Ohio State Controversy

List week the trustees of Ohio State University took it upon themselves to safeguard the nation's security. Giving to Ohio's president, Dr. Howard Bevis, the power to bar any speaker from addressing students an campus, they have shut their gates against all those "who seek to undermine the basic liberties of America."

Dr. Bevis' first step has been to deny a Quaker pacifist the right to speak at Ohio. Perhaps Dr. Bevis does not like Quaker pacifists. But to infer that the Quaker's purpose was "the overthrow of our government" is palpably ridiculous. The "overthrow" idea, however, was the trustees' criterion for curbing freedom of speech, and it was thus what Dr. Bevis had to adhere to in his ban. As a state institution, it is natural that Ohio's trustees and Dr. Bevis should try to determine what constitutes inciting to overthrow. But it is not their business; it is the business of the law courts to make this decision.

In Constitutional law, where "overthrow of the government" is tempered by the Clear and Present Danger clause, restriction of speech is valid. In the country's universities, however, where the unfettered exchange of ideas is essential, free speech must not be hampered. This becomes most important in a world which is frightened and looking for danger. Freedom of assembly and of speech in our educational institutions cannot be dependent upon the day-to-day prejudices and opinions of one group or one man.

The excesses which arise when the right to determine what men can say is treated as the province of university officials have been illustrated by the situation at Ohio State. It is encouraging at all events that every one at the University except the trustees are alive to the dangers of the new policy; religious and lay organizations alike have joined in protesting against it as a serious infringement of academic freedom.