What Mizzou should learn from ODU

Over the past week we’ve watched the spectacle at the University of Missouri of movement leftist student – and faculty – activists engaging in coercive and borderline violent tactics taken straight out of Rules for Radicals to pursue an agenda that is, in fact, so radical that it’s literally nonsensical – everything from an apology from the university president for his “white privilege” followed by his resignation, to racial quotas for hiring of faculty, to a “comprehensive racial awareness and inclusion curriculum” which would be administered by a board from which whites would be specifically excluded, to free public college for all and complete forgiveness of all student debt, to a $15/hour minimum wage for unskilled workers.

And, of course, the famous “safe spaces” for everyone who is in danger of being offended by stuff.

Because, of course, if these demands aren’t met, these Victims of America will remain as oppressed as their forebears were in the days of segregation.

Okay, it’s hardly shocking that radical leftists are engaging in radical tactics to achieve radical ends. They’ve been doing that for well over 100 years.

What is shocking, however – and, indeed, dangerous – is that Mizzou capitulated to these loonies.  They didn’t even try to resist:  After just one day of these leftist antics, the university president gave in to their demands and resigned.  He had not done anything wrong, and, indeed, it now appears likely that everything that formed the basis of these “protests” were complete hoaxes, but he caved to the loons anyway

Score one for Saul Alinsky.  Champagne bottles must surely be popping at the White House.

But it didn’t have to end this way.  Mizzou could have followed the example of my alma mater, Old Dominion University, and perservered.

In 1992, for my commencement ceremony, ODU invited James Kilpatrick to be the commencement speaker. Kilpatrick was a prominent and highly respected nationally syndicated conservative newspaper columnist, and the movement leftists on campus – students and faculty alike – were apoplectic.  They simply could not countenance a point of view contrary to their own.  So, in typical Alinskyite fashion, a campaign of personal destruction was launched to try to force the university to rescind its invitation.

The focus of the protests was the fact that some 30 years earlier, Kilpatrick had been an outspoken advocate of Massive Resistance, the effort during the Civil Rights era by some in segregationist states to deliberately ignore court orders to desegregate schools and other public facilities.  By the early ’90s, of course, virtually no one anywhere was still advocating this position, including the vast majority of people who had advocated it decades earlier.  And, in that vein, Kilpatrick had long ago and repeatedly renounced and apologized for his former unenlightened and, indeed, hurtful views and advocacy.  By the time of his invitation to the ODU commencement he had shown sufficient sincere repentance that no one anywhere had expressed any objection to his regular columns appearing in hundreds of newspapers throughout the country.

But that history from decades past, long since renounced by Kilpatrick, formed the basis for hundreds of leftist students and faculty to launch and maintain a vicious and sustained attack on his integrity, honor, and suitability to deliver a speech at an institution of higher learning.  It was the talk of the campus, on the front pages of the papers, and the lead on the evening news for weeks on end.

But to everyone’s surprise (especially those in the “news” media that were so predictably sympathetic to the leftist protesters), ODU refused to rescind the invitation.

Finally, regrettably, James Kilpatrick himself withdrew from the event because he did not want the (contrived) “controversy” to mar this important life event for the graduating students.  So, ODU President Jim Koch announced that he personally would give the commencement address in Kilpatrick’s place.

The big day arrived, and at the appropriate time, Dr. Koch took the podium.  And what he said should be heard by every university president and leader in the country now dealing with a new generation of hateful movement leftists seeking to topple our great institutions:

He said that he was ashamed of those who had harassed James Kilpatrick, and he was especially ashamed of the faculty members who had done so.  (Dr. Koch always taught a couple of classes himself during his tenure as president, so he was himself a member of the faculty.)

He reminded them that a university, by definition, is an institution that should and must encourage a free exchange of ideas across the political and ideological spectrum.

He announced that as a response to the narrow-mindedness shown at our university in those recent weeks, he was creating a new President’s Lecture Series in which prominent speakers across the spectrum would be brought to campus to share their thoughts and ideas.

And he announced that the inaugural speaker for this new series would be . . .  James Kilpatrick.

Dr. Jim Koch was a leader who refused to be cowed by a bunch of ignorant radicals seeking to stifle dissent on his campus.  Our country desperately needs more like him today.