Teach-ins, strikes form decade's lasting legacy

The 1960s was a decade that began more quietly than it ended. A nation that had become accustomed to prosperity and endorsed the status quo saw the emergence of a youth-based social movement and collective questioning of social institutions. The University was no exception to this shift.

"They were the days of excitement, the days of madness, the days of rage," said SNRE Prof. Bunyan Bryant, recalling his days as a student at the University during the 1960s. It was a time when "you could go through a whole gamut of feelings in one day," he said.

Photo courtesy of Michiganensian A police officer holds down a protester outside the Fleming Administration Building during the Black Action Movement's 1970 strike against racist admissions policies.

The expanding Civil Rights Movement and the war in Vietnam provided the impetus for student activism at the University and across the nation - social movements that made the late '60s in "an era of unequaled protest," said Margaret Steneck, a history lecturer with an appointment in the Residential College who teaches a history course titled "The History of the University of Michigan" with her husband, history Prof. Nicholas Steneck.

Increased student involvement for civil rights on northern college campuses like the University and the end of student deferments to the draft in 1967 were a source of external pressure for internal change. Steneck said students challenged the paternalistic structure of the University that no longer seemed appropriate in a time of increasing emphasis on the world outside of campus.

This desire for change manifest itself in protest against University policies and in protest against national policies.

"There was the beginning of a sense that there could be grass roots activity," said a 1970 University graduate who wished to remain anonymous.

Bryant described student protest to warfare in Vietnam as a culmination of two strong sentiments: belief in the immorality of the war as well as resistance to the draft.

"One day people were on campus, and the next day they were gone," Bryant said, describing the draft and the outrage that students felt toward the policy.

"We felt we had the moral high ground" and this, "juxtaposed with self-interest, became a powerful kind of tool," Bryant said.

Protest to the war in Vietnam on a grass roots level came in the spring of 1965 when the nation's first teach-in occurred at the University.

Attended by about 2,500 students, the teach-in was an all-night series of speakers and workshops in Angell Hall, according to "The Making of the University of Michigan 1817-1992" by Howard Peckham.

"People were thirsty for information and knowledge," said Bryant, who attended the teach-in. It was a "very powerful experience. We felt we could do something."

This same feeling that non-violent protest could spur change was the motivation behind many civil rights initiatives on campus, including the Black Action Movement strike of 1970, known as BAM I. BAM, an organization comprised of many campus groups, was determined to increase the number of minority students on campus.

"The movement for black civil rights here was also a movement to simply get black students into the University," Steneck said.

Bryant, who picketed and passed out fliers trying to convince students not to go to class during the strike, said many students honored the picket lines. The Residential College and the School of Social Work shut down, and LSA class attendance fell to a low of 25 percent, according to the Peckham's book.

The BAM strike "was a very difficult time" for the University, then University President Robben Fleming said during a speech last month about student unrest during the '60s. Fleming served as head of the University from 1968 to 1979.

BAM occurred at a time when violence was raging on college campuses across the nation, and the strike increased the potential for conflict at the University, Fleming said.

The strike, which lasted eight days, came to an end when negotiations between BAM and the administration resulted in a commitment made by the University to work toward 10 percent black student enrollment by 1973. BAM and the administration also agreed to additional BAM demands, all designed to create a better atmosphere for minority students.

As 1970s began, student activism shifted its center away from the Vietnam War and took a new focus with movements for environmental rights and women's rights, in an attempt to "make the world a better place," Steneck said.

But ultimately the period of protest dwindled and the onset of economic recession in 1975 turned student concerns in new directions, Steneck said.

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