Thursday March 2, 1988
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Published since 1889 by the students of the University of Kansas
Vol. 98, No. 109 (USPS 650-640)
KKK heated topic Issues aired at meeting
By Rebecca J. Cisek Kansan staff writer
Students, faculty and administrators met yesterday to update each other on the forum scheduled for Monday that would bring members of the Ku Klux Klan to campus.
About 15 people attended the two-hour closed meeting yesterday in Strong Hall's Rack.
David Ambler, vice candleholder for student affairs, said the meeting was not called to make any decisions about Monday's forum. Wayne Webb, president of the Black Student Union, said the purpose of the meeting was to open the lines of communication.
Michael Foubert, Lawrence graduate student and president of Slightly Old Americans for Freedom, is organizing the forum titled "Freedom of Expression in the University Environment: Voices from the Right." Ann Eversole, director of the organization, led the the
Class meets at airport to question KKK
By James Buckman
Kansan staff writer
A KU journalism class interviewed two members of the Missouri Knights yesterday morning in almost complete secrecy at Lawrence Municipal Airport.
Harry Jones, the instructor of the reporting class that conducted the interview, originally had intended his class to interview members of the white supremacist group, an affiliate of the Ku Klux Klan, in his classroom on the KU campus in February.
But controversy and pressure from members of the black community, partly because Jones invited the Klansman to speak during Black History Month, caused Jones to find an alternate means of conducting the interview exercise.
Jones said his students were not told that they would conduct the interview viedearday.
"The class had a clue that it was going to be in March," he said. "I did it today because I wanted to get the damn thing over with."
yesterday when they arrived at his class. "They were told at 8:30 when they arrived in room 101 downstairs to get in their cars and go out to the airport," Jones said.
In a note given to his students before the trip, left for the airport, Jones said the trip would be voluntary, with the expectation that the event would attract no attention and occur without incident. The note said that at the first sign of any incident or disturbance, such as a protest demonstration, the students would be free to leave and consider the class
canceled.
Jones said he had asked the Klansman Tuesday night to do the interview. He said he had an agreement with the members that he would give them only short notice before the interview so that they could not arrange for demonstrations or controversy to call attention to their cause.
"I had them meet me at a restaurant, he the turnip excite, and then I drove them in my own car to the meeting place," he said. "I had two kids in my class tail我 must to make sure they didn't have somebody tailing us. They didn't try to double cross me."
He said that the secrecy surrounding the class exercise had successfully allowed for him to carry out his original objective: giving his students a chance to report on and
expose racism.
"It went exactly as I had planned except that it quadrupled in the educational value because of all the brohaha," he said. "It heightened their interest in the whole damn thing, and the more interested they are, the better they write.
"We learned what a bigot looks like, and what a narrow-minded bigot looks like. We stared bigry in the face for an hour."
Marilyn Pollack, Wilmette, Ill., sophomore, said the interview was a great experience.
"It was absolutely both fascinating and repulsive at the same time," she said. "I'm glad we did it.
See CLASS, p. 12, col. 1
Knights tell KU students about goals
By Meredith Relph
Special to the Kansan
Using bibical parallels and historical allusions to illustrate their philosophies, two members of the Missouri Knights of the ku Klux Klan met yesterday with a kU
Far left: the KU Klucse Club braces the elements during an afternoon practice. Left: the St. Louis Junior, book on from the sidelinet.
Craig Sandu/KANSAN
h a pass during a drill.
The work teams through one of many scrimages. Left to right: Dan Grossman, Denver sophomore; Fed Nash, Wilmette, III.; freshman; and John Armstrong, Englewood, Cole, sophomore.
KANSAN MAGAZINE March 2,1988 1
gle.
st writes in Miami.
d the Klan an 'unbeat
hat he had been a member nine or 10 months. He said because he was "looking for coermenting."
hat in Missouri, there were 00, but more than 250" Klan.
seen a member since 1981. he joined after witnessing st whites in Miami
d the Klan an "upbeat,ation," and said that one of the Klan was to promote le."
See FORUM, p. 12, col. 1
ate
hing should be done to get them curriculum."
bill will be heard on the House probably within two weeks, son said. The Speaker of the decides when the bill will be.
th Branson and Lowther said would be considerable debate e floor.
when the speaker brings it up on calendar, there will certainly be very stormy debate." Branson
Associated Press supplied some mation for this story.
ng army disloyals
ced by violence in a middle-class iborhood near the banking dis-
On Tuesday, security agents oyed an opposition radio station he neighborhood, apparently appeal for Noriae demonstration.
monstrators gathered yesterday
f the four-lane street in front of
station, set up barricades of
nurse and set fire to a mini-
bird.
i-riot police chased the protest-to side streets and apartmentings. Chunks of concrete were d down at police from at least f the apartment houses.
ice fired tear-gas grenades and
tear gas into the buildings
portable tanks, filling the entire
borocho with the acrid, stinging
o officer in charge stood in the e of the street and shouted to ints. "You'll come out like cockes!"
e did, and reporters on the saw no one injured.
spokesman for the Panama Commission said anonymous tone callers warned Tuesday yesterday that a bomb was being used by thekesman Franklin Castellron he associated Press the build-as evacuated and searched both but no bombs were found.