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Tuesday, February 8.1972
University Daily Kansan
Garry Wills
KANSAN comment
Editorials, columns and letters published on this page reflect only the opinions of the writers.
Kansan Photo by JIM FORBES
The New Yorker has published the second part of Seymour Hersh's report on the Army's coverup of the massacres at Mali and My Khe.
It seems, in retrospect, that what set My Lai apart was not "American's savagery"—that was on routine display and in public, especially day of the My Lai murders, and has been reported (on a smaller scale) in hundreds of encounters. No, what made it stick in the memory and engage in realism was, a single man's act of dececy.
Further My Lai Revelations
'A Chief Warrant Officer named Thompson saw civilians being killed as he and his helicopter were landed to interfere, a 'sawed-off runt of a lieutenant' tried to wave him off, and Thompson had the gunmen machines train their guns on the ground.
Thompson had performed his act because civilians were being slaughtered, but what mattered most to the first investigators was not that slaughter, but the act itself. As General Coran K. Henderson told Orlan O. Coran K. Henderson to investigate the matter: "We don't want Americans shooters American."
Stated in crude terms: G君sn't count. Col. Henderson "investigated" Thompson's report, and explained the incident (he says) by assuming that Thompson was inexperienced (he was not) and had been unstrung by him. Thompson also went down below" (which so unstrung him that he landed in its midst).
The thoroughness of this "investigation" is revealed by the fact that it did not turn up the truth about its key assumption, the Chief Warrant Officer's inexperience--though that was a matter easily checked on. And the fierceness of the men and gone or found on the battlefield seemed apparent hundreds of dead were left behind in the village, yet only three enemy weapons could be found in the area.
Thompson's act, his latter reporting of it, and the fact that Americans had leveled their guns at other Americans — including him, who shot at some stir at the time, led to reports and
The half-conscious assumption on which this kind of investigation was basely, is simply, that a man had to be panicky to get upset at the mere killing
an investigation, and so left, a trail of semi-suppressed awareness about this particular incident.
of Vietnam civilians. When Thompson told his chaplain about the incident, the chaplain, too, passed a protest up through military channels. But he was not surprised when nothing immediate came of his protests. He said his experiences in Vietnam had made him fearful that as far as the United States Army was concerned, there was no such thing as murder of a Vietnamese civilian."
But some men remembered with shame what they had done, and talk of it spread. When an ex-GI named Ronald Rendhour wrote to the Pentagon about My Lai, there were memories of the investigation of Thompson's act. As the actor, all his documents dealing with those first incidents all but one, saved by inadvertence—obligingly disappeared, but too many had seen them, helped make them, filed them, heard of them for men to deny Only a fraction of what went on that day was recoverable, against the systematic self-protection of the Army. But it is symbolic that the one person who had centered on the decent act that put My Lai into our history books—Chef Warrant Officer Hugh Thompson's altercation with "a sawed-off run" named William Calley.
Radical to the Root
James J. Kilpatrick
Copyright, 1972 Universal Press Syndicate
In view of the events of the past week involving the "February Sisters," I think we would do well to take another look at the first event of all, the one that provided the impetus for what was to follow.
Bill of Rights Vital
The thought that comes to mind is that Morgan would have a society in which female chauvinism replaced male chauvinism. A society in which credence would be given only to the philosopher of the philosopher's society in which sexual activity would be controlled entirely by women.
Another example: "Most acts of sexual intercourse on this planet could be classified as rape." Rape she would define as sexual intercourse not initiated by a sincere desire on the part of the woman.
WASHINGTON — Now and then, covering the U.S. Supreme Court, you rediscover one of the fundamental principles of our country—that the Bill of Rights is breathing, vital part of our law.
A week ago today, radical feminist Robin Morgan came to KU promoting her goal of redefining sexual roles toward human sexuality so that in the future no distinction, sexual or otherwise, would be made between human beings.
For instance, she says part of the movement she defines as women's liberation has been subverted because most of the women in this sector of the movement think in terms of Marx and Lenin. What's wrong with Marx and Lenin? They were men.
However, I doubt that Morgan really wants to replace our male dominated society with one in which women pull all the strings. She has simply slipped up on that age old problem that is both the badge and the curse of the first rate radical: moderation is the biggest sin of all.
This is a far cry from her stated goal of a society in which no sexual distinctions are to be made.
The problem, of course, and it's a problem that marks fanaticism of any kind) is that many of her constituents contradict her avowed views.
All of the evils of society stem from sexism, said Morgan, and every man, whether he admits it or not, is a sexist oppressor.
At her speech in the Kansas umon,
the first thing she did was to ask the
"sisters" to move up front. And the
"others"? Sorry fellas, back of the bus.
That was the day they argued "the Amish case." The Court had before it the First Amendment, and on this particular Wednesday
"The only way to end all that is bad," she said, "is to be radical, to go to the root."
But then the only way to enlist the support needed to overcome the oppression, especially oppression as pervasive as male chauvinism is to muster all the help you can get. To appeal to the masses, you must moderate. If you moderate you lose your membership in the radical clique because you have to be satisfied with less than perfection.
The really sad thing is, moderation and unification probably could solve some of the most blatant examples of male chauvinism, while radical feminism serves only to entrench them.
the great amendment read: "Congress shall make no law prohibiting the free exercise of religion by Frieda Yoder, Barbara Miller and Vernon Yuzu. The question was, had Judy ruled that the Constitution upon their constitutional rights? To be sure, every case arising under the Constitution may be stated in such a fashion. The
Mike Moffet Associate Editor
Sixth Amendment says, if you read it closely, that "Danny Escobedo shall enjoy the right to be held against his defence." The Fourteenth says that "the City of Topeka shall not deny to Oliver Brown the equal protection of the laws." It knows that rights are personal.
Yet most of the time, even in
the landmark cases, the principal actors are vague figures, dimly perceived behind a screen of lawyers. It wasn't that way when he worked on it. There in the marble-columned courtroom, listening intently, they three amish fathers, dark-bearded, blue-dimened, blue-footed, blue-stumps. They had come to find out if the First Amendment means what it is meant to mean, that 15-year-old Frieda Yoder the New Giarus High School in Green County, Wisconsin.
This is the raw stuff of which our law is fashioned; and there must be something wrong with a man—something inside him has died, or never been born—if he fails to experience a tingling sensation in his skin. The sovereign State array against three of its smallest snarrows
The facts are not in dispute. Under Wisconsin law, all children are compelled to attend a State-accredited school, either public or private, through their fifteenth year. The three children had been graduated from the eighth grade in the New Glauco Public School in September, when classes resumed at the high school, their friends refused to enroll them. On inquiry, Truant Officer Kenneth J. Clewen was told that the Anishinagua religion forbids higher education, beyond the grammar school level. He thereupon complains charging the criminal complaints charging the did wellfully violated the law "against the peace and dignity" of the State.
The three fathers were convicted in the trial court. Some
months later the Wisconsin Supreme Court, by a divided vote, held the convictions void. The State there appealed; and on this particular Wednesday in Washington, 1,000 miles from Wichita, the land of Wisconsin, we came to another landmark in the law of our land.
The State contends that the First Amendment applies merely to freedom of worship; that its citizens should interfere with the children's freedom of worship; that education according to State requirements is essential to good citizenry; that it should provide power and the duty to prevent ignorance; and that if the Amish should be held exempt, other states may also privilege the same privilege to the detriment of the system as a whole.
There the case now rests, in the hands of our 'one Supreme Court'. My guess is that the Amish fathers will win, hands down, but it will not be their victory alone. It will be a victory over them, must believe unbelievers alike, who translate the vision of Tom Jefferson in terms of the faith of Frieda Yoder.
To which the Amish respond that their rule as to worldly education is an essential aspect of their faith; that they and their children are demonstrably good citizens, never arrested for crimes, never a burden on public discourse; that 'education' and 'ignorance' should not be defined solely by the State; and that their numbers are too small to constitute a threat to public education.
Copyright 1972 Washington Star Syndicate, Inc.
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Griff and the Unicorn
By Sokoloff
"Copyright 1972, David Sokoloff.
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