For the past two years or so, Brown University has been the scene of an intense controversy concerning the limits of student freedom and responsibility. Ranged on the one side is the administration, whose philosophy can perhaps best be summed up as "giving the students only as much freedom as we feel they can handle." Standing on the other side is virtually the entire undergraduate body, which feels that the administration is much too strict, and which, in some cases, purports to see everywhere the influence of a "Big Brother" from University Hall.

If the old adage "Where there's smoke, there's fire" can be applied to this situation, one can assume that the University must be guilty of at least a few repressive measures. A close examination reveals that in some areas it most certainly is--sometimes through design, sometimes naively, sometimes through necessity.

Chastisement Of Paper

The most vocal anti-administration organ at Brown is the Brown Daily Herald. In its treatment of this student paper, the University has often appeared somewhat repressive. Although there is no outright censorship of the paper, the administration has occasionally taken it upon itself to chastise the student editors for criticizing the University. This can best be seen in two specific cases, one concerning a letter to the editor, and the other involving an editorial.

The letter to the editor was written by David E. Labovitz, news director of the Brown Daily Herald and reputedly a radical. After the deans had spoken to a meeting of students and had left unanswered certain questions on parietal rules, Labovitz wrote his letter requesting that they make their policies and reasons more public. He was then called up to see various deans. "They gave me hell and put a copy of the letter in my record," he said.

This was not an isolated case, for several other boys were also summoned to explain their criticisms. K. Roald Bergethon, dean of the college, explained that he called up two or three boys last year for various reasons, but "not primarily because they wrote a critical letter." He said he was mainly interested in finding out exactly what the complaint was so he could understand it better. Labovitz agreed that Bergethon seemed sincerely interested in solving problems, but he criticized the other deans for "rapping him (Labovitz) on the knuckles." At any rate, a dean would have to be somewhat naive not to realize that any call to his office is apt to be intimidating to a certain extent.

The editorial alluded to above was written about an incident involving compulsory chapel. It seems Labovitz and another student got up and walked out of the middle of a sermon on the material advantages of church membership. Labovitz says he was then called up by Edward R. Durgin, dean of students, and told that "if you don't like chapel, you shouldn't be at Brown." The Herald wrote an editorial criticizing various aspects of chapel, and they in turn were criticized. "I didn't feel that that was a very just move on the part of the University," William R. Bollow, editor of the Herald said afterward. "We went to see them and President Keeney spent half an hour bawling us out. He thought we were being irresponsible."

Influence Over Activities

One of the chief complaints among Brown undergraduates is that the University exerts too strong an influence over student activities and organizations. As one talks to the students about this, one hears four examples cited over and over again.

The most popular of these is the band issue. It seems that the University controls the purse strings for all class dances, and that it has set an unofficial limit of around $2000 to be spent on a band. Unfortunately, the students often want to hire a big name band, which usually requires a larger sum of money. But the University feels that a big weekend doesn't necessitate a big name band, Robert Minnerly, chairman of the 1956 spring weekend, explained. "They fear the band would send an inferior group of players for an exorbitant sum," Minnerly added. "They're afraid the students will get gypped by big-time promoters." He added that the only way his committee could get money, even for posters, was to have a requisition slip signed by the associate dean of students.

David Lewis, president of the Cammarian Club, Brown's Student Council, also felt that the University was afraid to let the students take too much of a chance with their money. "The students aren't given enough chances to make mistakes," he said.

A second example frequently cited is the case of the short-lived sports car club. The club was allegedly outlawed at Brown because there were non-Brown students in it, a factor which limited the University's control over it. "The students would like to have more control over their own organizations," Lewis said, "but lately the University has started to clamp down. Had the students more say in the matter, the sports car club would probably not have been removed."

The Nixon Incident

A third example uppermost in the students' minds took place in early October. A request by the Young Republican Club to invite vice-President Nixon to a morning rally on the campus was turned down by Samuel T. Arnold, provost of the University, because the noise "might be very disruptive to classes." The Brown Daily Herald took a very dim view of this and felt the Young Republicans should have protested the decision. But as Lewis explained, "If you are bringing a major speaker here, the University must know all about it before he can come."

The fourth case cited by most students is actually very little understood by them. The general consensus seems to be that the University exercises some sort of influence over the choice of plays put on by the drama groups. But the influence here does not consist of controls from without. As William Talbot, president of the Sock and Buskin, explained, his group has faculty members, and consequently any decision it makes is naturely not a purely student decision.