The Summer Crime

In July, when the University shrinks into a Summer School, the CRIMSON changes from its self-supporting, six-tunes-weekly character into a weekly newspaper, partially subsidized by the administration. In the past, the CRIMSON has never bothered very much about any exact contract with the Summer School, concerning what it should or should not print. Usually, its editorial page has assumed a non-partisan character, and its summer editors have concentrated their efforts on Summer School news, reviews, and an occasional sports story. When there has been a difference of opinion, both parties have always yielded a bit. Conscious of the School's financial investment, the SUMMER CRIMSON has allowed the Weld Hall administration considerable voice in the paper's management, unlike its winter counterpart which stands aloof from all Faculty interference.

This July, the SUMMER CRIMSON published an editorial attacking the Eisenhower administration for its "apathy" in failing to take advantage of the turmoil behind the Iron Curtain. Alan K. Campbell, Assistant Director of the Summer School, complained that the editorial was not in keeping with the CRIMSON-Summer School precedent. This difference should have remained one between the two involved parties; instead it suddenly exploded into an alleged attack on "freedom of the press." A former CRIMSON editor, working for the Boston Globe, got the story, printed the bare facts minus the background, and soon had it buzzing across the nation's wire services. Immediately, Campbell and William Yandell Elliott, Director of the Summer School, were opening virulent letters from alumni and faculty denouncing them for underhanded censorship. One of them came from Law Professor Zechariah Chafee, Jr., who had read enough only to convince himself that this was a stroke against free speech.

The CRIMSON, placed in a martyr's position by a public regrettably only half-acquainted with the facts of the matter, was beginning to feel very sorry about the whole affair. Meanwhile, Weld Hall found its villainous role extremely uncomfortable and began to needle the paper for all kinds of past errors which had never before even entered the controversy. The summer paper finally agreed to publish without editorials, and as a face-saving gesture changed its name to The Summer News. But the tempest magnified from a little harmless wind left both the CRIMSON and the Summer School smarting from publicity which did not help either in the least. -MICHAEL MACCOBY   -Reprinted from the Alumni Bulletin, September 26, 1953.