College President James Wright defended the derecognition of Zeta Psi fraternity in an interview with The Dartmouth, even as petition candidates Peter Robinson '79 and Todd Zywicki '88 have used the issue in their trustee campaigns.
At the heart of the controversy surrounding Zete's derecognition lies a delicate balance between free speech and holding Dartmouth students responsible for harassment. Zete was derecognized in 2001 by Dean of Residential Life Martin Redman when a copies of its internal newsletters, which denigrated several women, became public. Redman declined to comment on the issue.
The fraternity had been temporarily derecognized in 1987 for incidents surrounding the publication of a similar newsletter, and representatives of the house allegedly agreed to permanently cease publishing an internal newsletter.
While members of Zete also declined to be interviewed for this article, in 2002 former Zete president Eugene Boyle '02 told The Dartmouth that the internal newsletters "did not contain any threats against women."
"This action was not justified on the merits. The penalty imposed was overly harsh and grossly disproportionate to the offenses charged," Boyle said in 2002.
In a community letter released in 2002, Wright remarked that, "speech has consequences for which we must account." Since 2002, however, Wright has expanded on his remarks.
"My letter was aimed at [the Dartmouth] community. There was anguish and emotion in the community at that time," Wright said in an interview with The Dartmouth. Wright defended the letter and denied that his remarks caused Zete's punishment.
"It was sort of the community letter that presidents should be able to send from time to time," he said. "And we can debate my view of these things, but my letter did not constitute the basis for any sort of action against Zeta Psi."
In justifying the actions taken against Zete by the College, Wright described what he saw as the important difference between organizations and individuals. He noted that, while the College had derecognized Zeta Psi, it had not taken any action against its individual members.
"I would make a distinction between an organization that's recognized by the College and sort of individual speech. And I don't mean that organizations don't have rights to free speech. They do," Wright said. "But Zeta Psi had to do with College recognition of an organization that had engaged in repeated instances of quite offensive conduct, singling out very specific students in a most insulting and defamatory way."
However, in a Feb. 21, 2002 editorial, Dean of the College James Larimore stated that "individual students" agree to be held accountable to the Dartmouth Community Standards of Conduct, which outline appropriate student behavior.
Some have observed that the standards make no distinction between individuals and campus organizations -- each of the seven standards laid out apply to both "students and student organizations."
In their candidates statements, both Robinson and Zywicki voiced their support of unhampered student speech and promised to uphold free speech.
"No institution of higher learning can devote itself to the life of the mind unless each of its students understands that he or she is entirely at liberty to speak his or her mind," Robinson wrote in his statement.
Free speech has become a contentious issue throughout the Ivy League. Columbia's campus became embroiled in controversy in past months over Jewish undergraduates' contention that their pro-Palestinian professors were bringing their politics into the classroom. They believed that their professors were presenting only one side of some topics, and that they were being graded based on their opinions rather than the academic value of their ideas.
The President said he supported the right of faculty to express their political views away from the classroom but characterized politicized lectures as inappropriate.
"I think outside the classroom, faculty members may express their political views. I don't think they should be proselytizing, and I don't think they should be trying to impose or extend their views to their students or their classes," Wright said. "Professors, too, have a freedom to their political views and a freedom to express them."
Wright thought the issue of free speech important enough to emphasize during his Convocation speech this fall.
"My effort at Convocation last year was to affirm obviously the importance of free speech, but also that free speech really means having opportunities for a dialogue is because the dialogue part of the learning process," Wright said. "And I was trying to encourage us to do a better job of that."
