After Evading ID Checks, Some Library Study-in Participants Remain Unpunished

Participants at two recent study-ins at Widener Library and the Harvard Law School Library left the premises before administrators managed to check their Harvard IDs. Now, it seems, they will escape punishment entirely.

Weeks after the study-ins — which occurred at Widener on Nov. 9 and the HLS library in Langdell Hall on Nov. 16 — participants have not been disciplined, a break from Harvard’s policy of issuing two-week library bans to study-in participants.

Silent study-ins have become a favored tactic for pro-Palestine protesters at Harvard, as well as faculty who argue the University’s penalties suppress free speech. Harvard has doled out consistent — if largely symbolic — library suspensions to participants, pointing to a University policy that bans protests in libraries.

After other study-ins this semester, participants were notified within two weeks that their access to the library where they conducted the demonstration would be temporarily suspended.

But Harvard Business School professor Reshmaan N. Hussam and Law School professor Andrew M. Crespo ’05, who helped organize the Widener Library study-in, both told The Crimson that participants had not received sanctions.

Third-year Law School student Corinne Shanahan, a co-president of the HLS chapter of the National Lawyers’ Guild, also wrote in a text message that she was not aware of any punishments that had been issued to participants in the Nov. 16 study-in. The NLG maintains a form to track library bans and assist students in filing appeals.

Shanahan joined the Langdell Hall protesters after they left the library but did not participate in the study-in.

Harvard Library spokesperson Kerry Conley declined to say why study-in participants were not punished and whether Harvard was able to identify the protesters. Conley also declined to say whether administrators made an attempt to identify participants after the two study-ins ended.

“We do not comment on individual matters related to library access or privileges,” Conley wrote in a statement.

—Staff writer Neil H. Shah contributed reporting.

—Staff writer Tilly R. Robinson can be reached at tilly.robinson@thecrimson.com. Follow her on X @tillyrobin.