To the Editor of the CRIMSON:

The Civil Liberties Committee of the Harvard Student Union wishes to congratulate the Harvard chapter of Phi Beta Kappa on its call for a committee to preserve academic freedom. The need for such a committee grows daily more apparent as college after college after college, with the exceptions of Yale and M. I. T., follows Harvard's rules of etiquette in refusing to allow Earl Browder to speak before student organizations in college buildings. We have, as yet, no assurance that the Harvard authorities are convinced that they "made a silly mistake in the Browder case" nor that they will not be encouraged by their success as a model for etiquette to take further steps in the future to preserve the 'proprieties'.

The CRIMSON's editorial of December 9 states that "the great majority of people and certainly the great majority of Harvard students would condone academic freedom in extravagant terms. But granted that academic freedom is a good thing, the constitution of an undergraduate committee to protect it is something else." Just as lip service to the American desire to keep out of war is no guarantee against our involvement in war, so lip service to civil liberties is no guarantee against their suppression. We feel that there has been sufficient evidence of infringement of academic freedom throughout the nation--witness the Browder case at Harvard and the recent Dies Committee attacks on the American Student Union--to make the formation of such a committee as PBK has called for a wise precaution at this time.

By taking this step to preserve the values of the academic world, Phi Beta Kappa has demonstrated that its position in that world is well deserved. Civil Liberties Committee of the Harvard Student Union.