| OCR Text |
Show WINTER 2013 UHQ pp 4-90_UHQ Stories/pp.4-68 12/5/12 9:38 AM Page 80 uTAH HISTORICAL QuARTERLy Wilkinson ruled that any student apprehended at the scene of a “riot,” defined as a gathering of two or more people disturbing the peace, would be summarily “dismissed.”96 As fall semester 1965 began, Wilkinson asked the Dean of Student Life, in what may be the earliest reference to the possibility of Vietnam-related protests, to “look out” for “incipient tendencies” among students “so that we can nip [them] in the bud.”97 To students two days later, Wilkinson commented, “All of us feel very good because we feel that the student body is completely behind us.”98 Despite mounting anti-war sentiment nationally, not until late 1968 did the first major demonstration occur at BYU, when sixty students wearing black armbands attended a speech by Curtis LeMay retired U.S. Air Force general and conservative running mate of third party U.S. presidential candidate George Wallace. Their backs to LeMay, the students tried to disrupt his address by applauding at intervals.99 Fearing such activities might escalate, administrators produced a list of “suggestions regarding disturbances” and appointed a committee on student unrest.100 They also adopted, two years later, a civil disturbance plan and discussed the feasibility of organizing a campus “riot squad.”101 As U.S. fighting in Vietnam intensified through 1968-69, so did student unrest. In March 1969, representatives of a BYU “Free Student Coalition” presented sixteen demands–including recognition of a Mobilization for Peace Club, abolishment of ROTC class credit, and establishment of a Civil Rights week–to unreceptive administrators.102 Wilkinson, in an April memo, expressed anxiety that “nothing get started on this campus against the ROTC” and blamed national demonstrations on “communist revolutionaries.”103 “Their ultimate goal,” he later explained, was “... destruction of our existing social order.”104 At campus-wide devotional services in late April 1969, Boyd Packer invited student critics to study elsewhere.105 When rumors of a demonstration against the appearance of Vice-President Spiro T. Agnew surfaced in early May, BYU’s Dean of Fine Arts suggested that 96 See “Six Face Discipline for Friday Student Rampage,” Daily Universe, December 5, 1962; “On the Acropolis,” Daily Universe, December 14, 1962; “300 Participate in Riot,” Daily Universe, February 24, 1965; “Dean Sets Action Code,” Daily Universe, September 28, 1965. 97 Wilkinson, Memorandum to J. Elliot Cameron, September 22, 1965, Wilkinson Papers. 98 “President Wilkinson Blasts Misconduct in Annual Address,” Daily Universe, September 24, 1965. 99 See Ralph McDonald, Letter, Zion’s Opinion, November 13, 1968, Perry Special Collections. 100 “Suggestions for School Leaders Regarding Disturbances”; Swen C. Nielsen, Chief of BYU Security, Memorandum to Committee on Civil Disturbance, October 24, 1968, both in Perry Special Collections. 101 Swen C. Nielsen, Memorandum to Sam F. Brewster, “Confrontation and Disaster Alert Plan,” March 25, 1970, Perry Special Collections. 102 “Sixteen Demands of Free Student Coalition Delivered by Ralph McDonald at Hyde Park Forum, March 5, 1969, 12:00 noon, Memorial Lounge, ELWC,” Perry Special Collections. 103 Wilkinson, Memorandum to Edwin B. Butterworth, April 12, 1969, Perry Special Collections. 104 “Pres. Wilkinson Lays Riots Squarely On Revolutionaries,” Daily Universe, April 18, 1969; “Rout Campus Rioters With Force,Y. President Declares,” Salt Lake Tribune, April 19, 1969. 105 “Packer Discusses Role of Dissent,” Daily Universe, May 1, 1969. 80 |
