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James Wilson Will Speak At Today's SFAC Meeting

NEWS ANALYSIS

James Q. Wilson, professor of Government and head of the University Committee on Cambridge community relations, has agreed to meet with the Student-Faculty Advisory Council today. The meeting will be open to the public and is scheduled for 4 p.m. at the Winthrop House junior common room.

SFAC members had expressed a desire to exchange ideas with representatives from the Wilson Committee before it made its report to the Faculty. Stanley Hoffman, professor of Government, arguing for this position at the last meeting, pointed out that if SFAC waited until after the Wilson report had been made public it would lose its chance to influence the decisions of the committee.

The Council eventually decided to invite Wilson to appear before it. Clearly, SFAC, not wishing to be by-passed on any deliberations concerning community affairs, wants a genuine dialogue with Wilson.

Attempted Probe

The fear that Wilson might decline to appear or that he might agree to do so only if the meeting were closed to the public seems to have been unfounded. Nevertheless, it is difficult to guess exactly how much Wilson will reveal about his Committee's report because such reports are usually kept secret till they have been presented officially. Wilson may attempt to probe the feelings of the SFAC members without revealing any of his own but this maneuver will almost certainly be challenged.

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SFAC, at its last meeting, also sent a letter to Dean Watson asking that he explain his remarks about "sons of communists" being responsible for much of the student dissent at Harvard. It is understood that Dean Watson has sent SFAC a statement of his views and that this statement will be presented to the full Council at today's meeting.

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