On Names at Yale

Despite months of contrary activism on campus, Yale has decided to retain the name of former U.S. Vice President and ardent defender of slavery John C. Calhoun for one of its residential colleges. We believe this is a mistake.

Even as a board that has historically been hesitant to support name changes, we see this situation differently. Calhoun was a politician known for little more than his strong defense of slavery’s existence and expansion through the constitutionally-questionable philosophy of nullification. When we opposed name changes in the past, we worried about the application of present-day morality to multifaceted figures from the past. But even by the standards of his own day, Calhoun is not a figure worth honoring.

We opposed the renaming of Harvard’s House masters because changing a title that the administration itself admitted had no direct relation to slavery makes little sense. We opposed the changing of the Law School’s seal, because of its similarly attenuated relationship to racial animus and the importance of reconciling the past with the present without erasing the troubling parts of our history.

In the case of Calhoun at Yale, however, we see an entirely different situation: Some figures from the past should remain there. Calhoun should certainly be remembered as a Yale alumnus and vice president of the United States who promoted deeply problematic ideas about slavery. But there is no positive part of his legacy we can point to in attempting to honor him.

At the same time this change was announced, Yale also made three other decisions about names on campus, naming two new residential colleges and replacing the title of “master” with “head of college.” The new colleges, named for Benjamin Franklin, a “personal role model” of the donor who provided the funds to construct the college, and Anna Pauline “Pauli” Murray, a civil rights activist and the first African American to receive a Doctor of Juridical Science degree from Yale Law School, will allow Yale to admit 200 more students each year.

The decision to retain Calhoun but change “master” is both confusing and inconsistent. It does not make sense to change a title with tenuous connection to slavery, but keep the name of a man who once argued on the floor of the Senate that slavery was “a positive good.”

Still, despite the unfortunate circumstances of these naming decisions, at least one deserves praise in its own right. Murray is more than deserving of the honor, and we commend Yale for celebrating her as a pioneer in racial and gender identity. While it’s important not to categorize people with labels they did not use, we are excited that Yale chose to honor someone who lived outside the norms of gender and sexual identity.

As we discuss these changes at Yale, it’s also important to remember that Harvard still plays a role in all of this: Murray was rejected from Harvard Law School simply due to her gender. This dubious connection underscores the undeniable value of elevating figures like Murray in our collective memories, and also the hard but necessary obligation to remember difficult periods of our history. With so many figures like Pauli Murray worth remembering, continuing to honor John C. Calhoun and pursuing contrived battles over titles like master will only set back real progress on inclusion.