The Dartmouth Review
Encyclopedia
The Dartmouth Review is a conservative, independent, bi-weekly newspaper
at Dartmouth College
in Hanover, New Hampshire
(U.S.
). It was founded in 1980 by disenchanted staffers—including Gregory Fossedal
, Gordon Haff, Ben Hart, and Keeney Jones—from the college's daily newspaper, The Dartmouth
. It spawned a movement of politically conservative independent U.S. college newspapers such as the Yale Free Press, Harvard Salient
, California Review
, Princeton Tory
and Cornell Review, and has been at the center of several lawsuits.
Past staffers include author Dinesh D'Souza
, talk show host Laura Ingraham
, the Far Eastern Economic Review
' s Hugo Restall, Pulitzer Prize-winner Joseph Rago of The Wall Street Journal
, and The New Criterion
' s James Panero
. Author, columnist and former Nixon and Reagan speechwriter Jeffrey Hart
, now Professor of English Emeritus at Dartmouth College, was also instrumental in the founding of the newspaper and has been a long-time board member and adviser. , it claims 10,000 off-campus subscribers and distributes a further 4,000 newspapers on campus.
In addition, the Dartmouth Review has been a conservative voice on campus issues. The paper has consistently supported a college curriculum based on the Western Canon, criticized Dartmouth College's alcohol policies as too strict, and resisted "political correctness
" on campus. In 2002, Dartmouth's liberal newspaper, the Dartmouth Free Press, documented other issues on which the Dartmouth Review had taken a stand, most of them campus-oriented. The paper has often maintained a flippant yet humorous tone. For example, former editor Bill Grace described one of the college's departments as a "Whitman's Sampler" of professors in one issue.
In defending and promoting Dartmouth traditions and conservative positions, the Dartmouth Review has often provoked controversy. The Dartmouth Review gained national attention and notoriety early on for positions on social issues regarded as politically incorrect
. Examples from the newspaper's history:
as saying that the Review's current "impact on campus is debatable" since the paper no longer dominates campus debate as it did during his editorship.
Newspaper
A newspaper is a scheduled publication containing news of current events, informative articles, diverse features and advertising. It usually is printed on relatively inexpensive, low-grade paper such as newsprint. By 2007, there were 6580 daily newspapers in the world selling 395 million copies a...
at Dartmouth College
Dartmouth College
Dartmouth College is a private, Ivy League university in Hanover, New Hampshire, United States. The institution comprises a liberal arts college, Dartmouth Medical School, Thayer School of Engineering, and the Tuck School of Business, as well as 19 graduate programs in the arts and sciences...
in Hanover, New Hampshire
Hanover, New Hampshire
Hanover is a town along the Connecticut River in Grafton County, New Hampshire, United States. The population was 11,260 at the 2010 census. CNN and Money magazine rated Hanover the sixth best place to live in America in 2011, and the second best in 2007....
(U.S.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
). It was founded in 1980 by disenchanted staffers—including Gregory Fossedal
Gregory Fossedal
Gregory Fossedal is the self-described chairman of the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution .Fossedal, Gordon Haff, Benjamin Hart, and Keeney Jones founded the right-wing Dartmouth Review in 1980. Fossedal graduated from Dartmouth College in 1981 magna cum laude with an A.B. in English Literature...
, Gordon Haff, Ben Hart, and Keeney Jones—from the college's daily newspaper, The Dartmouth
The Dartmouth
The Dartmouth is the daily student newspaper at Dartmouth College. Founded in 1799, it is America's oldest college newspaper. It is published by The Dartmouth, Inc., an independent, nonprofit corporation chartered in the state of New Hampshire.-History:...
. It spawned a movement of politically conservative independent U.S. college newspapers such as the Yale Free Press, Harvard Salient
Harvard Salient
-Overview:The Harvard Salient was founded in 1981, and is one of the oldest in a movement of conservative newspapers established in the Ivy League during the beginnings of the Reagan administration.It publishes biweekly...
, California Review
California Review
The California Review is an Independent Conservative college paper distributed primarily on the campus of the University of California, San Diego. The publication is one of a handful of campus newspapers partially funded by the Associated Students of UCSD...
, Princeton Tory
Princeton Tory
The Princeton Tory is a magazine of conservative and moderate political thought written and published by Princeton University students.In the fall semester of 2009, the Tory came out with a new website on which it publishes all of its print articles. In addition, the Tory opened a new blog....
and Cornell Review, and has been at the center of several lawsuits.
Past staffers include author Dinesh D'Souza
Dinesh D'Souza
Dinesh D'Souza is an author and public speaker and a former Robert and Karen Rishwain Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. He is currently the President of The King's College in New York City. D'Souza is a noted Christian apologist and conservative writer and speaker....
, talk show host Laura Ingraham
Laura Ingraham
Laura Anne Ingraham is an American radio host, author, and conservative political commentator. Her nationally syndicated talk show, The Laura Ingraham Show, airs throughout the United States on Talk Radio Network...
, the Far Eastern Economic Review
Far Eastern Economic Review
The Far Eastern Economic Review was an English language Asian news magazine started in 1946. It printed its final issue in December 2009. The Hong Kong-based business magazine was originally published weekly...
The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal is an American English-language international daily newspaper. It is published in New York City by Dow Jones & Company, a division of News Corporation, along with the Asian and European editions of the Journal....
, and The New Criterion
The New Criterion
The New Criterion is a New York-based monthly literary magazine and journal of artistic and cultural criticism, edited by Hilton Kramer and Roger Kimball. It has sections for criticism of poetry, theater, art, music, the media, and books...
James Panero
James Panero is the managing editor of The New Criterion and former editor-in-chief of The Dartmouth Review. In addition to his editorial duties for The New Criterion, Panero serves as the magazine’s gallery critic...
. Author, columnist and former Nixon and Reagan speechwriter Jeffrey Hart
Jeffrey Hart
Jeffrey Peter Hart and raised in New York, New York, is a cultural critic, professor emeritus of English at Dartmouth College, essayist, and columnist who lives in New Hampshire, United States. After two years as an undergraduate at Dartmouth, he transferred to Columbia University, where he...
, now Professor of English Emeritus at Dartmouth College, was also instrumental in the founding of the newspaper and has been a long-time board member and adviser. , it claims 10,000 off-campus subscribers and distributes a further 4,000 newspapers on campus.
Stances and controversies
The Darthmouth Review has consistently favored a stronger voice on the part of alumni who share its worldview in college governance and alumni issues, particularly elections to Dartmouth's Board of Trustees. In 1980, the paper reported on the election of John Steel, who later became an anti-seal activist in California, to the board after a contentious petition campaign. (Eight members of the Dartmouth Board of Trustees are known as Alumni Trustees because they are nominated by alumni.) More recently, the paper was a driving force behind what it called the "Lone Pine Revolution," in which the alumni independently nominated and then saw elected four trustees critical of the college's stances on "free speech," athletics, "alumni rights," and the college/university dynamic. Several of these trustees said their campaigns were aided by the newspaper's favorable coverage of them.In addition, the Dartmouth Review has been a conservative voice on campus issues. The paper has consistently supported a college curriculum based on the Western Canon, criticized Dartmouth College's alcohol policies as too strict, and resisted "political correctness
Political correctness
Political correctness is a term which denotes language, ideas, policies, and behavior seen as seeking to minimize social and institutional offense in occupational, gender, racial, cultural, sexual orientation, certain other religions, beliefs or ideologies, disability, and age-related contexts,...
" on campus. In 2002, Dartmouth's liberal newspaper, the Dartmouth Free Press, documented other issues on which the Dartmouth Review had taken a stand, most of them campus-oriented. The paper has often maintained a flippant yet humorous tone. For example, former editor Bill Grace described one of the college's departments as a "Whitman's Sampler" of professors in one issue.
In defending and promoting Dartmouth traditions and conservative positions, the Dartmouth Review has often provoked controversy. The Dartmouth Review gained national attention and notoriety early on for positions on social issues regarded as politically incorrect
Political correctness
Political correctness is a term which denotes language, ideas, policies, and behavior seen as seeking to minimize social and institutional offense in occupational, gender, racial, cultural, sexual orientation, certain other religions, beliefs or ideologies, disability, and age-related contexts,...
. Examples from the newspaper's history:
- The Dartmouth Review continues to refer to Dartmouth's sports teams as the "Indians" after the traditional school mascotMascotThe term mascot – defined as a term for any person, animal, or object thought to bring luck – colloquially includes anything used to represent a group with a common public identity, such as a school, professional sports team, society, military unit, or brand name...
which was officially discarded in the early 1970s. To promote the Indian mascot as well as the Indian symbol, the newspaper sold Dartmouth t-shirts emblazoned with the symbol. (To poke fun at these shirts, members of the Native American Society printed "Dartmouth Whites" shirts featuring the Monopoly Uncle Money Bags character in place of the Indian symbol.) - When the Alma Mater, originally called "Men of Dartmouth," was changed to be gender-neutral, the paper printed and distributed copies of the original lyrics. These lyrics are reprinted each year for incoming freshmen.
- In 1986, students affiliated with "The Dartmouth Review formed the Committee to Beautify the Green and dismantled, with sledgehammers and early in the morning, the shantiesShantyShanty may refer to:* Ice shanty, a portable shed placed on a frozen lake* Sea shanty, shipboard working songs* Shanty Hogan , Major League Baseball catcher* Shanty town, unit of irregular, low-cost dwellings...
that had been erected on the campus quad as part of an ultimately successful campaign to cause Dartmouth to divestDivestmentIn 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...
itself of South AfricaSouth AfricaThe 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 investments during apartheid. No one was under attack. The shanties were said to be blocking the College's annual Winter Carnival and were considered by many to be eyesores; the town of Hanover had ordered the illegally-constructed structures torn down. When the College had moved to remove them, 150 students blocked the workers. Ten Dartmouth Review staffers who dismantled the shanties were disciplined by the College, even though there was physical or verbal form of "attack," and the shanties were illegal to begin with. - In 1984, the Dartmouth Review sent a reporter to a public meeting of the Dartmouth Gay Students Association. The Dartmouth Review got The Dartmouth Gay Students Association's message out to campus by publishing excerpts from the meeting with the names of the group's leaders.
- In 1988, the Dartmouth Review published an article criticizing a black professor by judging one of his courses "one of Dartmouth's most academically deficient." After hearing a profanity-laden phone call from the professor after publishing the story, staffers sought a comment, the professor yelled at them and attacked a student. The school accused the students of harassment.
- In the fall of 1990, the Dartmouth Review (whose staff was at the time one-quarter Jewish) was accused of anti-SemitismAnti-SemitismAntisemitism is suspicion of, hatred toward, or discrimination against Jews for reasons connected to their Jewish heritage. According to a 2005 U.S...
for its publication of a quote from Mein KampfMein KampfMein Kampf is a book written by Nazi leader Adolf Hitler. It combines elements of autobiography with an exposition of Hitler's political ideology. Volume 1 of Mein Kampf was published in 1925 and Volume 2 in 1926...
in its masthead in place of its usual quote from Teddy Roosevelt. The quote was discovered by Dartmouth Review staffers three days after the paper was distributed. The Dartmouth Review recalled the issue and then editor-in-chief, Kevin Pritchett issued a campus-wide apology. According to Review backer William F. Buckley, Jr.William F. Buckley, Jr.William Frank Buckley, Jr. was an American conservative author and commentator. He founded the political magazine National Review in 1955, hosted 1,429 episodes of the television show Firing Line from 1966 until 1999, and was a nationally syndicated newspaper columnist. His writing was noted for...
's book In Search of Anti-Semitism, this incident was the work of a disgruntled former staff member. - In response to the Hitler quotation in particular and the Review's stance in general, almost two thousand people assembled on the Green for a "Rally Against Hate". Both the rally and President Freedman were later criticized by some among Dartmouth alumni and by the national media. The "Hitler Quote incident," as it came to be known, came on the heels of several smaller incidents allegedly suggesting anti-Semitism on the part of the Review. The incident led to a satiric response by the Harvard Lampoon, who in April 1992 replaced the usual Dartmouth Review newspapers with their own "All Hitler Fashion Preview," including a quote page with exclusive (and fake) Hitler quotes. During the same period, College President Freedman, who was Jewish, was caricatured as Adolf Hitler on their front page with the caption "Ein Reich, Ein Volk, Ein Freedman."
- The November 28, 2006, issue of the Dartmouth Review featured a cover image of an Indian brandishing a scalp, with the headline: "The Natives are Getting Restless!" The illustration is widely used by national anti-Indian coalitions; the paper itself included multiple pieces criticizing both Native American students' complaints about a string of incidents perceived as racist, as well as the College's apologies for them. On November 29, 2006, more than 500 students, staff, faculty members and administrators responded to the issue by gathering for a "Solidarity Against Hatred Rally" in front of Dartmouth Hall. In an interview with the Associated Press, the Dartmouth Review editor-in-chief said the paper was in response to "the overdramatic reaction to events this term." Editors subsequently issued statements expressing "regret" and called the cover, but not the issue's content, a "mistake".
Influence and legacy
In 2006, the newspaper celebrated its twenty-fifth year of publication by releasing an anthology entitled The Dartmouth Review Pleads Innocent: Twenty-Five Years of Being Threatened, Impugned, Vandalized, Sued, Suspended, and Bitten at the Ivy League's Most Controversial Conservative Newspaper, in which William F. Buckley lauded the newspaper as "a vibrant, joyful provocative challenge to the regnant but brittle liberalism for which American colleges are renowned." Some claim the newspaper's influence with current students may be on the decline, especially after the founding of moderate and liberal campus newspapers (The Beacon, a short-lived monthly campus publication, was founded by a former Review staffer). A February 17, 2003 article in The Nation, co-authored by a founder of the liberal Free Press, quotes early Review editor-turned-national-pundit Dinesh D'SouzaDinesh D'Souza
Dinesh D'Souza is an author and public speaker and a former Robert and Karen Rishwain Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. He is currently the President of The King's College in New York City. D'Souza is a noted Christian apologist and conservative writer and speaker....
as saying that the Review's current "impact on campus is debatable" since the paper no longer dominates campus debate as it did during his editorship.