his Army career which culminated as the Chief of Staff of the Army. Apparently, his speech was not partisan enough for the audience comprised mostly of students and faculty, who had obviously expected him to air his well-publicized differences with the Bush administration on appropriate troop levels in Iraq. After his formal remarks, a long line formed for Q&A. Most of the questions were preceded by mini “speeches of opportunity” with anti-military undertones. But try as they may, the general refused to be sucked in – a form of diplomacy well-honed in a long, successful military career.

The current point of contention at Manoa is the pending establishment of the University Affiliated Research Center (UARC), a formal University-Navy research partnership with “win-win” written all over it. The partnership would facilitate joint projects with national security applications, most of which would have civilian applications as well. Nevertheless, the UARC was the catalyst for the illegal, weeklong student-faculty occupation of the president’s office last spring, and is still being portrayed as an evil monster octopus with tentacles probing and encircling every aspect of Manoa’s academic life.

Anti-UARC articles by Beverly Keever, professor of journalism at UH-Manoa, were passed out at the Shinseki event. After misrepresenting later emerging details of the UH-Navy contract as a diabolical coverup, she concludes, “These surprises … are likely to stoke rising tensions on UH’s flagship campus” – a prophecy she no doubt intends to help come true.

Granted, college is the time for idealism and hope, the time we enjoy before having to actually deal with the real world. But that doesn’t excuse university faculty – who are supposed to already be in the real world, and wiser than their students – from making and teaching the connection between academic freedom and the source of that freedom – our Constitution – which our military is sworn to “protect and defend.”

Find this article at: http://www.midweek.com/content/columns/coffeebreak_article/the_anti_military_bias_on_campus/

Amicus Harvard Law School Professors In Support of FAIR, in Rumsfeld v. FAIR

source: http://www.acslaw.org/node/8623

By Harold Eugene Oliver III, George Washington University Law School

Amici of various Harvard Law School Professors put forth the following arguments in support of FAIR: (1) The Solomon Amendment bars only anti-military policies; it does not give military recruiters a special right to disregard neutral and generally applicable recruiting rules; and (2) Sound principles of judicial restraint counsel that this Court should resolve the question of statutory coverage before turning, only if necessary, to constitutionality.
A collection of faculty members from the Harvard Law School have written this amicus brief on behalf of Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights, Inc. (FAIR) in Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights, Inc.#160; Before the Solomon Amendment, Harvard?like many other law schools?had not allowed the military to utilize its Office of Career Services (OCS) due to the discriminatory employment practices of the military.#160; However, Harvard did not deny the military access to its facilities; the military could use Harvard’s facilities for recruiting if they had been invited by students or student groups.#160; After the government threatened to pull funding in 2002?stating this practice did not meet the requirements of the Solomon Amendment?Harvard was forced to change their policies and allow the military to use its OCS.#160; The authors of this brief are writing because they are troubled by the military and government’s actions, believing them to be inconsistent with the principles of academic freedom and the actual language of the Solomon Amendment.
The faculty’s first major argument is that the Solomon Amendment only applies to schools with an “anti-military” policy that prevents the military from recruiting on campus.#160; They argue that the law school’s policy does not fall into that classification since it does not specifically target the military and, therefore, they did not violate the Solomon Amendment.#160; Instead of focusing on preventing military recruitment, they argue that Harvard’s anti-discrimination policy is in the same vein as other law school policies such as those that prohibit when employers can contact students or regulations about their hiring process?all of which are legal.#160; They argue that if the military did not want to follow the anti-discrimination policy than they should do what any employer does when they do not want to follow one of Harvard’s policies?they can choose not to recruit there.#160; The Solomon Amendment did not intend, according to the authors, to grant the military special privileges in recruiting that even other federal agencies do not have; instead it only intended to prevent clear anti-military or anti-ROTC policies from being promulgated.#160; Additionally, the authors suggest that the Department of Defense’s (DoD) regulations favor their interpretation of the Solomon Amendment; the DoD’s regulations state that the Solomon Amendment’s funding restrictions do not apply to schools that are applying the restriction keeping the military off-campus to all employers.#160; This is the case with the law school’s anti-discrimination policy; it is being applied to all employers recruiting on their campus.#160; As such, this policy is a neutral policy?as opposed to an anti-military one?and its enforcement does not violate the Solomon Amendment.
Their second major argument is the Solomon Amendment only mandates “access” to law schools for recruitment purposes; it does not demand equal access to these schools and any suggestion that it does ignores both the text of the Amendment and its history.#160; To the authors, the text of the Solomon Amendment may not “prohibit or prevent” military recruiters from having access to campus resources.#160; The text says nothing about a law school having to give the military every possible resource available.#160; The legislative history also suggests this; as Solomon himself argued that this Amendment would only apply to schools that had “barred” the military from recruiting on their grounds.#160; They also suggest that there is a massive disparity in DoD regulations on this issue and their litigating position.#160; DoD regulations state that schools only have to prove that access is “equal in quality and scope” when the school is not providing access; a far cry from the permanent requirement for equality that the DoD is arguing for in its litigation.#160; As a result of this, the law schools in question could not have violated a regulation that does not exist and the Solomon Amendment should not be applied in this case.
Since the Solomon Amendment only applies to anti-military policies?not neutral and universally applied guidelines?and that it only demands access, not equality, the Harvard Law School faculty argues that the Supreme Court should rule in favor of FAIR and prevent the federal government from pulling funding as a result to the schools’ enforcement of anti-discrimination policies.

By James Kirchick
Published Wednesday, October 15, 2003

Source:

http://www.yaledailynews.com/opinion/staff-columns/2003/10/15/anti-jag-policy-quashes-law-students-free-speech-r/

On Monday, the Yale Daily News reported that nearly half of the Yale Law School’s professors plan to sue the Department of Defense over its campus recruiting policies. In their haste, they ought to heed the words of of the free speech champion, and former Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis. In the 1927 case Whitney v. California, Brandeis expressed in his concurring opinion what has emerged as an essential condition in First Amendment legal thinking: in heated disputes, “– the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence.” Unfortunately, certain members of the faculty are pursuing an illiberal agenda by attempting to prevent Judge Advocate General Corps recruiters from meeting with students on campus.

The military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” policy has inflamed a national controversy in which an anonymous group of law schools sued the Defense Department over the Solomon Amendment. They plan to argue that the 1995 federal statute, which requires universities receiving federal funds to allow military recruiters on campus, violates the free-speech principles of the Constitution. Liberals have embraced the issue of gays in the military as one of civil rights. With a pervasive distaste for the armed forces, it is easy for the Left to attack the military’s policy on gays.

But what if the military’s decision to prohibit open gays from serving, aside from its unseemly un-American quality, is detrimental to our national security? Last November, the military discharged seven Arab-speaking linguists because of their homosexuality. At a time when we are fighting an Arabic-speaking enemy and when the need for trained Arabic speakers is dire, the stupidity of this policy could not be clearer. It is not the military’s concern who its translators sleep with, just that they speak their respective languages proficiently. Frank Kameny, one of the first gay rights advocates and a veteran of World War II, offered a tongue-in-cheek yet logically argued response. “To lower the quality of our armed services is to give aid and comfort to our enemies. But under Article III, Section 3 of the Constitution. giving aid and comfort to the enemy is a definition of Treason — anyone — who supports, administers, or is involved in the exclusion of gays from our armed services — is a traitor who should be indicted, prosecuted, tried, convicted, and hanged for Treason.”

Conservatives trumpet their toughness on national security but most of them (with notable exceptions like the late Barry Goldwater) oppose allowing gays to serve openly, placing their anathema to gay people over the national interest. But militaries throughout the Western world allow gays to serve openly. Britain, Canada, France and Israel, a country which by necessity has one of the most effective fighting forces on earth, allow open homosexuals to serve. What makes gays in the military such a political hot potato here is the influence of the religious right, a phenomenon unique to America and a major factor contributing to the military’s anti-gay policy.

But here at Yale, liberals are guilty of a similar ideological sin to their conservative opponents, for they, too, place dogma over the national interest. And by impeding students from seeking information on joining the JAG Corps, not only do they prevent our nation’s military from attracting the best and brightest minds, they are also undermining the principles of the First Amendment.

It is surprising that so many professors from a school as prestigious as Yale Law would sign onto a lawsuit that rests on such problematic legal ground. No one has forbidden law students, faculty or the administration from speaking out against “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” Thus it is difficult to understand how anyone’s free-speech rights are being violated. Opponents of the Solomon Amendment can stand at the law school with camouflage gags symbolically placed in their mouths and hang black sheets in its hallways, but actively preventing students from seeking information about joining the armed forces is a different action entirely. If anything, it is Yale Law School that violates the free association and speech rights of the JAG representatives and the students who wish to meet with them. Law students should have the same opportunity to receive information about the JAG Corps as they do to receive information about joining some big corporate law firm. It is not the University’s role to tell its students who they can and cannot meet with on campus. To do so prevents the free flow of information and contradicts the mission of a discursive intellectual community. Yale University has a binding agreement when it accepts federal money. If Yale breaches the contract by refusing military recruiters the right to interview students on campus, then the University should not expect the government to fund this obstruction. Unless the professors can prove that the Solomon Amendment is forcing them to violate the Constitution, which they cannot, they will have no case.

In addition to the general anti-military sentiment that is so prevalent on this campus, now one may be labeled a “homophobe” if he merely wants to discuss job opportunities with a military recruiter in a law school classroom. Case in point: only one student signed up to meet with the JAG recruiter last week and that appointment was eventually cancelled.

From a tactical perspective, preventing military recruiters from meeting with students will not change the military’s anti-gay policy and those advocates who so self-righteously believe that they are having an impact on this issue greatly exaggerate their own importance. If gay advocates ever wish to change the military’s unconscionable policy, they would be well-advised to encourage, and not hamper, military recruitment at a socially progressive campus such as Yale. Gay writer Paul Varnell wrote earlier this year in the Chicago Free Press that banning Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) programs on campus, which Professor Donald Kagan said was “a stain on our record,” has forestalled the revocation of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” by discouraging those very heterosexuals who oppose the policy from joining the armed forces. “In short,” he writes, “the effect of banishing ROTC and military recruiting by the most liberal, gay-accepting colleges and universities was to increase the proportion of recruits and young officers who are less accepting of gays, whose college experience was unlikely to counter negative views of gays, and who do not want gays in the military.” While claiming to be leading the fight for gay equality by snubbing their noses at the military, sympathizers of the gay cause are actually harming the movement’s prospects.

It pains me to no end that a country that preaches equality has not fully accepted many of its own citizens into the fold. It is maddening that one of the greatest national institutions is not open to me simply because of who I am. But it would be selfish and self-aggrandizing to let my personal disagreement with the military’s unfair policies get in the way of my peers who wish to seek information about serving their country. If the University itself were to join this lawsuit, an institution that touts its duty to produce public leaders would be thwarting that very ideal.

James Kirchick is a sophomore in Pierson College.

College Professor: “Real Freedom will come when American Soldiers Murder Superiors

Vows to kick young conservatives off campus

HERNDON, VA – Warren Community College English professor, John Daly, said that “Real freedom will come when soldiers in Iraq turn their guns on their superiors.” Rebecca Beach, a freshman at Warren Community College in Washington, New Jersey, received this unexpected reply to a recent email she sent the faculty at her school announcing the appearance of decorated Iraq war hero, Lt. Col. Scott Rutter, on Thursday, November 17 to discuss America’s accomplishments in Iraq.

In the email, Daly told Rebecca that he will ask students in his English and writing classes to boycott the event and also vowed “to expose [her] right-wing, anti-people politics until groups like [Rebecca’s] won’t dare show their face on a college campus.” Daly’s mean spirited and hateful comments were directed at Rebecca for organizing Lt. Col. Scott Rutter and for hanging up fliers contrasting the number of people killed under communism to those liberated under Ronald Reagan.

Since Professor John Daly has created a hostile learning environment for Rebecca, she is demanding that Warren Community College President William Austin institute seminars on free speech and sensitivity to teach intolerant leftists, such as Daly, to be respectful of differing opinion

Daly’s insane email to Rebecca also claimed that “CAPTIALISM has killed many more” people than communism [emphasis his] and that the “poor and working class people” are recruited to “fight and die for EXXON and other corporations.”

“John Daly was hired to teach English, not to verbally attack students and lead leftist protests,” said Jason Mattera, spokesman for Young America’s Foundation.

The full unedited text of Professor Daly’s email follows.

November 13, 2005

Dear Rebecca:

I am asking my students to boycott your event. I am also going to ask others to boycott it. Your literature and signs in the entrance lobby look like fascist propaganda and is extremely offensive. Your main poster “Communism killed 100,000,000″ is not only untrue, but ignores the fact that CAPITALISM has killed many more and the evidence for that can be seen in the daily news papers. The U.S. government can fly to dominate the people of Iraq in 12 hours, yet it took them five days to assist the people devastated by huricane Katrina. Racism and profits were key to their priorities. Exxon, by the way, made $9 Billion in profits this last quarter–their highest proft margin ever. Thanks to the students of WCCC and other poor and working class people who are recruited to fight and die for EXXON and other corporations who earning megaprofits from their imperialist plunders. If you want to count the number of deaths based on political systems, you can begin with the more than a million children who have died in Iraq from U.S.-imposed sanctions and war. Or the million African American people who died from lack of access to healthcare in the US over the last 10 years.

I will continue to expose your right-wing, anti-people politics until groups like your won’t dare show their face on a college campus. Real freedom will come when soldiers in Iraq turn their guns on their superiors and fight for just causes and for people’s needs–such freedom fighters can be counted throughout American history and they certainly will be counted again.

Prof. John Daly

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[Because of the extraordinary response to Maj. Jim Gant's paper, One Tribe At A Time, I've decided to leave it up all week in the "Number One Slot."  My ongoing interview with Chief Ajmal Khan Zazai will pick again next Friday; the Chief has been in Kabul all week, meeting with U.S. and British commanders, and we haven't had time to speak. So all's well that ends well!]

The downloadable and open-able .pdf of One Tribe is here, on the right. On a personal note, let me say again that I consider it a privilege to offer this document in full, not only because of my great respect for Maj. Jim Gant, who has lived and breathed this Tribal Engagement idea for years, but for the piece itself and for the influence it is already having within the U.S. military and policymaking community.

One Tribe At A Time (85) Major Jim Gant’s “One Tribe At A Time” to your computer

One Tribe At A Time is by no means a super-pro Beltway think tank piece. What it is, in my opinion, is an idea whose time has come, put forward by an officer who has lived it in the field with his Special Forces team members–and proved it can be done. And an officer, by the way, who is ready this instant to climb aboard a helicopter to go back to Afghanistan and do it again.

Questions and comments

At the moment, Maj. Gant is at Fort Polk, Louisiana, getting ready to deploy to Iraq, where he will lead an Iraqi commando battalion. He’ll be available in the meantime, however (depending of course upon time demands), to answer questions or take criticisms. Just respond in the comments section below. And I myself have further thoughts I’d like to offer on this subject in the coming weeks.

Here’s a quick one:

The most common response I anticipate to the Tribal Engagement concept (and it’s a valid criticism, shared by Maj. Gant) will go something like this: “Yeah, this is a great idea–but where are we going to find the men to implement it?”

Men for the job

Tribal Engagement Team members, should this concept be adopted, would be called upon to commit for multiple tours under the loneliest, harshest and most hazardous conditions imaginable. To succeed with the tribe they are assigned to, they would have to demonstrate impeccable combat credentials and, even rarer, possess the “people skills” to establish and maintain rapport across a cultural chasm—Western to Tribal Afghan—that has defeated every outside entity from Alexander the Great to the British and the Soviets. The task would be extraordinarily difficult, dirty and dangerous, and in the end would almost certainly be rewarded neither by career advancement (because the enterprise would be unprecedented and outside the normal channels of military promotion) nor by recognition from the public at large, who in all probability will rarely hear of it and wouldn’t understand or appreciate it if they did.

How can we identify and attract such men?

Do you remember this tiny, three-line ad from the London Times, December 29, 1913?

Men wanted for hazardous journey, small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful, honour and recognition in case of success.

5000 volunteers queued up in response to this advertisement, posted by Ernest Shackleton seeking crewmen for his Antarctic expedition.

I may be wrong, but I don’t think our young American warriors would respond with any less enthusiasm than their British cousins did a century ago to a similar call. Do you?

Again, many thanks to Maj. Jim Gant for writing One Tribe At A Time, to Printer Bowler for designing and editing the .pdf and to Callie Oettinger for managing the outreach. I’m proud to put this document in circulation with as much reach as this modest blog can offer. We all hope it proves of interest and of use.

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