Middlebury’s Principles Require Discipline – Letters
March 14 | Posted by mrossol | American Thought, Losing Freedom, Politically correct, The LeftThese comments in Letters to the Editor, are very, very good.
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WSJ Letters to the Editor, 3/14/2017
Jay Parini and Keegan Callanan, professors at Middlebury College, have set out principles for their institution following the campus mob action that prevented Charles Murray “from communicating with his audience.” (“Middlebury’s Statement of Principle,” op-ed, March 7).
Setting out principles is the easy part. The challenge for administrators and faculty is to decide what to do when students and faculty violate those principles. Do you give them a pass and republish the principles? Do you hold education and discussion sessions? Do you expel the violators? Some of the Middlebury students used “hate” language. Perhaps they did not think this was the case since their own views of their actions were justified—at least in their minds. The president and trustees of Middlebury have a challenge. Will the faculty help them meet the challenge or will the faculty opt to just issue principles?
FRANK NICOLAI
Fort Washington, Md.
“As Mr. Murray was leaving, a group of as-yet-unidentified assailants mobbed him and seriously injured one of our faculty colleagues. In view of these unacceptable acts, we have produced a document stating core principles that seem to us unassailable.” If the principles were followed nationwide, they would end the climate of political correctness that pervades nearly all college campuses and re-establish free speech and other core constitutional rights for students and faculty.
Nowhere among the platitudes listed do the professors call for the rule of law.
There is no mention that the individuals who assaulted their colleague should be arrested and prosecuted. Students who crossed the line of peaceful protest to disrupt and shut down Mr. Murray’s lecture should be severely disciplined. Without the backbone of justice, “unassailable principles” have little or no meaning.
RON SCHMID
Watertown, Conn.
The signatories of the Middlebury College Core Principles document forgot to include a final paragraph, which should have read: Any student, if determined by due process, doesn’t adhere to these principles, will have a letter of reprimand placed in his or her file, be dismissed from Middlebury College and forfeit the balance of that semester’s tuition.
THOMAS W. ANDREWS
Longwood, Fla.
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