A STUDENT AND FACULTY RESPONSE TO THE COLUMBIA CRISIS
A Preliminary Report Based on Partial Returns

Bureau of Applied Social Research
Columbia University
May 20, 1968

Summary

This is a preliminary report of a survey conducted by the Bureau of Applied Social Research, a research unit of the Graduate Faculty of Political Science, Columbia University, under the direction of Dr. Allen H. Barton. It is based on approximately 1/3 returns from a questionnaire sent to all faculty members at the Morningside campus, and to 1/5 of the students registered on the Morningside campus. The figures given must be considered tentative since later returns may cause considerable changes. Where results are very one-sided, however, they are likely to hold good in the final returns.

1. Students and faculty have had similar experiences and have similar opinions on most issues. The largest differences are slightly over 20%, and appear on issues of how much power students and junior faculty should have.

2. Only a small minority favored the tactics of the sit-in demonstrators; but a majority favored some of their major stated goals, notably stopping gym construction and student-faculty handling of discipline cases.

3. The police action involved excessive violence, In the opinion of the great majority of students and faculty, although opinions vary about how widespread the excess violence was. Those who saw the police using force are much more critical than those who did not.

4. The effect of the police action was to increase acceptance of the sit-in demonstrations as justified, from a small minority to a somewhat larger minority of both faculty and students; but not to change attitudes very much on the major stated issues, or on general willingness or unwillingness to use police in demonstrations.

5. The administration is widely criticized for not negotiating further, although a small minority feels it negotiated too much; but there is widespread distrust of the sit-in demonstration leaders. Neither side came out with much approval.

6. There is a widespread feeling among students and faculty that they should have much more to say about how the University Is run, and a willingness to share power over decisions with one another and with the trustees. There is a concern that the community around the University be Involved in Planning decisions for the University area.

7. Attitudes toward the crisis are strongly related to dissatisfaction with the size and impersonality of the University.

8. Attitudes toward the crisis are strongly related to rank within the full-time faculty, the higher ranks being the more conservative.
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STUDENT AND FACULTY RESPONSE TO THE COLUMBIA CRISIS
A Preliminary Report Based on Partial Returns
Allen H. Barton
Bureau of Applied Social Research
Columbia University

Six days after the police action ended the occupation of five Columbia University buildings, the Bureau of Applied Social Research, a research unit of the Graduate Faculty of Political Science of the University, mailed out questionnaires to the entire faculty of the Morningside campus (about 2,000) and to 1/5 of the student body registered on the Morningside campus (to about 3,400 of the 17,000 students). The faculty mailing list used included senior faculty, full-time and part-time junior faculty, and a limited number of research personnel attached to departments and laboratories. (Teachers College, Barnard, and the professional schools located elsewhere in the city were excluded).

By a week after the mailing, about 1/3 of each group had returned questionnaires (769 faculty and 1,049 students). In order to bring preliminary results forward before the faculty and students go off for the summer, we are presenting these tabulations of the first third of the responses. Faculty responses include:

It must be kept clearly in mind that when final returns are in the figures maybe somewhat different -- a majority of 55% might become a minority of 40%, or vice versa. On the basis of past experience, however, it seems unlikely that very large majorities of 70 or 80 percent in these preliminary returns will be reversed in the final count; and the relationships between attitudes and other characteristics are likely to be valid, even though the absolute levels of figures may change somewhat. The important thing for this survey is not to predict whether a given issue would win by 51% on a referendum, but to show where there is general agreement, and where there are major disagreements.

The opinions expressed here ought not to be taken as a final mandate for legislative action. Opinions vary in quality, depending on how familiar the individual is with the alternatives and the arguments for each, and how much he has thought about them. The campus was Indeed the scene of Intense discussions In the two weeks preceding the distribution of the questionnaires, but not all of the issues in the questionnaire were equally discussed, and on many of them a much longer period of deliberation may be desirable. Questions of the precise allocation of power over decisions within the university, for example, were not considered in detail In the public and private discussions during and right after the police action; proposals on these topics are only now being formulated and presented. Therefore the specific ideas which are expressed in this survey might change after a summer of reflection on various proposals and arguments.

1 . Students and faculty have had similar experiences and have similar opinions on most issues.

The first general, and somewhat surprising, finding is that on most questions there is a relatively small difference in answers given by students and faculty. A difference greater than 10% appears on 15 of the 56 items tabulated so far, and it is over 20% in only three items -- all dealing with the relative power of students, junior faculty, and senior faculty. In general the students are somewhat more critical of the administration and favorable to the sit-ins and the subsequent student strike, but only by about 10 to 15 percent. Both students and faculty were on campus on the same days, both used the same news sources, and both were equally likely to be present the night of the police in action. (33% of the faculty and 39% of the students were there.) Faculty attitudes vary with rank (see section 8).

The full professors have the lowest acceptance of the goals and methods of the demonstrations, and lecturers and instructors the highest. Among the part-time student-teachers, the preceptors are close to the instructors, while the teaching assistants are relatively conservative. In the tables which follow we have included teaching assistants and preceptors in the faculty counts; omitting both groups would not change the faculty totals much.
much.

2. Only a small minority favored the tactics of the sit-in demonstrators; a majority favor some of their major stated goals.

Faculty and students were asked two very broad questions on goals and tactics, which had also been asked of students during the Berkeley "free speech" crisis in 1964:

"Were you for or against the main goals of the demonstration?"

"Were you for or against the tactics of the demonstration?"

We then spelled out a number of specific tactics and goals.

"How do you feel about the holding captive of Acting Dean Coleman in Hamilton for a day --
was it definitely justified, probably justified, probably unjustified, definitely unjustified?"

'How do you feel about the sit-ins examining and copying of President Kirk's files In his office at Low?"

It is clear that only a tiny minority felt these specific tactic justified.

The sit-ins proclaimed a list of six demands. Of these, faculty and students gave the strongest support to stopping the construction of the gym, and creating a joint student-faculty disciplinary committee. The elimination of remaining ties with the Institute for Defense Analysis and dropping charges from previous gym site demonstrations produced nearly even division; and the right to conduct indoor demonstrations get much less support, with the least going to the demand for amnesty, which the strike leaders had made their precondition to a settlement.

To further explore the gym issue we put forward several alternative ideas which had been discussed:

The spelling out of several alternatives and allowing the respondent to formulate his own solution reduces the proportion who advocate outright abandonment of the gym idea somewhat. Almost a third of the respondents wrote in some ideas of their own; these are being classified and will be presented in a later report.

3. The great majority of students and faculty believe that the police action involved excessive police violence, although opinions vary about how widespread the violence was.

About 39% of the students and 33% of the faculty members responding so far were on the campus the night of the "bust." Thirty percent of the students and 20% of the faculty members responding -- a great majority of those actually present on campus that night -- report that they saw the police hit, push, or charge into groups of people on the campus. Twenty percent of the students and 13% of the faculty -- about half of the students present and 40% of the faculty present -- report that they themselves were struck, pushed, or in groups that were charged at by the police, mainly the latter.

There was very general agreement that there was at least some excessive use of force by the police; a strong majority of those who were present and saw the force used characterize it as "greatly excessive to the point of brutality," and a somewhat smaller majority of them say that it was widespread and involved many of the police.

"From what you have seen, heard, or read, was the police use of force:

"What was your impression of how many police used excessive violence.

What is your impression of the use of violence against police by the demonstrators:

Those students and faculty who were present and saw these actions were, to be sure, a somewhat self-selected group. They report more support for the sit-ins at the time they first heard of them, before the police action:

The self-selection bias is not however overwhelming; people of a wide range of opinions were present. Further analysis will be made to assess the effects of such bias on the perceptions of the police action, by comparing those present who had different initial predispositions. There was general reporting of isolated use of violence against the police by the demonstrators, but hardly anyone reports it as being widespread.

4. The effect of the police action was to increase acceptance of the sit demonstrations as justified from a small minority to a somewhat larger minority of both faculty and students; but not to change attitudes very much on the major stated issues.

Respondents were asked to recall their feelings when they first heard of the demonstrations, and then to report their current feelings.

"How did you feel when you first heard about the occupation of University buildings and offices by the demonstrators - -
at that time did you feel it was: definitely justified, probably justified, probably unjustified, definitely unjustified, I was undecided."

"How do you now feel about the action of the sit-ins?"

In this sense the police experience was "radicalizing" for those who underwent it, and there was also some spillover on the rest of the faculty and student body.

With respect to the six demands of the demonstrators, there is a much slighter effect, to the extent that people can accurately recall their previous positions.

Even on the issue of whether police force should ever be used, there is relatively little effect insofar as the respondents can recall their prior positions.

"If you can remember your opinions while the demonstrators were occupying the buildings, did you feel then that: police should be used to get them out without any offers of concessions; police should not be used if they were willing to compromise some of their demands, but should be used if they insisted on staying in until all their demands were met; police should not be used to get them out under any circumstances."

"How do you feel now about the use of police to remove the demonstrators?"

These figures suggest relatively little rejection of the general principle of police by those who had previously favored it, as a result of seeing the police in action. Most of those who saw them in action were, by their own account, already opposed to using the police against the sit-ins; that is why they were present on the night of the bust. Overall only a small minority favored using the police without an attempt at compromise. However there remains an overall majority of both students and faculty who favored using police if the demonstrators refuse a compromise solution; a large majority of the faculty (about three quarters), and a bare majority of students (just over 50%). As we have seen, however, there was a very widespread reaction against the police behavior in this particular situation, and this is reflected in various forms of protest.

If the most immediate outcome of the police action was the call for a general strike of students, joined in by the heads of a large number of student organizations previously not involved in the demonstrations. Support for this strike was expressed by only a minority of both the students and faculty responding so far; but among those who saw the police action the majority of both supported the strike at the time they filled out the questionnaire.

"Have you been in favor of the general student strike since the police action?"

We know that those who were on the scene when the police came included a larger than average share of those favorable to the demonstrations; to what extent this self-selection accounts for the relationship between seeing the police action and supporting the strike will have to be explored in further analysis.

The Administration is widely criticized for not negotiating further, but there is widespread mistrust of the sit-in demonstration's leaders; neither side came out with much approval.

It is often said that in situations like the Columbia crisis, the administration can only lose popularity; whatever it does will make a lot of people unhappy. The data seems to bear this out:

"What is your overall opinion of the way the administration has handled the crisis?"

"Do you feel the Administration negotiated: too much, too little, about enough?"