Yard Protests a Vital Part of Harvard History

To the editors:

Friday’s staff editorial (“The PSLM Must Go”, April 20) criticized the living wage demonstration in the Yard, largely because it “disrupted the lives of the unlucky student” who live there. The editorial board ignores both the proud history of Yard demonstrations and the importance of the living wage campaign to Harvard’s educational and leadership role.

In January, 1961, life in the Yard was brought to a complete halt when almost the entire student body gathered to greet Overseer and President-elect John F. Kennedy ’40. In the 60’s and 70’s the issues of civil rights and Vietnam often interfered wtih normal activites in the Square and the Yard.

But the Harvard community’s hospitability and tolerance for such activism, including the living wage protest, reflects Harvard’s strong commitment to the essential principles of freedom of assembly and freedom of speech, both on and off campus.

The living wage campaign raises a vital issue of fairness within the Harvard community. Harvard’s living wage employees should receive a fair wage that enables them to support themselves and their families. Thus the Yard is a particularly appropriate site for assembly and speech in support of the protest.

But this is not just another parochial Harvard issue: it reflects a challenge to our entire society to enable its citizens to have the basics of life. No one who works 40 hours a week 12 months a year should be forced to live in poverty, especially when they work for a well-endowed institution which seeks to foster equality and fairness as basic tenets of life.

Student activists have long made a difference in American life, and Harvard students have been in the vanguard of those movements. Today’s protest continues that proud tradition.

Edward M.Kennedy ’54-’56

Boston, Mass.

April 23, 2001

The writer is a U.S. Senator representing the state of Massachusetts.