The Dean Who Plugged Them Into the SWP
Richard C. Gilman was the dean of Carleton College from 1960 to 1965 when the present-day leaders of the revisionist Socialist Workers Party were all undergraduates.
Although many years have elapsed, Gilman still recalls the students who were, as he puts it, 'plugged into' the SWP.
This is a highly irregular way to join a political party. Normally, students are recruited by party members during the course of campus lectures or campaigns.
But at Carleton, in the rural town of Northfield, Minnesota there was no SWP branch nor a single member on campus when Jack Barnes, now the party's national secretary, arrived in September 1957.
The SWP did not come to Carleton to recruit Barnes and the rest of the 'Carleton Twelve,' Carleton went to the SWP and 'plugged them in.'
They were 'plugged into' the SWP organization in the 'Twin Cities' — St. Paul and Minneapolis — which sprawl either side of the Mississippi River.
The key figure in the operation was Gilman, a high flyer in the American college education system. As dean of the college, his responsibilities are similar to those of the vice-chancellor at a British university.
He is in overall command of staff and students, administrator, business manager and disciplinarian. Because American college education is big business, the dean must have strong, confidential connections with Federal and State government as well as the private foundations and banks who pour money into student programs.
The dean is the liaison man with the 'talent spotters' from the government and big corporations who trawl the campuses looking for up-and-coming personnel.
There is a saying that the deans who produce the 'right material' get their budgets handsomely replenished. Those who don't, get eased out.
Among his contemporaries, Gilman was renowned as a 'political dean.' Today he is president of Occidental College on the outskirts of Los Angeles, another private, but more lavish version of Carleton.
Richard Carleton (!) Gilman was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1923 and graduated from Dartmouth College in philosophy in 1944. He then spent several years in the US Navy in the Pacific and rose to the rank of lieutenant.
On release from the navy, Gilman was selected to study at New College, Oxford, but it is unclear from his biographical details who sponsored this scholarship.
He returned to the US after two years and completed his PhD at the Graduate School of Boston University in 1952. His dissertation was on 'The General Metaphysics of William Ernest Hocking.'
Hocking was a dour theologian and moralist in the early 1900s who contributed such forgettable works as 'The Meaning of God in Human Experience,' 'The Spirit of World Politics,' 'Human Nature and its Remaking' and 'Morale and its Enemies'.
After lecturing in philosophy at a private college, Gilman became executive director of the National Council on Religion in Higher Education for four years from 1956 to 1960.
A devout Congregationalist who has served as church moderator, Gilman's connections with the church are described as 'deep.'
It was at Carleton that Gilman began to broaden the scope of his activities. He served on the executive committee of the Minnesota Private College Council, he undertook studies for the Special Study Committee of the Executive Committee of the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education as well as for the Minnesota Council on Economic Education.
He became consultant to the private Danforth Foundation on graduate and fellowship training and to the multi-billion dollar Ford Foundation in 'special programs for education.'
In the centenary volume, Carleton: The First Century the importance of outside funds for special staff and student projects is stressed:
'During most of Carleton's history, as was common generally, faculty members had to secure funds for research and publication where they could find them, usually out of their own resources.
'Beginning approximately with the 1940s, however, teachers increasingly enjoyed the advantage of grants from foundations and corporations for both equipment and personal expense involved in such scholarly activity.' (our emphasis). Then the authors say: 'By 1963 the dean of the college (Gilman) was responsible for administering some half a dozen or more accounts and funds known to faculty wits as the 'Gilman Foundation,' providing valuable opportunity for faculty members to undertake special projects and to stimulate new ideas.' (Carleton: The First Century, page 156).
When he went for the job as president of Occidental, Gilman gave a delightfully vague account of his political affinities. It was summed up in a report of his appointment to Occidental.
'In the past he has actively engaged in politics as a member of town and country committees and as a speech writer and other capacities in Maine congressional (1952) and senatorial (1959) campaigns waged by his brother George, a Republican.
'However, Gilman's politics are generally Democratic, though above partisan dogmatism. Since his deanship he has not actively engaged in politics.' (The Occidental, February 16, 1965).
The truth is that Gilman has never left politics. For example, last year he was selected for a four-month assignment in Washington to establish President Carter's new Department of Education.
The new department has 17,000 employees, a budget of more than $15 billion and more than 160 education programs under its control.
He was selected by Education Secretary Shirley M. Hufstedler who is one of Occidental's prestigious trustees.
His role was to recruit personnel for the newly-established department and to present short-lists to Hufstedler. In an interview with the college magazine, Gilman explained how he went about selection and screening procedure:
Gilman (interview):
'In the first place, the sheer number of senior appointments to be made within a brief period of a few weeks or months heavily taxed our time and resources, especially since we wished to be responsive to affirmative action considerations to insure diversity in terms of sex, race, ethnic factors and the rest.
'And secondly, after compiling lists of suitable nominees, we had to check them out with the White House, key members of Congress, representatives of special interest groups, and others.
'At one time we had half a dozen people doing nothing but running telephone checks, some of which had to be followed up with additional contacts.' (Occidental College Magazine, Spring, 1980).
The author of the article concluded: 'He recalled that like most college and university presidents across the country, he was opposed to establishment of a separate Department of Education.
'However, when the new department became law, he felt he should assist in whatever way he could to get the department organized in such a way as to achieve the goals and objectives which brought it into being.'
In other words, the education establishment adjusted to the new situation and have made certain the new department is 'as safe as houses.'
Prior to his Washington assignment, Gilman's political colors fluttered over Occidental during the anti-Vietnam war days.
The first student protest occurred at Occidental in November 1967 when about 40 students staged a sit‑down in the Quad to obstruct military recruiters who had come to sign up GIs and trainee officers.
'As a result of this demonstration, we issued an official statement defending the right of dissent but indicating clearly that such obstruction of the rights and movements of others was clearly in violation of academic freedom,' Gilman wrote in a pious review of the anti‑war protests at his college.
By 1969, however, following the fall of the Johnson administration and election of President Nixon, anti‑war feeling among students was running much higher.
Sensing open conflict with the students, Gilman suspended all recruitment activities at Occidental and set up a staff‑student committee to advise on new procedures on how the talent‑spotters would operate in the future.
Occidental newspaper reported that Guidance and Placement Director Chester Arnold cancelled visits by no less that 42 organizations — 'Among them the United States Information Agency, the Central Intelligence Agency and IBM.'
The paper added, 'This represents four‑fifths of the Guidance Center's winter program of career counselling, traditionally the busiest time of the year for such activity.'
Arrangements were made for US Navy recruiters to visit the campus at the end of April 1969. On the eve of their visit, Gilman allegedly received a phone call from an 'emotionally disturbed' student who threatened to use a gun to stop the navy officials visiting the college.
The FBI was brought in and the navy's visit was postponed for a week. When they did turn up, a large group of students sat down inside the Placement Office, effectively preventing the navy from making any recruits.
The college authorities led by Gilman, who read the Riot Act, took their photographs and names. A campus court was set up and the 'accused' were tried. They were 'found guilty' and expelled for the rest of the term.
Summarizing the events in the Occidental, Gilman warned that he would not allow a repetition of student direct actions: 'During these past several months we were in close contact with local law enforcement authorities and arrangements were also made to obtain court injunctions if needed: we will be similarly prepared in the future.'
He concluded by upholding the ideals of 'academic freedom' — also a cherished objective of J. Edgar Hoover, then director of the FBI. In the November 1970 issue of Occidental, there appeared an extraordinary full‑page advertisement from Hoover, entitled 'An Open Letter to College Students.' It carried the caption 'Paid for by the Friends of Occidental.'
In it, Hoover said: 'As a 1970 college student, you belong to the best educated, most sophisticated, most poised generation in our history.
'The vast majority of you, I am convinced, sincerely love America and want to make it a better country.
'There's nothing wrong with student dissent or student demands of changes in society or the display of student unhappiness over aspects of our national policy.'
This was tested at Kent State University, in Ohio on May 4, 1970, six months earlier, over Nixon's decision to bomb Cambodia.
The National Guard burst on to the campus, opened fire on students, killing four of them and wounding nine others.
Hoover's open letter is a good example of the type of software employed by Gilman on the campus. It establishes the links with the FBI as one of the 'friends of Occidental.'
On August 9, 1979, Gilman gave a tape‑recorded telephone interview to Dave Keil who, unknown to Gilman, was researching Security and the Fourth International on behalf of the International Committee of the Fourth International.
Keil began by asking him whether Carleton was very socially active.
Dialogue
Gilman: 'I was there from 1960‑1965 as dean of the college. While my responsibilities were primarily for the academic program — the title was dean of the college. I was academic dean — I was nevertheless involved in a lot of different things.
'It is true that during the early sixties it was very lively socially and a politically aware campus. I think there were several reasons for that, but chief amongst them would be that Carleton was a school of high academic reputation and it attracted very bright students. Although located in a small town in Minnesota, it attracted students from the country over, from the West Coast and the East and there was a great deal of lively diversity among the students. The campus was one where different viewpoints were not only tolerated, but to some extent encouraged, so there was a lot of lively discussion.
'I think also, that is in addition to the diversity of the student body and the high ability in the student body, the social awareness, I think those things all put together make for that kind of place.'
Keil: This college more than any other across the country as far as I could determine had a tremendous proportion of people who became active and ultimately leaders of the Trotskyist movement in the United States.
Gilman: Now, let me just come at that a minute. I am not aware of this fact, that is, today that there are people who become leaders who came out of this period and became leaders. Have you got any names that come to mind?
Keil: Yes I could. Let me see — Jack Barnes, who is today national secretary of the Socialist Workers Party, Mary‑Alice Waters, who is editor of the Intercontinental Press.
Gilman: Are they out of the Fifties?
Keil: Well, Jack Barnes graduated in '61. Mary‑Alice Waters graduated in '63. There is a woman by the name of Elizabeth Stone who graduated in '61, she's another prominent leader.
A John Benson, who graduated, I believe, in '63. A Charles Styron, who graduated in '63. A Douglas Jenness, a Larry Seigle, Barbara Matson, Caroline ... I don't think I've exhausted it yet, a fantastic number of names which come up.'
Someone said to me, did you know that virtually the whole leadership of one of the radical movements came from this college. I said, that's fantastic. I said, where. I thought they were going to say Columbia, Berkeley. They said, no, it's Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota.
Gilman: Have you talked to anyone else from there?
Keil: I actually spoke to a Mr. Fjelstad and I just went and looked up at that time who was dean and who were some of the officers that I could get in touch with.
Gilman: Well, Ralph Fjelstad was ... he may be retired now, but he's been a long time in the profession of political science and is himself liberal to moderate, but was not really involved as a sort of, what should we say, father-confessor or adviser of these students.
Keil: Who would know more? Do you remember some of the names yourself?
Gilman: I remember those names.
Keil: Were they all very politically active people at the time? You see, I'm not sure whether this happened all that much later on in life or something.
Gilman: No, it was very, very active during that period. One of the reasons ... When you first came on, I was telling you some of the reasons generically — bright students, from all over the country, an open campus, freedom of expression, academic freedom was preserved and protected and so on.
And those could happen anywhere. Though there's another factor that may be peculiar to Carleton, but not necessarily to institutions, but you've got to remember historically, the old Trotskyite party, the SWP, was an offshoot and that was strong in Minnesota.
It gained a great deal of respectability when it became the Democratic Farmer Labor Party, DFL, I don't mean when it became, but in the sort of transformation. So there's a lot of that around.
There was an active chapter of the SWP in Minneapolis-St. Paul at that time and some of our people at Carleton were plugged into the SWP and they ... Keil: You mean the SWP came down and recruited them? Gilman: It was just as easy for them to go up, but the SWP had an organization in the Twin Cities. Some of the students, some of the Carleton students, were plugged into that. Keil: How did that happen? Gilman: I don't recall, I just know there was linkage and it was through that linkage that we became very much involved in the Fair Play for Cuba Committee and that was really, I believe, the strongest political movement at the time that I was there.
I remember, for example, I think I knew more about the Cuba situation ... I mean I knew more about both sides of the Cuba situation than anybody. I made it my business to find out about it. I went to New York and went to the headquarters of the FPFC and I began doing a lot of getting of information on this because I needed to have it to deal with the situation. Keil: You say you yourself went to New York to the FPFC ... This must have been the big thing on campus and must have been a tremendous ... Gilman: The Fair Play for Cuba Committee was the major movement of that time, as I now recall it. Keil: I know this was the way that Barnes and other people like him became politically aware at that time. He went to Cuba. Did you recommend that he go? Gilman: I wasn't ... I just. Look, my job is to know as much as I can about things, and so I was getting the literature. I went and talked with people. I did the same thing out here in the 1965-70 period.
I just felt I had to have it to know what was going on. We had out there Lincoln Rockwell, the Nazi leader and I had a book on him as long as his arm. And then the SWP in Twin Cities. But my recollection was that a lot of that was coming out of the Twin Cities and that our people were plugged in up there.
I know, for example, that Carleton sponsored the Carleton Students Association or some outfit at Carleton sponsored these speakers who were on the left side or whatever side they call it. These speakers would make the rounds for nickels and dimes, you didn't get honoraria of any size. They weren't interested in that.
It's my impression, and we're going back 20 years now, but my clear impression was that Carleton was paying these people $500, which enabled them to touch base all over the area.
In other words, Carleton students were funding, or the Carleton student organization was funding these speakers and providing an honorarium which was more than they would normally be getting, or even expecting, which enabled them to visit more widely the area. So Carleton became a regular pit stop on the circuit.
When Keil mentioned the name of Dan Styron, the member of the SWP's 'Carleton Twelve' who committed suicide last year, Gilman said: 'I remember Dan Styron. He was very much a leader.'
Later in the interview, Keil asked Gilman what the group who were 'plugged into' the SWP were like. Gilman: I think of them as very decent, very able people. The thing that I keep emphasizing is that Carleton is a place where the pursuit of ideas took place and there was free inquiry, there was a wide range of political, social and economic interests and I became aware during that period of the network that develops among people of the left and you've got it of people of the right, although it's somewhat of a different order.
It's a kind of brotherhood or sisterhood, or whatever you want to call it. They know people in different places and Carleton being somewhat affluent compared with a lot of other places, our students had funds to go and do and see and whatever. Their being able, they became leaders in the thing.
I got the same thing here. During the sit-ins we had, I found out that we had practically an open telephone line between here and a place in Oakland, California, and I looked up and I was able to find out about some of these things and it was just the same kind of thing as the FPFC, that kind of network.
We had something that broke out here in June '71 and '72 and some people knew about it almost before I did and I found out that it went from here to Cambridge and to Hanover and back and I could trace it. I mentioned this network and that network I saw for the first time when I was at Carleton. Keil: Did someone come to Carleton and set up a Fair Play for Cuba Committee or did they contact themselves? Gilman: Probably, a lot of both. But, this is a network source of information. That's what it is. It's an information source, an idea source, a program source.
Keil: That was sort of the way it got going there ...
Gilman: What I told you earlier was, I thought, I had always assumed that it was a lot to do with the SWP up in Minneapolis–St. Paul. I knew that historically because of the 1920 movement up there, the movement in the 1920s.
Keil: It was an affluent college and they had all come from ...
Gilman: Middle class and upper middle class homes.
Keil: Did you find it an anomaly that people from upper class homes, what would appear to be conservative backgrounds, would make such a tremendous transformation?
Gilman: It happens. It's not uncommon. It's part of the rejection of the guilt, a way to work out the guilt. I'm not a psychologist and I don't really get into that kind of stuff, but I've seen this often enough to know that it happens.
I followed some of the people here and there are a couple of very, very interesting transformations amongst radical leaders here on campus and now among the conservatives of the wide, wide world out there. Where a couple of others have gone, I don't know.