music, [dId a gala picnic. Their mimeographed sheet, given out on Commencement morning, said, in part: ''''hile Columbia awards honorary degrees to distinguished men for their contributions to society, it will continue to sponsor IDA research, to suppress the ghettos and perpetuate the inhuman war in Vietr.am. While Columbia is afraid to hold its graduation outdoors where the community members can participate, it is not ashamed to arbitrarily buy up and tear down their homes all over Morningside Heights and West Harlem. vVhile Columbia congratulates students for their studies, it busts the unions of the employees who make that education possible.... We invite the residents of the Harlem and Morningside communities to join us in developing our political movements. . . . SDS leaders had decided to softpedal their SLX demands and continue their efforts to involve "the people" in seizing Columbia. As another of their fivers said, "1 one of those whose labor allows the University to function are represented at graduation," and "none of those whom the University and its policies affect-community people, in particular-are allowed to attend graduation." SDS thinking now seemed to be that conb'ol of Columbia should be turned over to "the people in the streets," that all University life should be directed by a vast consortium of students and groundskeepers, professors and campus dishwashers, research assistants and aged ladies in local rentcontrolled apartments, alumni and Harlem blacks, administrators and Vietnam veterans. Said one professor of political science, after reading the SDS notices, "It's a beautiful vision, full of brotherhood and based on total equality. I can see 'the people' meeting once a week in participatory democracy sessions under the lights in Yankee Stadium to decide on faculty salaries, medical school admissions, or the fate of the mathematics department." Commencement was preceded by the usual Alumni Federation Luncheon in Wollman Auditorium. Alumni Federation preSident Robert Lilley '33 said to the capacity crowd of alumni, "This is the best attended Commencement in years. We have six times the number of proxy votes for the election of new officers that we normally have." With deep sincerity, Lilley praised Dr. SPRING, 1968
Diplomat Charles "Chip" Bohlen, an honorary degree recipient, speaking at the Alumni Federation's Commencement lu.ncheon on Ju.ne 4. At the luncheon, President Kirk was given a standing ovation by the alumni.
Kirk, who rose and was given a standing ovation by the alumni. President Kirk then spoke briefly, saying, among other things, "Our Trustees are among the finest in the nation." (Two days before, on "Meet the Press," an BC Sunday television show, President Kirk denied that there was anything "basically wrong" with Columbia, said that if he had to do it all over again he would not have done anything in the past five weeks differently, and attributed the student rebellion largely to the Vietnam war and a "small, hard core" of anarchists and romantic revolutionaries.) Charles Eustis "Chip" Bohlen, a career diplomat and an honorary degree recipient, was the guest speaker. Labor leader David Dubinsky was on the dais as an honorary doctorate recipient also, but there was no Negro receiving an honorary degree. At 2:00, an hour before Commence-
ment began, Lewis Cole directed a march of some 20 radicals, led by two girls carrying red flags, to the five checkpoints to pick up the expected great crowd to join the leftist students. At the site of the new School of International Affairs, the first stop, the parade was to pick up members of the Morningside community. Only 18 persons were there. Worse, Cole and his marchers were booed and jeered at by the proletarian construction workers at the building site. At the second stop, Pupin Hall ("birthplace of the atom bomb"), only a handful of peace group representatives were waiting. One girl, cheWing gum, held a sign, "Welcome to Columbia, Home of Imperialism." There were very few "concerned parents" at Riverside Church; only a sprinkling of "students" at District Attorney Frank Hogan's Riverside Drive home; and almost no members of the "Harlem community" at the gym site. 93