Thought Police
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Thought Police
In 1954, at the height of a period of anticommunist sentiment in the United States, the University of Michigan held a board of inquiry to investigate the political beliefs of three of its teachers. The three had been called to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), and all had refused to answer questions related to their membership in or knowledge of the American Communist Party. H. Chandler Davis, an Instructor in Mathematics, also refused to answer the University Committees questions, and was dismissed. Clement L Markert, Assistant Professor of Zoology, chose to cooperate with the Universitys board of inquiry, and was reinstated, with a letter of censure inserted in his personnel file. Mark Nickerson, Associate Professor of Pharmacology, also chose to cooperate, but was nevertheless dismissed . The University of Michigan, in effect, fired two of its faculty because they kept their political views to themselves.
To render the Universitys decision so simply, however, is unfair. The teachers were fired when they failed to agree (or to agree strongly enough) with the prevailing political philosophy, at a time when disagreement with that philosophy was deemed to be dangerous (how otherwise can the existence of the HUAC be interpreted?) to public safety. And, regardless of how real or imminent a danger their silence can now be determined to have been, the fact is that, at the time, the danger was believed to be real, and the response to it was arguably justifiable. For it can be argued that the University of Michigan–an institution created and supported by the government of the State of Michigan–was justified in revoking its sanction from employees who had failed to assist efforts to marginalize a philosophy demanding (so it was feared) the destruction of the government (and, therefore, of the University itself). That this argument was justifiable is powerfully indicative of the mood of the nation at the time: a mood that had, by 1954, become so powerful as to spur the exercise of administrative authority throughout the country in the effort to alleviate a pervasive fear. M.J. Heale succinctly describes the rapid buildup to the situation that led to the dismissals of Davis and Nickerson:
When the Truman administration launched the prosecution of Communist party leaders in 1948, when Senator McCarthy began waving his lists of allegedly subversive government employees in 1950, and when the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee (SISS) began to interrogate university professors about their political opinions in 1951, they were giving aid and comfort to anticommunist activists across the land. Those public officials and private citizens in every community who suspected that Americas great experiment in democratic freedom was being undone by an insidious Communist conspiracy, and those who calculated that they could make political capital out of such suspicions, could only
take heart from this legitimization of their cause from on high. (2)
The circumstances of the anticommunist fervor that swept the nation at this point in its history have been fully and ably documented; these investigations include work on all of the interrogations, suspensions, and dismissals of university professors for avowed or suspected Communist sympathy. I dont propose to add to the body of factual information that has been unearthed. I am more interested in an interpretation of the facts: how did the fact of McCarthyism change America? Specifically, what effect did it have in the realm of American higher educationЖone of its chosen battlegrounds?
The question of government interference in university matters did not, of course, originate with the HUAC interrogation of professors. Already in 1915, the newly-formed American Association of University Professors (AAUP) recognized, in its first published Bulletin, that “where the university is dependent for funds upon legislative favor, it has sometimes happened that the conduct of the institution has been affected by political considerations” (31). The impetus for publication was a perceived attack on academic freedom in American universities. The concept of academic freedom was not new in 1915 ; neither was it, however, sufficiently established that the AAUP felt that the term required no clarification. Accordingly, they set forth the this definition: “Academic freedom [from the perspective of the teacher] comprises three elements: freedom of inquiry and research; freedom of teaching within the university or college; and freedom of extra-mural utterance and action,” (20). In 1940 the AAUP saw fit to clarify yet further its definition:
(a) The teacher is entitled to full freedom in research and in the publication of the results, subject to the adequate performance of his other academic duties; but research for pecuniary return should be based upon an understanding with the authorities of the institution.
(b) The teacher is entitled to freedom in the classroom in discussing his subject, but he should be careful not to introduce into his teaching controversial matter which has no relation to his subject. 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.
(c) The college or university teacher is a citizen, a member of a learned profession, and an officer of an educational institution. When he speaks or writes as a citizen, he should be free from institutional censorship or discipline, but his special position in the community imposes special obligations. As a man of learning and an educational officer, he should remember that the public may judge his profession and his institution by his utterances. Hence he 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 he is not an institutional spokesman. The judgment of what constitutes fulfillment of these
obligations should rest with the individual. (49-50)
In addition to being rather longer than the 1915 statement, this later definition is interesting for the caveats it introduces to the concept of academic freedom: specifically, the warning “not to introduce . . . controversial matter,” and admonition to “remember that the public may judge his profession and his institution by his utterances.” Both of these new passages reflect an understanding of the power of public reaction to potentially unpopular ideas.
And Communism was ever an unpopular idea in America. What made it all the more unpopular, however, was the notion that Communism was inherently stealthy, sly,