College professors and teachers should be required to sign a loyalty affidavit under penalty of perjury, the Education Committee of the Massachusetts State Legislature proposed yesterday. The move is the Committee's latest effort to drive Communists from educational institutions.
Failure to sign the affidavit would automatically cost both private and public school instructors their teaching positions. Further punishment includes a fine up to $10,000 imprisonment up to one year, or both.
The Committee on Education will report the bill favorably to the House on Tuesday for legislative action. There were no dissenters, but five committeemen reserved rights on the bill.
The new bill amends the 1935 Teachers Both Law, and adds to a 1951 law outlawing all subversive organizations, particularly the Communist Party. An earlier bill, compelling schools and colleges to fire Communists, under penalty of losing their charters, was vetoed by the Committee on Education in a 10-5 vote on the eye of the Jennies Committee's hearings here.
Thomas J. O'Toole '42, professor of constitutional law at Northeastern University, and adviser on the constitutional aspects of the new bill, stated last night that "the bill may very well be unconstitutional." He added, however, that the proposed measure is less unconstitutional lban some others the Committee has drafted in the past.
Read more in News
Lacrosse Team to Face Tech Away; Freshmen Play Here