Michigan Witch Hunt

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Fifth Estate # 72, February 6 - 19, 1969

It looks like the uptight Michigan Senate is going to do a witch-hunt thing.

As we reported in our last issue certain honkie State Senators want to investigate the activities of Students for a Democratic Society on the state campuses, and to find out why “students write dirty words in campus newspapers, take off their clothes in class and commit other acts that vex their elders.”

The State Senate first became concerned when Lee Elbinger read Yeats completely nude at Oakland University. The final straw apparently was the production of “Dionysus in ’69” Jan. 26 in Ann Arbor where the cast of ten appeared completely nude on stage twice during the performance. On January 28, $25,000 was appropriated for a State Senate Subcommittee to look into the situation on Michigan campuses.

At this writing there has been no reaction to the proposed witch-hunt by school administrations or by the creative and/or radical students the investigation is aimed at.

It would certainly seem that this is a clear case of “an attack on one is an attack on all” and the “all” might just take themselves up to Lansing to protest any investigation. Wonder what Sen. George W. Kuhn, one of the sponsors of the resolution would think if he looked out his window and saw 10,000 demonstrators?

Group Takes Stand

NEW YORK (PWS)—The Rascals have announced a new concert policy. They will not appear in concert anywhere unless half of the acts on the bill are black.

“We can’t control the audience,” said Felix Cavaliere, Rascal organist, “but we can be sure the show is integrated. So, from now on, half of the acts will be white, half black, or we stay home.

“We think there are more things that are important than money, and quite frankly we’re tired of seeing producers come at good groups and tell them to do a fast three minutes and then split,” the group stated. They plan only educational television and Smothers Brothers appearances from now on in.

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