UNL cancels William Ayers speech

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BY MELISSA LEE / Lincoln Journal Star

Following widespread public furor over its invitation to ’60s and ’70s radical William Ayers to speak at a conference next month, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln late Friday canceled the speech for security reasons.

“The university’s threat assessment group monitored e-mails and other information UNL received regarding Ayers’ scheduled Nov. 15 visit, and identified safety concerns which resulted in the university canceling the event,” read a four-paragraph statement issued by UNL.

UNL refused to provide specifics on the threats, but Board of Regents Chairman Chuck Hassebrook of Lyons said law enforcement officers had expressed concerns about the potential for violence during Ayers’ speech.

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William Ayers (AP file)

William Ayers (AP file)

With those concerns in mind, Hassebrook said, “I think it’s the best outcome.”

UNL’s invitation to Ayers — a founder of Weather Underground, the group that claimed responsibility for the bombings of public buildings in protest of the Vietnam War — represented poor judgment from the start, Hassebrook said.

“My concern has been not with what he was going to say about education. It was that he’s an unrepentant terrorist,” he said. “(UNL) did the right thing.”

In a statement, NU President J.B. Milliken said: "I understand why many Nebraskans were upset by the proposed Ayers lecture. But notwithstanding many calls for the Board of Regents or the president to cancel it, I believe strongly that such an action would have been inappropriate.

"While the immediate controversy over Ayers' scheduled appearance may be over, the importance of recognizing that a university is a place for the open exchange of ideas, free of outside political or popular pressure, remains."

Ayers, a distinguished education professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, had been scheduled to deliver the keynote address at the College of Education and Human Sciences student research conference.

The conference is part of a two-day celebration honoring the college’s 100th anniversary. Ayers’ address was to have been called “We Are Each Other’s Keepers: Research to Change the World.”

A faculty committee selected Ayers last spring, believing he could share valuable insight on topics like social justice and urban educational reform, Marjorie Kostelnik, the education college’s dean, has said.

But since then, Ayers’ connections to Sen. Barack Obama — the two served on a Chicago board together years ago — have emerged as a focus in the presidential race, making his name much more widely known.

So when news of Ayers’ planned appearance at UNL broke Thursday, the public reaction was swifter — and angrier — than UNL originally anticipated.

Phone calls and e-mails flooded the offices of NU President J.B. Milliken, UNL Chancellor Harvey Perlman, Kostelnik and the NU Foundation.

Some donors threatened to withhold financial support to the university unless Ayers was disinvited. One such donor: the Gilbert M. and Martha H. Hitchcock Foundation in Omaha, which has provided millions to NU in the past 40 years.

And statements from political leaders urging UNL to rethink its decision poured in.

“This is an embarrassment to the University of Nebraska and the State of Nebraska,” Gov. Dave Heineman said. “Bill Ayers is a well-known radical who should never have been invited to the University of Nebraska.”

Rep. Lee Terry, a Republican, and Sen. Ben Nelson, a Democrat, also issued statements condemning Ayers’ selection.

State Auditor Mike Foley also expressed concern, saying early Friday he’d sent Kostelnik a records request seeking details on the funding of the student research conference. Kostelnik had said Ayers’ appearance was to be privately funded.

Regents and Milliken had agreed the selection was bad judgment.

But regents also said it would have been inappropriate for them to act as censors.

The decision on whether to host Ayers, they said, was rightly left to UNL.

“You don’t want decisions about who can speak made by a group of elected officials,” Hassebrook said.

Even so, the swift decision to cancel Ayers may hurt UNL’s reputation within the scholarly community, one faculty member said.

“It’s a major infringement on academic freedom, unless it turns out that the university had clear evidence of threats to life,” said David Moshman, an educational psychology professor and expert on issues of academic freedom.

“If it’s not as serious as that, I think they used that as an excuse to make a political judgment.”

Moshman said UNL allowed what he termed a “heckler’s veto” — sending a message that those angry about a controversial speaker need only call in threats of violence to get the speaker canceled.

“That’s a dangerous precedent,” he said.

UNL faculty and students, particularly the committee that selected Ayers, now lose an opportunity to hear a professor highly regarded in his field, Moshman said.

“But they may also get a major lesson in academic freedom,” he said. “That may be an unexpected benefit.”

Reach Melissa Lee at 473-2682 or mlee@journalstar.com.