Bruise in the Night

Last Saturday night several Harvard students walking up Memorial Drive were suddenly chased by a group of hoodlums carrying clubs and other weapons. The students escaped into Winthrop House, but James Shine, a Yard Cop, was assaulted. According to the police records, Shine had to be "treated for bruises on back and arm."

This is one of four attacks against Harvard students that have taken place this summer; one of seven since the end of spring vacation. It is only the latest outbreak of a town-gown animosity that is as old as Harvard and, actually, as old as universities themselves.

This is not a simple problem. It is a social and economic problem, and the students themselves can't stamp it out by forming vigilante groups and calling revenge meetings such as the one held at Winthrop House last night. But neither can University Hall solve it by holding "the individual students responsible for participation in any public disturbance." As a matter of fact, it is rank idealism to assume that the antagonism can be wiped out altogether. As long as beautiful Georgian architecture casts its stately shadow on the slums of De Wolfe Street; as long as tweed coats and white-wall tires give life and breath to the spirit of "Gold Coast"; as long as University property is untaxed, the problem will exist. But it need not manifest itself in the form of group attack on unsuspecting students under the cover of dimmed street lights. It need not exist at the expense of teeth and jaw bones and eyes.

This is not a problem for the Dean's Office to cover up or for the student body to aggravate, but a problem to be handled by the recognized institutions set up to preserve law and order: at Harvard University that means the Yard Cops and the Cambridge policemen. It is easy to go off the handle about a roommate who has had his teeth kicked in. It is always easy to repay violence with violence. But if the student body persists in the vigilance activity of the sort that was launched last night, gang warfare will take it out on the innocent as well as the guilty and the beatings from both sides can only become worse and more frequent.

The police cannot solve the animosity, but they can handle its only if the students consciously try to keep out of fights. Given our cooperation, they must act, and act at once.