The Press 'HarBus' Hassle

IF THERE are any controversial stories in this morning's HarBus News, the HarBus proprietors will not be able to guarantee that the paper actually gets distributed. One week ago, members of Business School Afro, who were fed up with some articles and an editorial dealing with black students, stole the 4000 copies of the newspaper, a free weekly published on Thursdays.

Pressure on the HarBus to be nothing more than a sandwich of advertisements and press releases is not something new. But the scene of the pressure has changed and the level has escalated, from a subtle phone call and intimidation in a student room to overt theft. When the old proprietorship tried last month to publish a mediocre expose of the Business. Assistance Program (BAP)-a student consulting service to Roxbury businesses-the paper's editor was telephoned by the associate dean and harangued in his own room by five black students. The result was delaying the BAP story for a week and watering it down even more.

The associate dean, Thomas Graves, said there was nothing at all unusual about his telephoning HarBus editor Jeff Chokel and asking him about the BAP story. Graves said, "I wanted to be sure that a story at this time couldn't complicate a proposal" to the Ford Foundation for hundreds of thousands of dollars. "Interfering with a newspaper is the last thing I want to do," Graves said. Chokel disagreed with Graves's analysis. Chokel said it was the only time Graves had called him at home and "the only time Graves called up to check on the nature of an article."

That night, just before Chokel went to the printers with the BAP story, five black students visited him in his room and insisted that he not run the article. One of the blacks was Wilbur Stevens, general manager of the HarBus, whose veto of the BAP editorial had been overridden. Chokel said, "I think now I would have refused to speak to Wil unless they left. Wil was bringing in outside forces who shouldn't have been here." A white proprietor said that the five black students "weren't going there to get 'no' for an answer."

When the BAP story and editorial finally appeared in the old proprietorship's final edition, on March 12, Chokel had left the new HarBus editor, Terry Schmidt, with a very hot potato. The BAP editorial was entitled "Our Very Own Chappaquiddick" and began, "This year the Business Assistance Program ran off a bridge."

SCHMIDT felt the first real pressure against the HarBus after a Chuck Richards column ran on April 9. Chuck Richards, a pseudonym of one of the old proprietors, had written about a dozen of his humor columns over the past year, poking fun at classes, dorm life, faculty, administration, and the University police. His April 9 column fabricates a Harvard Business School Game with a monopoly-type board. The next to last paragraph of his column states, "Another interesting square is Flunk Out. Anyone landing on this one automatically-loses the game, unless he holds a Minority Group card."

Two letters castigating Chuck Richards were printed in the following issue of the HarBus. But members of Afro stole all the April 16 newspapers from their distribution points across the campus. Chuck Richards said Schmidt's apology-appearing in this morning's paper-was not warranted. The apology was part of the agreement Schmidt reached with Afro. Referring to his column, Richards said, "That particular line wasn't meant any more seriously than any other line. To lift that one line out of context and brand it as racist is absurd. Somehow when it hits closer to home, it seems racist."

The HarBus has been eager to print dissenting columns from members of Afro. Both Chokel and Schmidt have made concerted efforts to attract black reporters to the HarBus and Schmidt finally succeeded, with a story in the April 16 issue which Afro still branded as racist.

Grover Walker, co-chairman of Afro, said, "We have discussed this with the HarBus and we have an understanding with them." It is uncertain whether this understanding will lead to Afro's looking over every story dealing with blacks. With its show of force, Afro has knocked out the baby teeth of the HarBus which grew while Chokel was editor. Schmidt will now have to decide between a toothless paper or a stronger set of permanent teeth which will have a lot more bite.