Dershowitz Confronts Bok On Absentee Honoraries

It outspoken Professor of Law Alan M. Dershowitz has his way. Harvard will soon award honorary degrees in absentia to political prisoners and dissidents.

Dershowitz and 13 other members of the Law School faculty last month asked President Bok to award honorary degrees to Nobel laureate Andrei Sakharoy and his wife. Yelena Bonner, both of whom are being held in internal exile in the Soviet Union Dershowitz also requested that Bok offer the Sakharovs medical treatment in Cambridge.

But the proposals by Dershowitz, a staunch civil libertarian, run against a long standing Harvard tradition that it does not award honorary degrees to anyone who does not attend the Commencement exercises in Harvard Yard.

Bok, in a June 5 letter to Dershowitz made public by the Boston Phoenix, said he would not be able to offer the Sakharovs an honorary degree just two days before June 7 Commencement exercises.

Thing of the Past

But Dershowitz said this week he has not given up hope. "Bok's attitude is a thing of the past," he said.

Dershowitz cited the example of the University of Pennsylvania, which broke with its longstanding tradition of not awarding honoraries in absentia to offer an award this year. to Sakharov, who is reportedly nearing death and may have already succumbed to the effects of a prolonged hunger strike.

Dershowitz said Harvard will change its policy if top administrators face a mass movement of students and faculty. "Bok doesn't seriously consider things unless he feels that not to do something would create more hassle than to do something, he said.

Dershowitz said he will try to organize faculty and students on the issue next year but will not operate through the University bureaucracy.

I don't know what the internal dynamics are and I simply don't care," he said.

Administration members interviewed yesterday refused to comment on Dershowitz's proposals, and Bok is on vacation and could not be reached for comment.

Stephen Stamas '53, chairman of the Board of Overseers, however, said. "The University has a well established policy. I have no indication that the University has any intention of changing its longstanding policy."

One member of the Board of Overseers, who asked not to be identified, said facetiously that it would be "heart-wrenching" for the University to depart from traditional practice, but added. "Nothing ventured, nothing wrenched."

Harvard officials said that the Dershowitz request is not the first time such an issue has arisen Last year, the University declined an honorary degree to Solidarity leader Lech Walesa, who was invited to deliver the Commencement address but could not make it to Cambridge.

One Harvard official, who asked not to be identified, said. "If Bok made it a very high priority, he could probably get it, but he may be worried that it would be some kind of political statement.