Four years ago, 200 students occupied University Hall to demand that ROTC be removed from Harvard, and most of the rest of the campus joined them in the two-week strike which ensued--a strike whose primary demand was that the soldiers leave for good. The Faculty also voted that ROTC be expelled.

We would caution President Bok that most of the University is likely to oppose yesterday's offhand suggestion, some more militantly than others. He is treading in extremely dangerous water. He should swim to shore before September.

EQUAL ADMISSIONS

RETURNING ALUMNI have no doubt been impressed by the change in Radcliffe's relation to Harvard. The increased number of women students, the more overt exercise of personal freedom, and coresidential living are clear steps forward from earlier days. But hesitant steps forward are not the same as equality for women. Harvard cannot demonstrate such a commitment without admitting men and women in equal numbers.

Arguments against equal admissions have proven specious. Contrary to predictions, colleges which have moved toward sexual equality have not suffered decreases in the contributions of tradition-minded alumni. Women graduates, it has been said, would contribute less money to Harvard than male alumni. Last Spring, the average pledge of Radcliffe seniors was higher than that of Harvard seniors.

It has also been argued that formal "non-discrimination" is a better policy than "one-to-one." But Harvard's past insistence on discriminating against women and the potential for disguising de facto discrimination under such a declared principle makes such a policy suspect at Harvard.

Harvard must adopt a deliberate equal admissions policy which entails devoting equal personal and financial resources to recruiting, scholarships, and personal services for men and women as well as assuring that qualified men and women teachers and workers will be hired in equal numbers. The Harvard and Radcliffe admissions offices should be combined to make the pursuit of this goal feasible.

Current alumni and the students graduating today can make a substantial contribution to the equal admissions effort. They can lend their support to today's women's demonstration by contributing to Harvard only with the stipulation that the University adopt an equal admissions policy. Contributions for this purpose can be sent to the equal admissions fund established by the Radcliffe Class of '71.

We urge support for today's demonstration and emphasize the importance of ongoing pressure by financial contributers to this University to create an equal admissions policy.

AFFIRMATIVE ACTION

FOR THREE YEARS now, the University has failed to meet Uncle Sam's requirement for a non-discriminatory hiring plan. And after a quarter of a million dollars, Harvard's latest endeavor appears no more likely to succeed. Given the government's vague standards, Harvard's delinquency in reaching an acceptable equal employment plan can only indicate its determination to get away with as little as possible.

Instead of searching for the most minimally acceptable guidelines for increasing the numbers of women and minority employees, the University should be drawing employment plans that will ultimately reverse traditional patterns of discrimination and help to destroy stereotyped sex-role patterns.

While the University has pledged a commitment to the increased hiring of women and minority group members at all levels in the Administration, faculties, and among salary-and-wage employees, it has also proposed that their numbers grow by less that 1 per cent in the coming two years. The University cannot seriously contend that such token statistical increases represent affirmative action that will eventually lead to truly equal employment.

Furthermore, the Administration's secrecy in compiling its data and developing its proposals runs counter to the ideal of an open University for which any affirmative action plan should stand. The University distributes publicly only abridged versions of the affirmative action documents it submits to HEW. And although the institution is not required by government directive to divulge the contents of its plan to its students or faculties until the proposal is accepted by HEW and becomes binding policy for the University, surely Harvard has nothing to lose by making all of its plans available to interested parties.

Once again the Administration is attempting to palm off a plan that falls far short of any real demonstration of commitment to the policies it has no trouble verbalizing. The University's obligation is not merely to meet the substandard requirements of the Federal government, but to begin immediate active recruitment of women and minority groups employees so that the near future will see a Harvard whose administrators, faculty members, and workers include equal numbers of men and women in all the ranks, receiving equal compensation for their duties.