Activism at Ohio Wesleyan University
Encyclopedia
Activism
has played an important role in the history of Ohio Wesleyan University
; The founders of Ohio Wesleyan University expressed a hope that the university "is forever to be conducted on the most liberal
principles." OWU has espoused activism
in its academic philosophy. Alumni of the school have prominently engaged in controversial issues of their times on three central issues — the scope of justice; distributive justice based on race, gender, and income; and institutions related to preserving social structures.
On August 5, 1846, the university's first president, Edward Thomson
, delivered his inaugural address
. He maintained that the college was a product of the liberality
of the people of Delaware
, and it was fortunate that Ohio Wesleyan was founded in a community divided in religious and political opinions; Thomson believed that the friction of a mixed society prevented dogma
tism and developed energy. The spirit of the college, he said, is the spirit of liberty.
Thomson stated in the early days of Wesleyan that a college education should be a barrier to avarice by furnishing "the understanding, the taste, and the perspective that directs us to life's higher purposes ... It would serve political tranquillity, both by accrediting the truly apt candidates for office and by creating citizenry astutely able to assert its liberty against any government's tendency to encroach".
Thomson was frequently vocal in the national political debates of his time, notably slavery and the expansion
of the United States. In 1857 he denounced the argument that southern
Christians
The Underground Railroad
, used as a "transportation system" for anti-slavery activists to free black slaves fleeing from the South to Canada, was extensively utilized in Ohio. In the 19th century, Ohio had one of the most active Underground Railroad operations in the nation. One of the state's most frequently used corridors on the Underground Railroad passed through Delaware County near Ohio Wesleyan University, now marked along the bikeway trail at U.S. Routes 23 and 36 in the city of Delaware.
Elizabeth Boynton Harbert (class of 1864), a women's suffrage
activist, published several books on women's issues
and suffrage, Out of Her Sphere and The Woman's Kingdom, and was the chief editor of a women's suffrage newspaper, The New Era, in 1885 Despite women's suffrage being a controversial issue, Harbert became an associate president of the World's Unity League, vice-president of the Woman's Civic League of Pasadena, vice-president of the Southern California Woman's Press Association, and president of the National Household Economic Association.
, a 1903 graduate of Ohio Wesleyan, is regarded as a significant figure in the history of professional baseball
for breaking the sport's racial barrier
. An racial incident early in Rickey's life when he was as a baseball coach for Ohio Wesleyan in 1910 would play an important role in his decision thirty years later. Rickey's team visited a hotel in South Bend, Indiana, where the hotel manager refused to provide a room for Rickey's black baseball player Charley Thomas. Rickey eventually convinced the manager to allow him to share his own room with Thomas. Rickey recalled Thomas rubbing at his hands, ashamed of the color of his skin and vowed, "Charley, the day will come when they won't have to be white." In 1943 Rickey became president and general manager
of the Brooklyn Dodgers
. Beginning with the 1946 signing of African American player Jackie Robinson
for the Dodgers, Rickey became renowned for his role in the racial integration of the game. Rickey's feelings on integration were a primary motivating factor in his decision.
In the war years
of 1917-1919, the break between the United States
and Germany
struck a military tone on campus. Individual students were volunteering in the Marines
, in the Canadian Forces
, and other forms of service. As America entered World War I the U.S. War Department
inaugurated the Students' Army Training Corps
, a program designed to use existing colleges and universities as training facilities for new military personnel. On the morning of October 1, 1918, about 150,000 college boys on US campuses transformed into student soldiers. This was the induction into the Students' Army Training Corps. In Delaware, on campus, approximately 400 students were given the oath of allegiance
. The men received the regular army training and academic instruction prescribed by the Committee on Education and Special Training of the War Department. The mode of student activities changed: campus traditions were put aside, and athletic events were cancelled throughout the fall semester of 1918.
program, funded by the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964, to help prepare students from lower-income and poverty areas for college. The Arts Castle, the Early Childhood Center, the Big Pal/Little Pal Program, the Andrews House, the Office of Community Service, and the International Ambassador High School Program are among the many programs founded since the 1970s to provide services to the larger community in Delaware.
Elden Smith, Wesleyan's 11th president, appointed a commission in 1968 to study student life and to refine and further edit Wesleyan's previously too-broad Statement of Aims. The commission's report recommended four criteria that OWU's educators should foster: perception, critical judgement, enjoyment, and active responsibility for the problems of society. On "active responsibility for the problems of society", the report stated, "A socially concerned individual who had no capacity for enjoyment, who exercised glib and trite rather than critical judgement, and who had no perception of reality, would be a public menace. Perhaps this is the meaning of 'do-gooder'. On the other hand, the absence of active responsibility for social problems might degenerate into obsession with self, and that perception might become dilettantism."
In 1969, the Commission on Student Life drafted a new form of student life. It formed the Wesleyan Council of Student Affairs (WCSA) with the right to decide basic policies on matters related to student life. The group was controversial from the start: more than two hundred students held a sit-in at the student union to gain faculty approval for issues-oriented representation. WCSA became involved in the first major controversy on the Wesleyan campus in the 1960s: its representatives called for the elimination of academic credit and existence for ROTC and demanded access to the University's budget and general financial statements.
in the early 1960s had a significant impact on Ohio Wesleyan students. A small minority had been concerned with the war for several years, but the bombing of North Vietnam
and the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
in August 1964 raised campus-wide awareness almost overnight. The Vietnam War, so distant, became a huge presence on campus, affected ideas of community, student power, and free speech, and influenced daily decisions like class choices and social interactions. The first stirrings of protest against the war
occurred in late 1964. In December, the Wesleyan Council of Student Affairs voted to send a letter to President Lyndon B. Johnson
opposing the expansion of the war and advocating withdrawal. Opposing expansion was a fairly moderate position, but calling for withdrawal was much more radical.
Wesleyan was the first college campus in the country to demonstrate against President Richard Nixon
's decision to invade Cambodia
on April 30, 1970. Following the demonstration, two hundred students occupied the Air Force ROTC building on campus to protest both the war and the awarding of academic credit for ROTC participation. The ROTC was seen as an extension of the "Pentagon's war machine."
President Wenzlau, then the president of OWU, attempted to disperse the protesters but was shouted down. The students demanded that the school hold a campus referendum on the issue of ROTC campus disbandment and that the vote be binding on university policy.
Wenzlau called for an emergency faculty meeting on May 1, 1970. The faculty body, surrounded by more than 300 students, decided to hold a faculty meeting later in the month when the entire faculty body would be present. The faculty meeting authorized sending a telegram to Nixon demanding an immediate unilateral cease-fire for all US troops in Cambodia
, Laos
, and Vietnam
.
The student referendum was held on May 22, 1970. The student body was split on the issue of ROTC, while 67 percent voted to censure the Vietnam War
.
in the U.S. civil rights movement
when she was a young student, and was a member of the staff of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
(SNCC).
Reverend Martin Luther King frequently spoke in the U.S. against the South Africa
n government in the 1960s, urging Americans to end trade
and investment
s in that country. Following political activity by South Africa's blacks in 1985, the government declared a state of emergency.
The resurgence of campus activism regarding racism existing elsewhere in the world came in response to David Warren's, the 13th president, involvement in the issue. In his inauguration Warren stated: "If there is one phrase which I believe best characterizes our Wesleyan education, it is: 'Here I stand.' Within these three words of Martin Luther -- 'Here I stand' -- is compressed the whole of our historical endeavor..."
In the 1980s the most organized campus movement was against investments in companies doing business in South Africa. By February 1987, student political action had brought Ohio Wesleyan to pledge to fully divest
any holdings connected to South Africa. The OWU Committee on Divestment was organized in 1988 and funded many activities related to its cause. It sponsored an Anti-Apartheid Week, candlelight vigils, and protest marches. One event which drew a lot of media attention was the 1988 demonstration before the Board of Trustees. Students carried a black and white paper chain as they climbed up the student union ballroom. As their leader announced "Divest!", students broke the symbolic paper chain.
Recent years have witnessed activism by student groups on the issues of the Iraq war, race, globalization
, and women's reproductive rights
.
In April 2002 about a hundred Wesleyan students gathered on The Mall
in Washington, D.C.
during a weekend of protests for an array of causes, including the Middle East crisis
, and also to denounce lending policies of the World Bank
. In February 2003 approximately 100 OWU students travelled to New York City to protest US actions in Iraq, with partial funding from the Wesleyan Chaplain's office.
During Ohio Wesleyan University Against the War on October 5 and November 17, 2004, more than one hundred students held peace rallies in front of Delaware's City Hall.
In 2004 the awarding of the Lilly Grant
, "Vocation: Identity, Intellect, and Life Choices: A Move Toward Wholeness", and the prospect of the participation by Ohio Wesleyan in the Lilly Endowment program on vocation, evoked an intense and adverse response from a significant group of faculty members. An open letter signed by more than 40 faculty members questioned the appropriateness of the predominantly Christian focus of the grant.
On March 17, 2005, the Student Union on Black Awareness (SUBA) and the College Democrats
organized a protest on Sandusky Street in Delaware against racial injustice on campus and in the country. University president Mark Huddleston
also participated in the protest. During his own college years, President Huddleston had mediated between protesters and administration, favoring classic liberal education over brick-throwers.
Academic pursuit and activism have found an intersection in the form of an annual event called The Sagan National Colloquium. Established in 1984, the SNC annually spotlights an issue of concern in the liberal arts
— the impact of science
on society
, race and reality
, censorship
and power
, and the role of globalization
.
Student activism
Student activism is work done by students to effect political, environmental, economic, or social change. It has often focused on making changes in schools, such as increasing student influence over curriculum or improving educational funding...
has played an important role in the history of Ohio Wesleyan University
Ohio Wesleyan University
Ohio Wesleyan University is a private liberal arts college in Delaware, Ohio, United States. It was founded in 1842 by Methodist leaders and Central Ohio residents as a nonsectarian institution, and is a member of the Ohio Five — a consortium of Ohio liberal arts colleges...
; The founders of Ohio Wesleyan University expressed a hope that the university "is forever to be conducted on the most liberal
Classical liberalism
Classical liberalism is the philosophy committed to the ideal of limited government, constitutionalism, rule of law, due process, and liberty of individuals including freedom of religion, speech, press, assembly, and free markets....
principles." OWU has espoused activism
Student activism
Student activism is work done by students to effect political, environmental, economic, or social change. It has often focused on making changes in schools, such as increasing student influence over curriculum or improving educational funding...
in its academic philosophy. Alumni of the school have prominently engaged in controversial issues of their times on three central issues — the scope of justice; distributive justice based on race, gender, and income; and institutions related to preserving social structures.
Early history
Edward Thomson
Edward Thomson was an American Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church , elected in 1864.-Early life:Thomson was born in Portsea, part of Portsmouth, England...
, delivered his inaugural address
Inauguration
An inauguration is a formal ceremony to mark the beginning of a leader's term of office. An example is the ceremony in which the President of the United States officially takes the oath of office....
. He maintained that the college was a product of the liberality
Classical liberalism
Classical liberalism is the philosophy committed to the ideal of limited government, constitutionalism, rule of law, due process, and liberty of individuals including freedom of religion, speech, press, assembly, and free markets....
of the people of Delaware
Delaware, Ohio
The City of Delaware is a city in and the county seat of Delaware County in the United States state of Ohio. Delaware was founded in 1808 and was incorporated in 1816. It is located near the center of Ohio, is about north of Columbus, and is part of the Columbus, Ohio Metropolitan Area...
, and it was fortunate that Ohio Wesleyan was founded in a community divided in religious and political opinions; Thomson believed that the friction of a mixed society prevented dogma
Dogma
Dogma is the established belief or doctrine held by a religion, or a particular group or organization. It is authoritative and not to be disputed, doubted, or diverged from, by the practitioners or believers...
tism and developed energy. The spirit of the college, he said, is the spirit of liberty.
Thomson stated in the early days of Wesleyan that a college education should be a barrier to avarice by furnishing "the understanding, the taste, and the perspective that directs us to life's higher purposes ... It would serve political tranquillity, both by accrediting the truly apt candidates for office and by creating citizenry astutely able to assert its liberty against any government's tendency to encroach".
Thomson was frequently vocal in the national political debates of his time, notably slavery and the expansion
Manifest Destiny
Manifest Destiny was the 19th century American belief that the United States was destined to expand across the continent. It was used by Democrat-Republicans in the 1840s to justify the war with Mexico; the concept was denounced by Whigs, and fell into disuse after the mid-19th century.Advocates of...
of the United States. In 1857 he denounced the argument that southern
Southern United States
The Southern United States—commonly referred to as the American South, Dixie, or simply the South—constitutes a large distinctive area in the southeastern and south-central United States...
Christians
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
The Underground Railroad
Underground Railroad
The Underground Railroad was an informal network of secret routes and safe houses used by 19th-century black slaves in the United States to escape to free states and Canada with the aid of abolitionists and allies who were sympathetic to their cause. The term is also applied to the abolitionists,...
, used as a "transportation system" for anti-slavery activists to free black slaves fleeing from the South to Canada, was extensively utilized in Ohio. In the 19th century, Ohio had one of the most active Underground Railroad operations in the nation. One of the state's most frequently used corridors on the Underground Railroad passed through Delaware County near Ohio Wesleyan University, now marked along the bikeway trail at U.S. Routes 23 and 36 in the city of Delaware.
Elizabeth Boynton Harbert (class of 1864), a women's suffrage
Women's suffrage
Women's suffrage or woman suffrage is the right of women to vote and to run for office. The expression is also used for the economic and political reform movement aimed at extending these rights to women and without any restrictions or qualifications such as property ownership, payment of tax, or...
activist, published several books on women's issues
Feminism
Feminism is a collection of movements aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for women. Its concepts overlap with those of women's rights...
and suffrage, Out of Her Sphere and The Woman's Kingdom, and was the chief editor of a women's suffrage newspaper, The New Era, in 1885 Despite women's suffrage being a controversial issue, Harbert became an associate president of the World's Unity League, vice-president of the Woman's Civic League of Pasadena, vice-president of the Southern California Woman's Press Association, and president of the National Household Economic Association.
Early 20th century: the effect of wars and politics
Branch RickeyBranch Rickey
Wesley Branch Rickey was an innovative Major League Baseball executive elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1967...
, a 1903 graduate of Ohio Wesleyan, is regarded as a significant figure in the history of professional baseball
Baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each. The aim is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot diamond...
for breaking the sport's racial barrier
Baseball color line
The color line in American baseball excluded players of black African descent from Organized Baseball, or the major leagues and affiliated minor leagues, until Jackie Robinson signed with the Brooklyn Dodgers organization for the 1946 season...
. An racial incident early in Rickey's life when he was as a baseball coach for Ohio Wesleyan in 1910 would play an important role in his decision thirty years later. Rickey's team visited a hotel in South Bend, Indiana, where the hotel manager refused to provide a room for Rickey's black baseball player Charley Thomas. Rickey eventually convinced the manager to allow him to share his own room with Thomas. Rickey recalled Thomas rubbing at his hands, ashamed of the color of his skin and vowed, "Charley, the day will come when they won't have to be white." In 1943 Rickey became president and general manager
General manager (baseball)
In Major League Baseball, the general manager of a team typically controls player transactions and bears the primary responsibility on behalf of the ballclub during contract discussions with players....
of the Brooklyn Dodgers
Los Angeles Dodgers
The Los Angeles Dodgers are a professional baseball team based in Los Angeles, California. The Dodgers are members of Major League Baseball's National League West Division. Established in 1883, the team originated in Brooklyn, New York, where it was known by a number of nicknames before becoming...
. Beginning with the 1946 signing of African American player Jackie Robinson
Jackie Robinson
Jack Roosevelt "Jackie" Robinson was the first black Major League Baseball player of the modern era. Robinson broke the baseball color line when he debuted with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947...
for the Dodgers, Rickey became renowned for his role in the racial integration of the game. Rickey's feelings on integration were a primary motivating factor in his decision.
In the war years
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
of 1917-1919, the break between the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
and Germany
German Empire
The German Empire refers to Germany during the "Second Reich" period from the unification of Germany and proclamation of Wilhelm I as German Emperor on 18 January 1871, to 1918, when it became a federal republic after defeat in World War I and the abdication of the Emperor, Wilhelm II.The German...
struck a military tone on campus. Individual students were volunteering in the Marines
United States Marine Corps
The United States Marine Corps is a branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for providing power projection from the sea, using the mobility of the United States Navy to deliver combined-arms task forces rapidly. It is one of seven uniformed services of the United States...
, in the Canadian Forces
Canadian Forces
The Canadian Forces , officially the Canadian Armed Forces , are the unified armed forces of Canada, as constituted by the National Defence Act, which states: "The Canadian Forces are the armed forces of Her Majesty raised by Canada and consist of one Service called the Canadian Armed Forces."...
, and other forms of service. As America entered World War I the U.S. War Department
United States Department of War
The United States Department of War, also called the War Department , was the United States Cabinet department originally responsible for the operation and maintenance of the United States Army...
inaugurated the Students' Army Training Corps
Reserve Officers' Training Corps
The Reserve Officers' Training Corps is a college-based, officer commissioning program, predominantly in the United States. It is designed as a college elective that focuses on leadership development, problem solving, strategic planning, and professional ethics.The U.S...
, a program designed to use existing colleges and universities as training facilities for new military personnel. On the morning of October 1, 1918, about 150,000 college boys on US campuses transformed into student soldiers. This was the induction into the Students' Army Training Corps. In Delaware, on campus, approximately 400 students were given the oath of allegiance
Oath of allegiance
An oath of allegiance is an oath whereby a subject or citizen acknowledges a duty of allegiance and swears loyalty to monarch or country. In republics, modern oaths specify allegiance to the country's constitution. For example, officials in the United States, a republic, take an oath of office that...
. The men received the regular army training and academic instruction prescribed by the Committee on Education and Special Training of the War Department. The mode of student activities changed: campus traditions were put aside, and athletic events were cancelled throughout the fall semester of 1918.
Campus climate in the swinging sixties
In 1966, students established an Upward BoundUpward Bound
Upward Bound is a federally funded educational program within the United States. The program is one of a cluster of programs referred to as TRIO, all of which owe their existence to the federal Higher Education Act of 1965. Upward Bound programs are implemented and monitored by the United States...
program, funded by the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964, to help prepare students from lower-income and poverty areas for college. The Arts Castle, the Early Childhood Center, the Big Pal/Little Pal Program, the Andrews House, the Office of Community Service, and the International Ambassador High School Program are among the many programs founded since the 1970s to provide services to the larger community in Delaware.
Elden Smith, Wesleyan's 11th president, appointed a commission in 1968 to study student life and to refine and further edit Wesleyan's previously too-broad Statement of Aims. The commission's report recommended four criteria that OWU's educators should foster: perception, critical judgement, enjoyment, and active responsibility for the problems of society. On "active responsibility for the problems of society", the report stated, "A socially concerned individual who had no capacity for enjoyment, who exercised glib and trite rather than critical judgement, and who had no perception of reality, would be a public menace. Perhaps this is the meaning of 'do-gooder'. On the other hand, the absence of active responsibility for social problems might degenerate into obsession with self, and that perception might become dilettantism."
In 1969, the Commission on Student Life drafted a new form of student life. It formed the Wesleyan Council of Student Affairs (WCSA) with the right to decide basic policies on matters related to student life. The group was controversial from the start: more than two hundred students held a sit-in at the student union to gain faculty approval for issues-oriented representation. WCSA became involved in the first major controversy on the Wesleyan campus in the 1960s: its representatives called for the elimination of academic credit and existence for ROTC and demanded access to the University's budget and general financial statements.
Vietnam war and Wenzlau controversy
The escalation of the Vietnam WarVietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
in the early 1960s had a significant impact on Ohio Wesleyan students. A small minority had been concerned with the war for several years, but the bombing of North Vietnam
North Vietnam
The Democratic Republic of Vietnam , was a communist state that ruled the northern half of Vietnam from 1954 until 1976 following the Geneva Conference and laid claim to all of Vietnam from 1945 to 1954 during the First Indochina War, during which they controlled pockets of territory throughout...
and the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
The Tonkin Gulf Resolution was a joint resolution which the United States Congress passed on August 10, 1964 in response to a sea battle between the North Vietnamese Navy's Torpedo Squadron 10135 and the destroyer on August 2 and an alleged second naval engagement between North Vietnamese boats...
in August 1964 raised campus-wide awareness almost overnight. The Vietnam War, so distant, became a huge presence on campus, affected ideas of community, student power, and free speech, and influenced daily decisions like class choices and social interactions. The first stirrings of protest against the war
Opposition to the Vietnam War
The movement against US involvment in the in Vietnam War began in the United States with demonstrations in 1964 and grew in strength in later years. The US became polarized between those who advocated continued involvement in Vietnam, and those who wanted peace. Peace movements consisted largely of...
occurred in late 1964. In December, the Wesleyan Council of Student Affairs voted to send a letter to President Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson , often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States...
opposing the expansion of the war and advocating withdrawal. Opposing expansion was a fairly moderate position, but calling for withdrawal was much more radical.
Wesleyan was the first college campus in the country to demonstrate against President Richard Nixon
Richard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...
's decision to invade Cambodia
Cambodia
Cambodia , officially known as the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia...
on April 30, 1970. Following the demonstration, two hundred students occupied the Air Force ROTC building on campus to protest both the war and the awarding of academic credit for ROTC participation. The ROTC was seen as an extension of the "Pentagon's war machine."
President Wenzlau, then the president of OWU, attempted to disperse the protesters but was shouted down. The students demanded that the school hold a campus referendum on the issue of ROTC campus disbandment and that the vote be binding on university policy.
Wenzlau called for an emergency faculty meeting on May 1, 1970. The faculty body, surrounded by more than 300 students, decided to hold a faculty meeting later in the month when the entire faculty body would be present. The faculty meeting authorized sending a telegram to Nixon demanding an immediate unilateral cease-fire for all US troops in Cambodia
Cambodia
Cambodia , officially known as the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia...
, Laos
Laos
Laos Lao: ສາທາລະນະລັດ ປະຊາທິປະໄຕ ປະຊາຊົນລາວ Sathalanalat Paxathipatai Paxaxon Lao, officially the Lao People's Democratic Republic, is a landlocked country in Southeast Asia, bordered by Burma and China to the northwest, Vietnam to the east, Cambodia to the south and Thailand to the west...
, and Vietnam
Vietnam
Vietnam – sometimes spelled Viet Nam , officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam – is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea –...
.
The student referendum was held on May 22, 1970. The student body was split on the issue of ROTC, while 67 percent voted to censure the Vietnam War
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
.
Involvement in college affairs in the 1970s
OWU students continued to demand more say in university affairs, in addition to making a strong stand on national issues. The Wesleyan Council for Student Affairs and the administration battled over appropriate wording for alcohol and visitation policies. Several hundred students staged a "drink-in" at the MUB (the student union) in 1971. In the spring of 1971, students set up a tent community called "The People's Park" in front of Sturges Hall to protest housing policies. Students became involved in decisions on several faculty tenure denials, the academic schedule, and plans for a new gymnasium. Starting in 1970, the Board of Trustees approved a student seat on its board, which was to be filled every three years.On racial equality again
Mary King, class of 1963, worked alongside the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. was an American clergyman, activist, and prominent leader in the African-American Civil Rights Movement. He is best known for being an iconic figure in the advancement of civil rights in the United States and around the world, using nonviolent methods following the...
in the U.S. civil rights movement
Civil rights movement
The civil rights movement was a worldwide political movement for equality before the law occurring between approximately 1950 and 1980. In many situations it took the form of campaigns of civil resistance aimed at achieving change by nonviolent forms of resistance. In some situations it was...
when she was a young student, and was a member of the staff of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee ' was one of the principal organizations of the American Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. It emerged from a series of student meetings led by Ella Baker held at Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina in April 1960...
(SNCC).
Reverend Martin Luther King frequently spoke in the U.S. against the South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
n government in the 1960s, urging Americans to end trade
Trade
Trade is the transfer of ownership of goods and services from one person or entity to another. Trade is sometimes loosely called commerce or financial transaction or barter. A network that allows trade is called a market. The original form of trade was barter, the direct exchange of goods and...
and investment
Investment
Investment has different meanings in finance and economics. Finance investment is putting money into something with the expectation of gain, that upon thorough analysis, has a high degree of security for the principal amount, as well as security of return, within an expected period of time...
s in that country. Following political activity by South Africa's blacks in 1985, the government declared a state of emergency.
The resurgence of campus activism regarding racism existing elsewhere in the world came in response to David Warren's, the 13th president, involvement in the issue. In his inauguration Warren stated: "If there is one phrase which I believe best characterizes our Wesleyan education, it is: 'Here I stand.' Within these three words of Martin Luther -- 'Here I stand' -- is compressed the whole of our historical endeavor..."
In the 1980s the most organized campus movement was against investments in companies doing business in South Africa. By February 1987, student political action had brought Ohio Wesleyan to pledge to fully divest
Divestment
In finance and economics, divestment or divestiture is the reduction of some kind of asset for either financial or ethical objectives or sale of an existing business by a firm...
any holdings connected to South Africa. The OWU Committee on Divestment was organized in 1988 and funded many activities related to its cause. It sponsored an Anti-Apartheid Week, candlelight vigils, and protest marches. One event which drew a lot of media attention was the 1988 demonstration before the Board of Trustees. Students carried a black and white paper chain as they climbed up the student union ballroom. As their leader announced "Divest!", students broke the symbolic paper chain.
Recent activism
Globalization
Globalization refers to the increasingly global relationships of culture, people and economic activity. Most often, it refers to economics: the global distribution of the production of goods and services, through reduction of barriers to international trade such as tariffs, export fees, and import...
, and women's reproductive rights
Reproductive rights
Reproductive rights are legal rights and freedoms relating to reproduction and reproductive health. The World Health Organization defines reproductive rights as follows:...
.
In April 2002 about a hundred Wesleyan students gathered on The Mall
National Mall
The National Mall is an open-area national park in downtown Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States. The National Mall is a unit of the National Park Service , and is administered by the National Mall and Memorial Parks unit...
in Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
during a weekend of protests for an array of causes, including the Middle East crisis
Israeli-Palestinian conflict
The Israeli–Palestinian conflict is the ongoing conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. The conflict is wide-ranging, and the term is also used in reference to the earlier phases of the same conflict, between Jewish and Zionist yishuv and the Arab population living in Palestine under Ottoman or...
, and also to denounce lending policies of the World Bank
World Bank
The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans to developing countries for capital programmes.The World Bank's official goal is the reduction of poverty...
. In February 2003 approximately 100 OWU students travelled to New York City to protest US actions in Iraq, with partial funding from the Wesleyan Chaplain's office.
During Ohio Wesleyan University Against the War on October 5 and November 17, 2004, more than one hundred students held peace rallies in front of Delaware's City Hall.
In 2004 the awarding of the Lilly Grant
Lilly Endowment
Lilly Endowment Inc., headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana is one of the world's largest private philanthropic foundations and is among the ten largest such endowments in the United States....
, "Vocation: Identity, Intellect, and Life Choices: A Move Toward Wholeness", and the prospect of the participation by Ohio Wesleyan in the Lilly Endowment program on vocation, evoked an intense and adverse response from a significant group of faculty members. An open letter signed by more than 40 faculty members questioned the appropriateness of the predominantly Christian focus of the grant.
On March 17, 2005, the Student Union on Black Awareness (SUBA) and the College Democrats
College Democrats
The College Democrats of America is the official youth outreach arm of the Democratic Party. It consists of over 100,000 college and university students from across the United States. The organization has served as a way for college students to connect with the Democratic Party and Democratic...
organized a protest on Sandusky Street in Delaware against racial injustice on campus and in the country. University president Mark Huddleston
Mark Huddleston
Mark W. Huddleston is the 19th President of the University of New Hampshire , having been elected to that position on April 18, 2007.-Biography:...
also participated in the protest. During his own college years, President Huddleston had mediated between protesters and administration, favoring classic liberal education over brick-throwers.
Academic pursuit and activism have found an intersection in the form of an annual event called The Sagan National Colloquium. Established in 1984, the SNC annually spotlights an issue of concern in the liberal arts
Liberal arts
The term liberal arts refers to those subjects which in classical antiquity were considered essential for a free citizen to study. Grammar, Rhetoric and Logic were the core liberal arts. In medieval times these subjects were extended to include mathematics, geometry, music and astronomy...
— the impact of science
Science
Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...
on society
Society
A society, or a human society, is a group of people related to each other through persistent relations, or a large social grouping sharing the same geographical or virtual territory, subject to the same political authority and dominant cultural expectations...
, race and reality
Reality
In philosophy, reality is the state of things as they actually exist, rather than as they may appear or might be imagined. In a wider definition, reality includes everything that is and has been, whether or not it is observable or comprehensible...
, censorship
Censorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
and power
Political power
Political power is a type of power held by a group in a society which allows administration of some or all of public resources, including labour, and wealth. There are many ways to obtain possession of such power. At the nation-state level political legitimacy for political power is held by the...
, and the role of globalization
Globalization
Globalization refers to the increasingly global relationships of culture, people and economic activity. Most often, it refers to economics: the global distribution of the production of goods and services, through reduction of barriers to international trade such as tariffs, export fees, and import...
.