A look at Vassar activism

Stephen Cheng Staff Writer

Amanda Melillo Contributing Editor

The most recent ACT OUT protest ended with six Vassar students being arrested for their demonstration against the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” military policy. Challenging “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” is just one of the causes that Vassar students have espoused in the College’s vibrant history of civil activism and student protest. While not all of these causes have involved civil disobedience for political ends, Vassar students have long since participated in national and campus-based movements to affect change.

Months of Vietnam war protest in 1967
The destruction and controversy of the Vietnam War ignited activist sensibilities in Vassar students on more than one occasion. On April 12, 1967, 200 Vassar students and faculty members gathered outside of Main Building for a silent vigil to generate enthusiasm for upcoming national protests.
The crowd slowly circled Main Building holding signs that expressed demands such as “End draft—Let young men live.” The next day, a smaller faction of students who supported the moral grounds for military decisions and activities in Vietnam formed a peaceful counter-protest outside Main.

Three days later, Vassar students gathered in New York City with between 100,000 and 400,000 people. Individuals at this protest included hundreds of groups and colleges, such as the Veterans for Peace in Vietnam and the Women’s Strike for Peace. The crowd marched from Central Park to a rally held at the United Nations Plaza, during which eminent civil rights speakers such as Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke.

On Oct. 27, 1967, 100,000 people (with 100 Vassar students in their midst), attended a Mobilization for Peace March in Washington, D.C. The march began at the Lincoln Memorial and proceeded to the Pentagon. The procession was delayed by the American Nazi Party, which met the protestors with an armed counter-resistance. Chaos ensued at the Pentagon; protestors tried to break into the defense headquarters and to engage in civil disobedience outside of the building. Police subdued the protestors with arrests, beatings, and tear gas bombs, but Vassar students were unharmed by the authorities.

Students arrested at Iraq War demonstrations in New York City
Five Vassar seniors were arrested for their involvement in a non-violent demonstration in New York City against the death toll of the Iraq war on Aug. 31, 2004. The demonstration took place in concert with Direct Action Day, a city-wide protest effort that was scheduled for the second day of the 2004 Republican Convention and led to a total of 550 activism-related arrests.

The students had met in Central Park early that morning wearing black clothing and white makeup. They carried signs reading “war dead.” Accompanied by five legal observers and several journalists, the students bought subway tickets and boarded the uptown line with the intention of delivering an early-morning reminder of the consequences of war. It was not until the students attempted to reprise their performance on the downtown subway line that they were surrounded by 20 undercover police officers and placed under arrest.
The five students were charged with loitering and obstructing governmental administration, and were released by 10:30 p.m.

In an article written in the 9.9.04 issue of The Miscellany News, George Lee ’05 explained that he joined the protest due to the enormity of the destruction. “Kill all the students at Vassar five times,” said Lee. “That’s the number of lives lost. The beauty gone forever.”

Historic rally defends women’s rights
More than 200 Vassar students were among the 500,000 to 800,000 people that gathered in Washington, D.C. for the March for Women’s Lives on April 25, 2004 to protest President Bush’s policies on abortion, reproductive rights, and women’s rights. A “march coalition” of campus organizations, such as the Feminist Majority Leadership Alliance, the Women’s Health Center, and the Campus Health Organization for Information (CHOICE), had been organizing transportation for students since October. Protestors at the March, both male and female, hailed from 60 different countries, and the demonstration was deemed the largest in U.S. history. Speakers like Whoopi Goldberg and Hillary Clinton roused enthusiasm during the event, and afterwards, women bearing banners and wearing pro-choice clothing marched peaceably through central Washington, D.C.

After returning from the event, student protestor Adrienne Weisner ’04 reflected on the protest’s central issues in the April 30, 2004 issue of The Miscellany News. “Americans demonstrated that we will not remain silent while a radically conservative administration gradually encroaches on our basic civil liberties,” said Weisner.

In the same spirit of self-efficacy, Vassar students have coordinated on-campus efforts to make lasting changes to College policies, often in response to political and social issues on the national level.

Campus poll brings suffrage to forefront
Inez Milholland, Class of 1909, spearheaded the suffrage movement at Vassar and received media attention in 1908 when she helped organize a panel on women’s voting rights featuring speakers Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Rose Schneiderman, Helen Hoy, and Harriot Stanton Blatch. In March 1909, Milholland created a poll to gauge students’ opinions of women’s suffrage. The poll incited a campus debate in which students and professors publicly discussed its findings.
College President James Monroe Taylor objected to the debate because he had not expected professors to voice their opinions, and many professors were in favor of suffrage. Shortly after the debate, a petition advocating uninhibited discussion at Vassar on women’s suffrage was circulated. At the time, there was also a suffrage club on campus.

After Taylor’s retirement in February 1914, Henry Noble MacCracken became president, and claimed to sympathize with the suffrage movement. But when Milholland (by then a graduate) tried to continue suffrage activism on campus, MacCracken’s administration frustrated her efforts by prohibiting advertisements for demonstrations and forbidding her to speak out on campus for suffrage. Not until the U.S. entered World War I did MacCracken allow a suffrage conference on Vassar’s campus. At this point, MacCracken also chose to publicly support a New York state referendum on female suffrage.

Students take over Main for new program
The College’s failure to implement an African-American Studies program led 35 students to occupy Main Building in protest from Oct. 30 to Nov. 1, 1969. Eight days before the protest, six representatives from the Students’ Afro-American Society (SAS) had presented nine demands regarding the creation of the program to College President Alan Simpson, and set Oct. 27 as the deadline for the College to make a commitment. Simpson reportedly wrote back rejecting most of the demands. No commitment had been made by Oct. 27, so the SAS took action.

Participants in the sit-in quietly entered Main at 3:20 a.m. on Oct. 30. The students asked Security to leave, and nailed the center entrance and side doors shut. They also sealed off the main lobby, the switchboard, the Post Office, the bookstore, and The Retreat. Simpson was not notified until shortly after 6:05 a.m. The three-day sit-in ended after Simpson agreed to form an Africana Studies program at Vassar.

The involvement of current Vassar students in activist causes builds upon a tradition of activism that began in the early years of the College’s existence. “Vassar women have been strong and dedicated for many decades,” said Rebecca McGill ’04, who attended the March for Women’s Lives. “It made me proud...to demonstrate that Vassar continues to be a college filled with people who fight for what they believe in.”

Sources:
The Miscellany News, issues 4.19.67, 10.25.67, 11.07.69, 9.17.04, and 4.30.04.
“The Suffrage Movement at Vassar,” The Vassar Encyclopedia Project. vcencyclopedia.vassar.edu.
“Inez Milholland,” The Vassar Encyclopedia Project. vcencyclopedia.vassar.edu.
“Takeover of Main Building, 1969” by Dr. Claudia Lynn Thomas, ’71, The Vassar Encyclopedia Project. vcencyclopedia.vassar.edu.