College Organizations Recommend Sit-In Demonstrations in Maryland

The Boston Co-ordinating Committee of the Northern Student Movement is urging students of Harvard, Radcliffe, and other colleges in the Boston vicinity to participate in sit-in demonstrations to be conducted in Maryland next week-end.

At Harvard, the Young Democrats, the Liberal Union, the Congregational-presbyterian Fellowship and the Republican Advance for Equal Opportunity have endorsed the project and anticipate participation by their members.

At a special meeting held last night, the YDCHR passed a resolution of support for the sit-ins but urged that no picketing be included, nor placards carried. A spokesman for the organization noted that it was hoped that the demonstrations would be as peaceful and orderly as possible. Picketing, he said, could conceivably threaten such orderliness.

The February 24 sit-ins will be part of extensive anti-segregation demonstrations being conducted by the Baltimore Civic Interest Goup in conjunction with the Northern Student Movement, the NAACP, the Congress On Racial Equality, and other biracial organizations. According to plans for the projected demonstrations, biracial groups will enter restaurants in the Eastern Shore area of Maryland and leave peacefully if requested to do so. Under Maryland law, however, a trespasser cannot be ordered of the premises of a business open to the public until the management has read the state trespass acts to him.

The Maryland demonstrations which were begun last November have apparently been successful in integrating restaurants in the Baltimore, Eastern Shore, and Route 40 areas.

Students from Wellesley, Simmons, Thfts, Boston College, Andover-Newton Theological Seminary, M.I.T., and Harvard will leave Boston by bus on the opening of February 23, will participate in the sit-ins Saturday afternoon, and return Saturday night.

The Civil Rights Co-ordinating Committee has requested students Interested in participating in the Maryland sit-ins to call TR 6-1651 or TR 6-5075 prior to midnight tonight in order to arrange transportation.