It's not often that I agree with Dan Linsalata '07, but he was correct in stating that the lawsuit filed against the College by members of the Association of Alumni Executive Committee will bring nothing but national embarrassment to the College ("Giving does not demonstrate approval," Oct. 4). The lawsuit is foolish, likely to fail and for the good of the College must be dropped immediately. Beyond that, in order for the entire Dartmouth community to move forward, those executives who sued the College should resign.
A review of recent articles in The Dartmouth describes these executives' claim, that based on the 1891 Resolution -- a completely non-binding agreement that said at the time that five trustees should be appointed and five elected from the alumni -- the recent changes to the board are illegal. I won't waste time debating the merits of the changes to the board, as the general consensus is that the changes are for the better.
Rather, consider why these alumni are suing the College they supposedly love. They are part of the ultra-conservative cabal with deep pockets that had a good deal of success getting partisan trustees like Stephen Smith '88 elected to the Board as petition candidates. By reducing the number of alumni trustees (to a level still far higher than our peer institutions), the power of this small group is somewhat diminished. Most people are fine with that, as these are the same people who have continually put a partisan agenda ahead of Dartmouth's best interests.
Suing the College and putting their own agendas ahead of the good of Dartmouth is bad, but some of their other recent behavior has been downright malfeasant. First, these members of the committee have time and again claimed to speak for all alumni -- as they are supposed to. Unfortunately, they have not brought the issue up for a vote by the alumni, and the outpouring of anger in response to their suing the College suggests that most alumni disagree with the right-wing group. It is highly disingenuous for these executives to use their positions to push a narrow, unpopular, partisan agenda in the name of all alumni.
Second, this lawsuit is being funded by an anonymous source that the association members involved in the lawsuit have refused to reveal. Although raised before, this issue deserves closer examination. Why have they refused to reveal their funding source? The best-case scenario is that it is funded by a few alumni whose views are highly unpopular in the alumni community. But I think there is a strong likelihood that it is in fact being funded by a conservative non-alumni or conservative foundation. In fact, the more one considers the latter scenario, the more it makes sense. Of course the executives party to the lawsuit would not want to reveal their funding source as it would create backlash within the Dartmouth community. Likewise, there are many conservative interest groups that would love to turn an Ivy League schools into a bastion of ultra-conservatism in higher education, and are willing to shell out money for actions like this lawsuit.
Third, and most egregious, was the BlitzMail message that these association executives sent out trying to explain their decision to sue the College. Actually, to be more precise, the message spread half-explanations and misinformation on the whole governance debate. In any event, the worst part was that the message, which was made to look as though it had come from the official Association of Alumni account, was in fact sent from an off-campus server. Interestingly (but not surprisingly) this is the same server that hosted the site of VoteDartmouth.org, which advocated against the recent change in the board's make-up. According to association executive (and College-suer) Tim Dreisbach '71, he and other board members drafted the email but handed it off to a "student volunteer" who sent it out completely independently, and he claims that he has no idea how it was done. If that sounds like a load of crap to you, you're not alone. It seems highly likely to me that Dreisbach and his accomplices had at least a general idea of how the blitz was to be sent out, and then handed it off to a member of the Smurf-hat, er, sorry, Phrygian Society. This "student volunteer" likely then performed the technical operations required to fake the blitz.
Given all of these missteps and malfeasances, the members of the Association of Alumni executive committee who are suing the College should step down immediately.
But they won't, because to them, their partisan agenda is more important than the association, more important than the alumni they were elected to represent and more important than Dartmouth. Therefore, the alumni themselves should recall these partisan hacks, for the good of Dartmouth. As the old saying goes: "Throw the bums out."
