Reston and Fairbank Gel Degrees At First Joint H-R Commencement

Harvard today conferred honorary degrees on 15 men and one woman, including James B. Reston, columnist and vice president of the New York Times, John K. Fairbank '29, Francis Lee Higginson Professor of History, and founder and director of Harvard's East Asian Research Center; and Cardinal Leon-Joseph Suenens of Belgium, world leader of the ecumenical movement in the Catholic Church.

Antonio Carrillo Flores, Mexico's Secretary of Foreign Relations, Luis A. Ferre, Governor of Puerto Rico, and Joseph Luns, Foreign Minister of the Netherlands and senior among foreign ministers of the world, received honorary Doctors of Law degrees.

At its 319th Commencement, Harvard singled out five men who have helped govern the University. In addition to Fairbank are: Baltimore lawyer William Luke Marbury, recently retired Senior Fellow of the Corporation; Thomas D. Cabot '19, a former Overseer and Trustee of Radcliffe College; Don K. Price, dean of the Kennedy School of Government; and James R. Reynolds '23, fundraising adviser to two Harvard presidents from 1949 to 1969. Reynolds received a Doctor of Humane letters; the other four received Doctors of Law.

Two blacks, Dorothy I. Height, Y. W. C. A. executive and President of the National Council of Negro Women, and Louis E. Martin, influential black journalist and special minorities advisor to Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, also received Doctors of Law.

In the arts, Harvard honored American composer Elliott C. Carter '30 with a Doctor of Music and architect Marcel Breuer, master of the famous Bauhaus in Dessau, Germany, with a Doctor of Arts.

Danish astrophysicist Bengt Stromgren of the University of Copenhagen received a doctorate of Science.

J. Edward Lumbard Jr. '22, Chief Judge of the U. S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in New York, received a doctorate of Law.

Exercises

Today's commencement included a special address of concern from graduating students, read by James Foster, a graduating law student. Foster told the 15,000 persons in Tercentenary Theatre, "We do not accuse you today," and asked adults to join with American youth to stop the war in Southeast Asia and political repression at home.

For the first time in history, a woman undergraduate, Kirsten E. Mishkin '70, gave the Latin Oration. Her subject was Woman's Liberation. She was the only woman speaker.

Reston

A Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, Reston is perhaps the most popularly known honorary degree recipient in a group which heavily favors foreign dignitaries and sons of Harvard.

Graduated from the University of Illinois in 1932, he began his career as a publicist for the Cincinnati Baseball Club and sports writer for the Associated Press. He has been a former London and Washington correspondent for Associated Press and the New York Times, and headed the Washington Bureau of the Times before becoming vice president in 1969. Reston received a Doctor of Letters.

Cardinal Suenens has been one of the leaders in the liberalization of the Catholic Church. He became a Cardinal in 1962 and moderator of the Vatican II Council during the height of Pope John XXIII's papacy.

In conferring his honorary doctorate of Law, President Pusey said, "The dawning spirit of ecumenism is encouraged by the deep faith and liberal spirit of this dedicated man."

Fairbank

Fainbank, foremost U. S. expert on East Asian Studies, founded Harvard's East Asian Research Center in 1959, which now includes one of the most comprehensive China study programs in the world.

A former ambassador to China during World War II, Fairbank was falsely labeled a Communist during the McCarthy era for advocating that the United States accept the fact that Nationalist China had lost the war. In the '50's, the stigma of McCarthyism forced him to recede from public life and continue his teaching at Harvard.

Carrillo

Carrillo received the doctorate of Law for being a "brilliant scholar-diplomat, honored servant of his country, friend of ours; his notable career has advanced amity and understanding in our hemisphere," according to the Harvard citation.

A former ambassador to the United State, Carrillo was director of the National School of Jurisprudence.

A millionaire industrialist who equates business success with social responsibility, Ferre described himself as "revolutionary in my ideas, liberal in my objectives, and conservative in my methods."

Height

Height has been a leader in the expansion of both blacks' and women's rights for the last 15 years. She was instrumental in the revitalization of the Y. W. C. A. as a member of its national board, and is currently a member of the President's Advisory Council on the Status of Women and President of the National Council of Negro Women, a confederation of 25 Negro Women's organizations.

Martin served as deputy chairman of the Democratic National Committee in

He became Governor of Puerto Rico in 1968 after strongly advocating eventual statehood for the territory, and is known for his liberal labor policies and profit-sharing managerial techniques, the early '60's. In this role, his behind-the-scenes conversations with Presidents Kennedy and Johnson led to the appointment of scores of Black Americans to high government positions.

Now, as co-owner and publisher of Sengstacke Publications, he operates a chain of black newspapers throughout the country.

Architect Marcel Breuer has designed several buildings in both Europe and America. One of the most famous is the UNESCO headquarters in Paris. From 1937 to 1942 he was a partner of the late Walter Gropius in teaching at Harvard and practice in Cambridge.

Price

Price was appointed dean of the Graduate School of Public Administration in 1958 and continued as Dean when the school was renamed the Kennedy School of Government in 1966.

He was a pioneer in the study of science and technology's impact on political institutions and public society.

He is also the first social scientist to head the American Academy for the Advancement of Science in the last 30 years.

Three of Harvard's 16 honorary degrees went to top administrators in the University. Cabot, a Harvard Overseer and Radclice Trustee, was hailed as a "generous and conscientious son" who has served the community with "perception, energy, an dconcern." Reynolds, one of Harvard's most successful fundraiser, was praised for his "genial spirit, integrity, and devotion."

Marbury

The honorary degree for Marbury came as no surprise. A member of the Corporation since 1948, Marbury stepped down as Senior Fellow last January after 22 years. He is president of the Peabody Institute of Baltimore and a former chairman of the U. S. Commission of Higher Education.

Also not surprising was the fact that Harry S. Truman did not receive an honorary degree for the 26th time since he became President in 1945.