What do Michael E. Kinsley '72, Grover G. Norquist '78 and Susan C. Faludi '81 have in common besides Harvard diplomas? All three were Crimson editors who espoused passionate and divergent political views during their undergraduate years.

While political radicalism at Harvard has declined since the 1969 takeover of University Hall and the 1972 storming of Mass. Hall, issues of ideology and political justice remain central to the thinking of Crimson staff, just as they are still considered by the University community as a whole.

A Charged Question

Being asked, "What are your politics?" has been a rite of passage for prospective editors of The Crimson since 1973. Over the last twenty-five years, however, the range of acceptable, and therefore most common, responses has changed--from "radical" in the '70s to "left" in the '80s to "Democrat," "centrist," and even the occasional "Republican" in the '90s.

Jonathan H. Alter '79, who held the now-defunct position of Crimson political editor, recalls how he was "booed in a good-natured way" when he identified himself as a "New Deal liberal" in 1975. "Liberalism was then considered a sell-out," Alter, who is now a senior editor at Newsweek, says, noting that "liberals" were not far enough left for the political atmosphere of the time.

Leftists so dominated The Crimson in the '70s that although political discussions occurred "all the time," according to Christopher B. Daly '76, another political editor of the paper, their scope was limited by unanimity among the participants.

"We lived it and breathed it, but we were rarely challenged on politics because we all agreed," says Daly, who is now a journalism professor at Boston University and the New England correspondent for The Washington Post.

Stephen J. Chapman '76, a Crimson editor and outspoken conservative in the early '70s, remembers being "one of four or five people maybe who considered themselves moderate or conservative out of fifty or sixty."

"We did get to present our view," Chapman, currently a columnist at the Chicago Tribune, says. "There were some people who detested us, but most people were civil despite thinking we were crazy."

Alter characterizes the treatment of political nonconformists not as "ostracism" but "as a source of amusement."

"Conservatives seemed a bit of an oddity," Alter says.

Radical Coverage

Former Crimson editors from the Vietnam War era agree that radicalism was both pervasive and influential.

Journalism became a vehicle for social activism as students joined the paper not because they were interested in writing, per se, but to promote their causes.

James K. Glassman '69, a Crimson managing editor, regards his class as the last for whom "the politics was just the subject matter, and journalism was the centerpiece."