The grand duke of the board of regents at this time was Judge N. C. Young, railroad attorney. Needless to say, Judge Young did not refrain from politics; on the contrary, he ran the Republican machine of the state—and incidentally never hesitated to denounce the liberals at his university. Judge Young’s assistant was Mr. Tracy Bangs, aggressive attorney for the Northern States Power Company and the Northwestern Bell Telephone Company. Mr. Bangs defended in a murder case the son of a rich farmer, and got his client off on a plea of “self-defense,” despite the fact that the victim, a farm-hand, had been shot in the back. Thereupon, several hundred of Mr. Bangs’ fellow citizens, including many university professors, signed a petition to the grand jury, charging him with jury-bribing and demanding his indictment. One professor, A. J. Ladd, asked him to resign from the board of trustees while he was under this indictment. Mr. Bangs did not resign, but he bided his time, and as I write he is seeing to it that Professor A. J. Ladd is separated from the university!
In 1915, when the Non-partisan League was started, the university “opposed it by nature”—so a former professor phrased it to me. One man, Professor Gillette, consented to speak at the first meeting of the league, and his life has been one long struggle with the reactionaries ever since. In 1917 President McVey resigned, and the board hastened to nominate his successor, before the Non-partisans got in and appointed Frederick C. Howe! They selected President Kane of the University of Washington—upon the reputation which he had made for himself by forgiving the crimes and accepting the chimes of the Seattle “Times.”
A professor at North Dakota, who got to know President Kane very well, describes him to me in these words: “He has less sense of honor than any man I ever knew.” It was not long before he had proved his incapacity in North Dakota, and there was a storm of protest concerning him; by way of defending himself he set up the claim that the opposition was due to his refusal to appoint nominees of the Non-partisan League to posts as teachers. The statement was absurd on the face of it, because all nominations were made by the heads of departments; but it served to bring the support of the reactionaries. I am told on good authority that President Kane made a deal with the I. V. A.—“Independent Voters’ Association,” camouflage for big business—that he was to be retained and allowed to “swing the axe,” in return for his using the university influence against the Non-partisan League.
The president had an organization all ready-made, in the fraternities and sororities; and in 1920, when the faculty petitioned for his removal, he and his reactionaries went to these groups for support. They incited a student rebellion—and I find this especially significant, in view of the insistence of all interlocking trustees and newspapers upon academic order and authority. What could be more shocking to a believer in propriety than for college students to organize and try to force the hands of their superiors? But of course that does not apply in a case where the sons of bankers and railroad attorneys and public utility magnates are endeavoring to cripple a political movement of “rubes” and “hicks” and “hayseeds.”
The active agent in this student rebellion was the wife of an employe of the Grand Forks “Herald,” whose owner, Mr. Jerry Bacon, represents the Twin City milling and railroad interests in North Dakota. Mr. Bacon had fought the movement for faculty control, calling it “sovietism in the university.” I am told by one of his friends that in this matter of the student uprising he went up to Minneapolis and got his orders from Louis Hill, son and heir of “Jesse James.” Whether he got the money from Mr. Hill I do not know, but I do know that the presses of his newspaper printed cards, supposed to be voicing the students of the university, urging the student-body to refuse to attend classes of those professors who demanded the president’s resignation. A student strike to keep President Kane in office! It must have been much pleasanter for him than that other strike, back in Washington, when the students made rhymes denouncing the crimes and rejecting the chimes of the Seattle “Times”!
Last year, when the “I. V. A.” came into power, the new Governor Nestos came to the university to deliver the Founders’ Day address, and revealed the new scheme of his crowd—to “get” the liberal professors on the issue of religion. In the North Dakota legislature a representative of the “I. V. A.” had proclaimed the terrible tidings that the state library was circulating “The Profits of Religion.” He described the pages referring to the Catholic political machine as “so sacrilegious, so terrible, that I would not read it in this house or any other place.” According to the Bismarck “Tribune,” he “called the attention of every minister in North Dakota to this book”—apparently overlooking the inconsistency of asking the ministers to read the book, and at the same time forbidding the state library to furnish it to them!
Now came Governor Nestos, accusing the professors of “undermining the faith of the students”; and President Kane wrote letters to three of the liberals, O. G. Libby, A. J. Ladd, and Dean Willis of the Law School—several pages of virulent abuse, culminating in the announcement of their dismissal. Under the constitution, this matter should have been taken up by the dean, and the professors had the right of appeal to the university council. This council appointed a committee, consisting exclusively of Kane supporters; nevertheless, after hearing the evidence, this committee unanimously exonerated the professors, and the board of administration did the same. The board tried to settle the matter by requesting both Kane and the professors to resign, but the railroad attorneys who are now running the university will not permit that. The struggle is still on, and the outcome uncertain as I write. One man who has got away tells me how it feels to teach under the control of big business in North Dakota:
“It means the surrender, not merely of your mind, but of your character; a man who stands it for two or three years becomes wholly unfit to influence the young. It has been less than a year since I left, yet I have had letters from probably twelve men at the university, asking me to help them to get positions elsewhere!”
Finally, in justice to the liberal professors, I think I should state that no person now at the university has furnished me any information about it. Several were asked to do so, and declined.