Professor John Dowling is remembered to this day by many of Harvard’s black alumni as a compassionate and racially sensitive House master, who respectfully removed the offensive Confederate battle flag from Leverett House at the request of his students and colleagues. Kerrigan is remembered at Harvard for what many viewed as her arrogance and disregard for the feelings of the vast majority of her diverse peers — peers who passionately appealed to her to remove the ugly Ku Klux Klan symbol of American terrorism and hatred from their college, and restore an atmosphere of racial harmony at Harvard.

Haley’s historic act of removing the Confederate battle flag from the South Carolina State Capital has inspired legislatures and citizens of other southern states, such as Mississippi, to advocate for removing the racially divisive emblem from their state flags. The achievement of this aim would mean progress in improving America’s race relations.

Some minority students were concerned that Haley’s visit to Harvard as guest speaker might provoke racially insensitive students to display the Confederate flag in their residence halls. Thankfully, this did not occur. Perhaps we have reached a level of racial understanding at Harvard where students and House masters realize that the display of the Confederate flag is hurtful to African Americans.

At the Kirkland House Confederate flag protest, I made the following statement:

“There is but one flag that historically and currently represents the United States of America and binds the people of our nation together as one, ‘The Stars and Stripes.’ At this College and throughout this country, we should raise and pledge allegiance to this flag only.”

Dr. S. Allen Counter Jr. is the Director of the Harvard Foundation and a professor of Neurology at Harvard.