Education: Penalty for Secrecy

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The University of Washington had been wrestling with the problem ever since July. Did the university have the right to fire six professors because they were or had been members of the Communist Party or were associated with Communist causes? Would it be a violation of academic freedom? Last week, the university gave its answer.

The case of the six professors had begun when a committee of the Washington state legislature investigated the university. Summoned for questioning, Psychologist Ralph H. Gundlach, Philosophy Professor Herbert J. Phillips and Joseph Butterworth of the English department refused to say whether they were members of the party or not. Three more—E. Harold Eby and Garland O. Ethel of the English department and Anthropologist Melville Jacobs—said that they had been, but were no longer. President Raymond B. Allen and a faculty committee on tenure and academic freedom undertook to investigate further.

To the faculty committee, Butterworth and Phillips finally admitted party membership. The committee decided that was not cause for dismissal. The committee also cleared the three who had admitted to onetime membership. But Professor-Gundlach, who still would not say yea or nay, was another matter entirely. The committee recommended he be dismissed for his very evasiveness.

In all but two recommendations—the cases of Butterworth and Phillips—President Allen agreed. His own recommendation to the board of regents: concealed membership was dishonest. "A teacher may be ever so sincere in his belief in Communism, but can he at the same time be a sincere seeker after truth . . .? My answer ... is no." Last week, the board also answered no. Gundlach, Phillips, and Butterworth were fired. The other three were put on two-year probation.