TEACH-INS" EMBARRASS JOHNSON ADMINISTRATION
By Evelyn Sell
. The rapid and spectacular. growth of the university "teach= in" is evidence of the unpopularity of the Johnson administration's policies in south Vietnam. On March 24 more than 3,000. students. and — scores of faculty members engaged in the first teach-in at the University of Michigan. In an all-night, twelve-hour series of lectures, discussions, meetings and outdoor rallies, the. students and: professors.explored. the. shameful history of. American intervention .in southeast Asia, Encouraged by the success of this first venture, the professors organized the Inter-University Committee for a Public Hearing on Vietnam and succeeded in establishing 150 chapters on campuses across the nation. Some 50 universities held teach-ins similar to the original one,
On May 15 the Inter-University Committee sponsored a national teach-in in Washington, D.C. Supporters and speakers included some of the most distinguished names in the academic community: David Riesman, famed Harvard sociologist; Dr. Benjamin Spock, author of child-rearing books; Hans J. Morgenthau, of the University of Chicago and a leading American writer on international relations; Robert M. Hutchins, former president of the University of Chicago and presently with | the center for Study of Democratic Institutions ; Isaac Deutscher, internationally famous author-lecturer.
More than 100 campuses in 35 states participated in the Washe ington teach-in through radio and television hook-ups. About 5,000 professors and students from all over the country participated directly in the Washington meeting and another 100,000 gathered in the local meetings across the country. Add to this number, hundreds of thousands.more Americans who learned of the teach-in through radio news broadcasts, special television shows and front-page stories in’ local newspapers. i .
a 2Lm
The national teach-in was significant both for its strength in rallying behind it vigorous opponents of United States actions in southeast Asia and for its weaknesses in failing to link its welldocumented, well-presented denunciations of American foreign policy with an equally clear-cut program of action.
When compared with the almost total lack of organized opposition to governmental crimes in Vietnam, the national teach~in stands out as a healthy and needed step forward. However, when compared with the April 18 march on Washington of 20,000 students demanding immediate withdrawal of United States troops, the appeal for immediate negotiations in Vietnam voiced by most of the scholars gathered in Washington marked a more equivocal stand.
Even the administration supporters participating’ in the teachin debates called for negotiations! —
The anti-administration professors could only differentiate themselves in their call for negotiations with "the Viet Cong" [Front of. .National Liberation] and official recognition of "Red China," Johnson's hypocritical speeches calling for negotiations and his’ brief cessation of air strikes against the north seemed to have convineed some of his critics that he was paying heed to their demands, Some professors at the Wayne State University teach-in, for example, stated they were for withdrawal but it was an unacceptable demand to Johnson; negotiations were acceptable -- so it was smarter to ask for what could be gotten than to ask for what wags really needed! (When you play the game in accordance: with capitalist rules, you're sure to lose,)
“Although the professors at the Washington teach-in traced and
criticized United States policies in southeast Asia as a whole, they barely touched on the matter of American troops being rushed into the Dominican Republic. Student groups were quick to respond -to the events in. the Caribbean. On May 5 hundreds of students from the University of California marched on the local draft board, presented - the board co-ordinator with .a black coffin and stated this was. done as a “symbolic protest" against "the invasion of the Dominican Republic." Forty of the students publicly burned their draft cards during this demonstration. The professors in Washington stuck very closely to their assigned topic; they barely mentioned the new outrages committed by the United States government in the Caribbean,
Despite its shortcomings, the national teach-in-movement has been a terrible embarrassment for the Johnson administration... A month after the first teach-in of March 24, the State Department announced plans for "an educational campaign" to counter criticisms from students and professors. The Detroit Free Press reported, “Informed sources disclosed that. officials feel an immediate counteroffensive is needed because of evidence that student demonstrations and professional 'teach-ins! are misleading Communist policy makers
about America's determination in Vietnam." The educational counteroffensive didn't silence the demonstrations and after the national teach=in of.May 15 the Detroit Free Press carried another article entitled "Campus Criticism Irks U.S. Envoys.'
"According to the U.S. diplomats," the article stated, "the Reds (i,e., "Communists in Hanoi and Peking') anticipate a collapse of support within the United States for ‘the government's Vietnam policies much the same way that French public opinion aroused itself against its government before and following the fall of Dien Bien Phu...The debate in the United States -- such as it is ~- has pro-= vided the Reds with fresh hope. And it is this that makes the American diplomats! work so frustrating and difficult."
On April 23 Secretary of State Dean Rusk denounced the campus protests against U.S. policies in Vietnam, Rusk said, "I continue © to hear and see nonsense about the nature of the struggle there, I sometimes wonder at the gullibility of educated men and the stubborn disregard of plain facts by men who are supposed to be helping our young to learn -- especially to learn how to think,"
The day before the national teach-in, George Meany, president of the mammoth American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations, sharply castigated academic opponents of President Johnson's foreign policy. Meany used the same argument often heard from the military brass hats and the State Department policy makers: the American public doesn't know what is going on in Vietnam and therefore is incapable of judging the situation in an intelligent fashion, only those who hold the true inside information are competent to dictate foreign policy. One of the strongest virtues of the teach-in movement is its insistence that the public should know what is going on in Vietnam. ;
: Eric Wolf, University of Michigan anthropologist and one of the. original organizers of the teach-in, stated that he and his associates reject "the assumption that we are incompetent to make a judgment because we do not have access to the immediate confidential intelligence available to high officials."
George Kahin, professor of government and director of the Southeast Asia Program at Cornell University, declared during his speech at the national teach-in, "When the American public faces the prospect of war, it has the ‘right to full and honest answers," He questioned the Johnson administration's readiness to supply those answers.
Prof, Kahin's remarks were particularly discomforting to the administration because he was to be the principal debater against McGeorge Bundy, special assistant to President Johnson for national security affairs. Bundy sent a last minute note withdrawing from the confrontation. Eric Wolf explained, "We were particularly inter-
ow? Ban
ested to have Mr. Bundy not only because he is one of the top policy makers, but also because his position in public affairs resulted from the status he earned among his colleagues in the academic community." It was later revealed that Bundy was unable to attend the teachin because he had flown to the Dominican Republic for a top-level meeting. However, the administration sent no one to replace their spokesman. Many students and faculty members felt that Bundy's -absence and the lack of any comparable substitute proved that the administration was unable to defend its policies. Many were angered at the government and Bundy's arrogance at cancelling out at the last minute .
Speaking for fellow faculty members who participated ina two-day teach=in at the University of Wisconsin, Dr. William - = - . Williams, professor of history, stated that his colleagues and he “are ‘concerned with the crisis in representative government involved in the Administration's policy of secrecy, its persistent refusal ‘to engage in candid open debate with its critics, and its regular disregard of facta which undercut its own rationalizations."
‘These remarks and the reactions voiced during the many teachins reveal a deep-going loss of confidence in the government's ability to cope with the global. problems now facing mankind. When the people of a country feel that their ruling class can no longer handle the reins of power, explosive social forces are brought much closer to bursting. The teach-ins have given. clear indication of this loss of confidenee in the political and military leaders of the United States and have encouraged people to speak out more forthrightly on their opposition to the war-provoking activities of the administration. :
“The sponsors of the national teach-in plan to keep their organization intact. They will try again to arrange a confrontation with Bundy. They will help arrange local campus discussions of foreign affairs (preferably with public officials), supply informa-tion and literature and conduct periodic national teach-ins patterned on the May 15 meeting. Some of the sponsors want to continue the Inter-University Committee as a permanent forum for discussion where both points of view could be aired while other sponsors urged the committee to engage in direct political action.
If the committee can be diverted into sterile debates with administration lackeys, its force and vigor and social function will dissipate completely. If it links itself up with the more militant student movement against American imperialism, it can add social weight and the luster of academic prestige to the struggle against the biepartisan foreign policy of Johnson, Goldwater & Co. Regardless of its future, the Inter-University Committee has succeeded in focusing national and international attention on the deep repugnance of the American people to the escalation of the war in Vietnam and it has forced the administration to pay some heed to the growing
H-27-.
clamor for a cessation of hostilities in southeast Asia.
The administration's disregard for the demands of the Ameri-~ can people -~ expressed so overwhelmingly in the vote against Goldwaterism in the 1964 election -- and its persistent arrogance towards the well-being of the people of the United States and the world shows clearly that scholarly debates are not enough. Careful research and an intelligent presentation of the facts and the problems involved are helpful and serve a useful purpose but as the founders. of the United States said so aptly in the Declaration of Independence:
"That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends (Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness}, it is the. Right of the People to alter or abolish it; and to institute a new Government..."
Most Americans have had to memorize the Declaration of Independence during their school years. The words ring loud and clear across the years,