Samiah Aziz Neha FIQWS 10115 Professor Hunter 11/1/2022

WEEKLY-9

Part1.

1. 1. After the 9/11 attack government took action to monitor the activities of university-

   based faculty. This action concerned the students as it might hinder free speech and freedom in college. From the early 1930s to 1940s, students at The CCNY protested against militarism, social injustice, and the threat of fascism. CCNY’s president, Frederick B. Robinson, violated students’ free speech, expelled 43 CCNY students, and fired more than 50 staff and CCNY faculty.

   2. The protagonist is the students, faculty, and school staff that supports free speech. The antagonist forces are the President of CCNY, Frederick B. Robinson, and his subordinates, who tried to. Suppress students’ free speech and freedom on campus.
   3. This situation affects the students and their academic freedom.

   4. This is relevant to me as a student of CCNY.

2. 1. After 9/11 government tried to control the activities of universities. In early 1930, the students of CCNY protested for their free speech and freedom on campus. The President of CCNY at that time violated their free speech and hurdled their activism. He fired a school staff and expelled students. He called the police on campus. Robinson invites a Fascist to a student assembly in the great hall. 2. Many students and faculty got suspended. Most students at CCNY were Jews and eastern European immigrants. Jews students were particularly concerned about the threat of fascism and anti-Semitism on campus.
3. 1. The resolution to this story is to fight for the freedom of speech on campus and fight against fascism and antisemitism, and military on campus.2. President Robinson resigned. The anti-fascist association was formed. Students were successful in eliminating ROTC as a requirement. 3. The depression era students were among the most successful radical organizers in the background of American student politics. They organized an effective student protest movement on campus. No other college generation had such influence on student politics before.

Part2
A. This is a story in which students of CCNY fought against fascism, militarism, and anti-

Semitism, social and economic injustice on campus. But the President of that time tried to resist their activism. He called the police on them and expelled many students. But finally, in 1938, Robinson resigned. The City University of New York’s Board of Trustees showed regret for the injustice being done to the faculty and staff. No one was reinstated.

Part3
1. -Cohen, When the Old Left Was Young, 1993

The student rebels of the Depression era rank among the most influential radical organizers in the history of American student politics. They built a prominent and influential student protest movement, organized America’s first national strikes, and shaped the political discourse on campus for a decade. No college generation before them and only the New Left insurgents of the 1960s after them ever had as much impact on student politics in twentieth-century America.

2. — Frederick B. Robinson
Quoted in the New York Journal and American, November 16, 1934.

“My suggestion is that some legal provision should be made defining subversive organized activities introduced into high schools and colleges against the wishes of those charged with administrating their affairs as criminal and liable to punishment.”

3. The City University of New York’s Board of Trustees (formerly known as the Board of Higher Education) unanimously adopts a historic resolution expressing “profound regret at the injustice done to the faculty and staff who had been dismissed or forced to resign in 1941 and 1942 because of their alleged political associations and beliefs and their unwillingness to testify publicly about them.”
4. “As a teacher, I have never tried to use the classroom as an agency for conversion. I conceive my task rather as that of developing the student, not indoctrinating him, of helping him to stand on his own feet intellectually, to think for himself scientifically, and to draw his conclusions based on his findings and interests.”

-Morris Schappes’s statement to the press before his public testimony on March 6, 1941
5. “Many of our officials believe that they are protecting civilization when they imprison a man for thinking in a certain way,’ but they are not protecting their civilization. Instead, they are destroying its very foundations.”

Richard Wright, foreword to Schappes, Letters from the Tombs, 1941.