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Friday, May 5, 1989 / University Daily Kansan
1956 protest brings professor to KU
Steve Traynor/KANSAt
Harry Shaffer, professor of economics.
by Stan Dial
by Stan Diel
Kansan staff writes
Harry Shaffer does not look like an activist. He looks more like Albert Einstein than Gandhi.
He quit to protest the controversial expulsion of Autherine Lucy.
But Shafer came to the University of Kansas in 1956, after quitting his job at the University of Alabama in protest of racial discrimination.
"She was the first black girl to be admitted to the University of Alabama by order of the Supreme Court of the United States," he said. "Three thousand white students rioted against her being admitted to the University. When she was almost killed, she charged that the University of Alabama and the State of Alabama failed to give her adequate protection. And she was right, they didn't.
"She was accused of having defamed the honor of the University of Alabama."
Shaffer said the university manipulated its disciplinary procedure by not allowing a faculty board, which would have ruled in her favor in the case. She was expelled by the Alabama Board of Regents.
The 69-year-old Austrian-born professor of economics and Soviet and East European studies speaks with an accent that is difficult to place.
Perhaps it is because he has lived in more countries and speaks more languages than he cares to volunteer. Shafer says he speaks fluent German, English and Spanish. His French and Italian are good, he say
"I don't speak Russian very well," he complains.
Although he grew up speaking German and learned French and English in school, he picked up playing in Italy, France, Spain and Cuba.
Shaffer, who looks suspiciously like the portrait of Albert Einstein that hangs on his wall, is a Jew, and his journey to the United States, and ultimately KU, began when his homeland was occupied by the Nazis.
"Austria is a very small country," he said. "And when Hitler came, it was too small for me and him, and he didn't want to leave, so I left."
After applying for an immigration visa, he spent time in Italy, France and Cuba waiting for its approval.
"I was one of the very first to register; but at that time, I was told that it might take five or six months." Shaffer said. "So six months later, I was in Paris and I went to the American Embassy and told them I wanted my visa to go to the United States.
"They said they had to check with the American Embassy in Vienna. I came back a week later and they said there is no registration. They said if I register now it would take at least 20 years."
He said he was the victim of corruption in the American Embassy.
"It turned out much, much later that two American vice-consuls had taken out people's registrations and put other people's in for money."
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Unable to immigrate to the United States, Shaffer moved to Cuba to with relatives. He was able to move to the U.S. during the outbreak of World War II, when European countries could not fill their quotes for troops to fight against as a bus and waiter, he was drafted and entered the army.
"In the armed forces, when you're drafted you go into the branch you're most qualified for," he said. "They put me in military intelligence, not because I'm intelligent, but because I know the knowledge of German, of course."
"I was trained for interrogation of German prisoners of war and translation of captured German documents that kind of thing."
After the war Shaffer attended
New York University on the G.I. Bill and in four years earned a bachelor's degree in international trade and a master's degree in economics. He earned his doctorate from NYU while teaching at KU.
"A billionaire, a person who has only a billion dollars, if he puts that money in the bank his interest is going to be $300,000 a day. I don't think anybody really needs that much."
While Shafer, a democratic socialist, admits his political views are not typical of KU faculty, he says stumps are exposed to a wide range of ideas.
There are 56 billionaires in the United States, Shaffer said, and that is unfair to the country's poor.
"I am not the kind of socialist that would not vote in American elections," Shaffer said. "I am the faculty adviser for the Young Democrats at KU, I was a delegate for McGovern. I am a registered Democrat. But I believe that much is to be said for the nationalization of industries, especially those that do not function under the conditions of competition.
Shaffer's office walls are as cluttered as his desk, which is immersed in books and term papers. A watercolor of a Jimi Hendrix-like figure
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"The steel industry, the automobile industry, all those monopolistic industries, I think there is little justification for keeping them in private hands. Go ahead and com- put him General Motors and see how you do."
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painted by one of his children is surrounded by pictures of Lenin, Stalin, Khrushchev, Breshev, Marx, Stalin, and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
He is quick to express his opinions. "I think that the support of the contras is a criminal thing to do," Shaffer said. "All the Central American countries are against it. They made an agreement among them, and we know that's best Central America so we tell them. 'You are against it, but we'll send these murders some more money anyway.'"
Shaffer's students say that while his political views are not typical, they are not radical either, and that he has an open mind.
"I like him a lot," said Bill Frame, Lawrence senior and a student in Shaffer's Soviet economy class. "This is the second class I've had with him and I took it just because he was the teacher. You get a little perspective on what other people think instead of getting at them. Whatever side you take, he'll take the other just to prove you wrong. It's amazing he doesn't win the H.O.P.E. award every year."
Mark Sharp, Johnson County senior and also a student in Shafer's Soviet economy class, agreed
"I'd say he's open to many different ideas," Sharp said. "He sees the good and bad in all economic systems."
matter said he found teaching lower level classes to be a challenge because students do not have a good background in economics coming out of high school.
"They have learned to repeat slogans. 'We must balance the budget no matter what,' . . . that they have learned. They don't understand why, they don't understand what a balanced budget is. They do not know the difference between the national debt and the deficit."
Of the classes Shaffer teaches, he says the greatest challenge and his favorite is Introductory Economics
"I consider it a challenge to introduce a subject that is usually prepared dry and boring to students who have no interest in going into economics or business." ShaFFER said. "I consider it my job to make interesting to them what can be taught as a very dry mathematical subject."
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