Oral history interview with Daniel H. Pollitt, April 5, 1991
Subtitle: interview L-0064-7, Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007)
Contributors: McColl, Ann, interviewer; Southern Oral History Program; University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Documenting the American South (Project); University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Library
Edition: Electronic ed.
Publisher: University Library, UNC-Chapel Hill
Published: 2008
Place of publication: [Chapel Hill, N.C.]
Language: eng
Subjects: Interviews; Law teachers; Civil rights workers; Academic freedom; Freedom of speech; Faculty; Political activity; Universities and colleges; Law and legislation; North Carolina; University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. School of Law; University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Other titles: Interview L-0064-7, Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007); Interview with Daniel H. Pollitt, April 5, 1991; Oral histories of the American South.
Description: This is the seventh interview in a nine-part series of interviews with civil liberties lawyer Daniel H. Pollitt. In this interview, Pollitt focuses on the Speaker Ban controversy as it unfolded on the campus of the University of North Carolina during the mid-1960s. According to Pollitt, conservative state legislators enacted the Speaker Ban because they opposed the wave of student activism at the University of North Carolina during the early 1960s. Pollitt explains that he saw it as a campaign of anti-intellectualism. After outlining how the Speaker Ban was passed by the General Assembly on the sly during the last day of the 1963 legislative session, Pollitt explains the reaction of UNC President William Friday and UNC Chancellor William Aycock. Opposition to the Speaker Ban was widespread on campus, and Pollitt, as a member of the American Association of University Professors, bided his time until the next legislative session of 1965 by monitoring the enforcement of the ban and speaking out against it. Pollitt explains that the threat by the Southern Association of Colleges and Universities to repeal accreditation of North Carolina schools provided the impetus for the General Assembly to withdraw the ban in 1965. He describes how the General Assembly nonetheless encouraged the Boards of Trustees at North Carolina colleges and universities to enact similar regulations on their own. The interview concludes with Pollitt's discussion of how he participated in putting together a lawsuit to challenge the new regulations and how Herbert Aptheker, an avowed communist, was brought to UNC to provide fodder for the lawsuit. Ultimately, the Ban was ruled "unconstitutionally vague." Pollitt's comments in this interview reveal how southern legislators and comparatively liberal universities (UNC in particular) often found themselves at odds during a tumultuous era of social change.
Notes: Title from menu page (viewed on Nov .12, 2008).

Interview participants: Daniel H. Pollitt, interviewee; Ann McColl, interviewer.

Duration: 00:52:32.

This electronic edition is part of the UNC-Chapel Hill digital library, Documenting the American South.  It is a part of the collection Oral histories of the American South.

Text encoded by Jennifer Joyner.  Sound recordings digitized by Aaron Smithers.

Text (HTML and XML/TEI source file) and audio (MP3); 2 files: ca. 80 kilobytes, 96.2 megabytes.

Original version: Southern Oral History Program Collection, (#4007), Series L, University of North Carolina, interview L-0064-7, Manuscripts Department, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Original transcript: 22 p.

Funding from the Institute of Museum and Library Services supported the electronic publication of this interview.

Mode of access: World Wide Web.

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