One of the most interesting of the many forms of protest
during the Vietnam war era was known as a “teach-in”. It was started at the
University of Michigan in Ann Arbor in March, 1965. Faculty members were
angered that Lyndon Johnson had ordered the bombing of North Vietnam, when many
of them had helped him get elected. They thought he would be less apt than
the hawkish Barry Goldwater to escalate the war.
But when Johnson went ahead, faculty members decided
it was time to act. They planned a strike, but as some state retaliation was
certain, a brilliant compromise was reached. Faculty decided instead to teach
their classes as usual, but focus on Vietnam, its history, culture and the
current US intervention. Once this was agreed upon, many more faculty joined
the group and the University administration supported the event, allowing the
use of auditoriums and public address equipment.
Student support for the event was overwhelming. Three
thousand students attended, packing auditoriums. After evening sessions on
March 25, and a midnight rally, faculty and students broke up into discussion
groups and 600 students were still there at 8 a.m. the next morning. US
policymakers both for and against the war spoke. Discussion continued throughout the weekend, including
information not provided by news media.
Arthur Waskow of the Institute for Policy Studies said,
“This teach-in is in the true spirit of a university where students and faculty
learn from each other and not from the calendar.” The teach-in was quickly
adopted as a model for sharing information and ideas at other universities, and
on May 15, university professors from across the country staged a national
teach-in in Washington DC that included members of Congress and State Department
officials.
The March 1965 teach-in helped focus the energies of young
people. Bob Moses, the courageous black leader of the Student Non-violent
Coordinating Committee, said “Justice and peace are twins, just as war is the
twin of racism. To win peace, you’ve got to fight for justice.” When Students
for a Democratic Society president Paul Potter asked, “How will you live your
life so that it doesn’t make a mockery of your values?” 20-year-old Bill Ayers
found the question “rattled in my heart and my head for years to come.” [Quotes
are from Fugitive Days: a Memoir, by Bill Ayers, 2001]
Universities played a vital part in opposition to the
Vietnam war, giving the movement a respectability that previous anti-war
protests lacked. This broadened mainstream opposition, leading eventually to
the denouement of an “unwinnable” war. In 1965, Line is also 20, Marty 19. Line
is attracted to many forms of activism, and in moving to Chicago, finds herself
in the thick of it. Protest of any kind is slower to foment in Marty, but she
too is inexorably swept into a decade of discussions of rights, racism,
imperialism, education and quality of life.
