Education: Freedom, But...

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Academic freedom shivered a little in the anti-Communist wind: ¶A New York State Supreme Court justice ordered the Buffalo school board to reinstate Teacher Eleanor Dushane, and give her $1,000 in back pay. Principal Charles J. Costello of Buffalo's East High had charged the fortyish schoolmarm with insubordination, subversive activity and inefficiency. Her real offense: posting a classroom notice of a lecture by PM Pundit Max Lerner.

¶ Ohio State University's 2,640 faculty members and 4,000 other employees faced a choice between signing an anti-Communist oath or getting fired. By a 6-1 vote, the trustees had approved a resolution by Board Member (and Brigadier General) Carlton S. Dargusch, 47, wartime deputy director of Selective Service. General Dargusch had heard "widespread" rumors of Communism on the campus and thought that now was the time for teachers to "come forward and be counted." The Cleveland Press denounced the project as "hysterical libeling of a whole faculty . . . [The oath] won't reach the liars. It will infuriate honest men."

¶ The American Association of University Professors was studying charges that faculty members had been fired for pro-Wallace activity at the University of Georgia, the University of Miami, and Evansville (Ind.) College. Most clear-cut case: the dismissal of young (29) George Parker, an assistant professor of religion and philosophy at Evansville and also county chairman of Citizens for Wallace. Just before he got the sack, Parker had presided at a meeting addressed by Henry Wallace. Explained Evansville's President Lincoln B. Hale: "Owing to Mr. Parker's political activities, both on and off the campus, his usefulness [is] at an end . . . The college fully subscribes to the principle of academic freedom, but. . ."