Shocking! American University Forced to Allow American Military Recruiters On Campus!

"Yale Law School has lost an appeal to bar military recruiters because of the school's requirement that job recruiters pledge non-discrimination, a pledge the military cannot make because of 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell.'" At least, according to edgeBoston.com.

That's true, as far as it goes. The Solomon Amendment of 1996 allows the Secretary of Defense to not give federal funding to colleges and universities if they keep ROTC or military recruitment off campus. They're free to stay military-free, but now the Defense Department doesn't have to pay them to do so.

Now, about the Ivy League's story that the military's 'discriminatory' "don't ask, don't tell" policy is why they want the American military off-campus: It's just the latest paint job on an old policy.

I don't blame America's institutions of higher education for trying to maintain their hallowed traditions and lofty standards. It was thirty four years and three days ago that The Harvard Crimson wrote the following about the Ivy League schools and the ROTC.

"Like an octopus, ROTC firmly plant its tentacles into all Ivy League school for decades. But since the late 1960s, when the program became a target of antiwar protest at all eight colleges, ROTC and the various climates in which it lived or died have taken different forms.

"A look at ROTC's fate at the eight Ivy schools reveals that the arms of the Ivy League ROTC octopus no longer seem to belong to the same animal."

Taking information from a few sources, here's what happened to the octopus.

• Brown "phased out" ROTC in 1969.
• New York's Columbia University expelled the ROTC in 1969, remaining unsullied by the institution to this day.
• Cornell University, facing "a growing feeling that the University itself was too deeply involved in United States military efforts, the faculty of Arts and Sciences at Cornell voted to discontinue all credited ROTC courses in that college." In a remarkable show of tolerance, ROTC courses were permitted at the university's other five undergraduate colleges.
• Dartmouth was purged of militaristic chauvinists in 1969, only to have the ROTC return in the mid-1980s.
• Harvard faculty voted 207 to 125 to kick the ROTC off their campus in 1969.
• Princeton also "phased out" the ROTC in 1970. ("Phased out" is The Harvard Crimson's euphamism for Ivy League schools' clearing militaristic miasmas from their pure academic air.)
• Stanford was ROTC-free by 1973.
• Yale seems to have been a great leader in removing militaristic threats to academic tranquility. The ROTC left that campus "voluntarily," around 1968.

I was in and out of post-secondary academia from 1969 to 1985, and I see that not much has changed. The great academic leaders of America seem to still be as dedicated to their version of tolerance, diversity, and anti-militarism as ever.

If the hallowed halls of ivy didn't retain a reputation for something other than intellectual shenanigans, their anti-military stance would be a fine joke.

As it is, loose associations of Muslim fanatics around the world are trying to establish their version of sharia law. If they succeed, it's unlikely that the ivy league's cherished academic freedoms will remain.

Watching what are supposed to be the best minds in America continue in their anti-military ways is as pathetic as watching a old hippie wrap himself in a burning flag.

More facts from
"Advocates for ROTC."