Harassing Students Unacceptable

In your latest report on the doings of the anti-Israeli faculty at Columbia you appear to be slipping away from a very key distinction that must be kept in mind in this type of conflict between justice and academic freedom [“Farrakhan for Columbia?” Editorial, January 10, 2005].

It is the distinction between a professor having a strong anti-Israeli bias both in his outside activities and even to some extent in his classroom presentations, and engaging in the kind of open student intimidation you have described in other editorials and news articles. In my own field of economics, we all know that those of use who are libertarian free-market types will, no matter how hard we try not to, tend to present the material with a tilt toward our ideology and vice versa for the liberal economists who favor more government intervention.

No professor should be fired for showing this type of bias in his class. But if I started to call my liberal students “Commies” or “left-wing nuts” in class (or even outside the class) I should be cashiered without question.

And if President Bollinger’s committee should come up with solid proof of these blatant intimidation charges, then dismissal of the offending professors is called for. I use the proviso “solid” because, although I am a fierce pro-Israeli partisan, I am also a conservative economist teaching in a liberal town and I know that it is possible for disgruntled students to try to make life miserable for a professor they disagree with ideologically.

DAVID M. O’NEILL
Adjunct professor of economics
Hunter College
City University of New York

Remembering Alton Tobey

As we, Claire and Myron Meadow, sat at the funeral service at Mamaroneck’s Zion Memorial Chapel, temporarily adorned with just some of renowned artist Alton Tobey’s works, we could not stop reminiscing about the wonderful, enriching experiences that both his late accomplished musician wife, Rosalyn Tobey and Alton Tobey provided for their family [“Alton Tobey, 90, Artist of Historical Themes and Portraits,” Stephen Miller, Obituaries, January 10, 2005].

As neighbors and good friends we shared a lot. Both of our daughters, Andrea Meadow Danziger of Larchmont and Roxanne Meadow Cohen of San Carlos, Calif., took weekly piano lessons from Rosalind at the Tobey Larchmont home. Their fascinating home/studio became one of the Meadow children’s’ favorite hangouts. Their little brother, Aaron Meadow, would sit on the top rung of the steps to Alton’s basement studio, watching and chatting as Alton would continue painting such monumental works as the “Medal of Honor,” a tribute to the generations of American servicemen which now hangs as a mural for all who visit the U.S.S. Intrepid to see.

Myron Meadow, who, like Alton, was a staunch admirer of Albert Einstein, loved viewing the multiple Einstein portraits done by Tobey. Alton told us how during one some vacation from Yale University the Tobeys went to Cape Cod. That same summer, Einstein, vacationing from Princeton was there as well. Alton’s easel was set up to sketch coastline scenes. Each day, Tobey would see Einstein, coming in, docking his rowboat and walking on the pier. Each day, Tobey would hurriedly and secretly sketch him. One day Einstein walked by and said “What are you sketching, young man?” Tobey showed him his artist’s pad with pages and pages of Einstein portraits. Einstein quipped, “If I don’t succeed as a physicist, I can become an artist’s model!”

Claire says “good morning” to Alton each day she enters the County Courthouse in White Plains and passes his mural “Roots of Westchester.” The mural depicts the history of Westchester with some of its past leaders. Some who are depicted in the mural are our first President George Washington, past president Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Governor Mario Cuomo and County Executive Andrew O’Rourke.

Like the Meadows, Alton had an abiding love for Israel. They will always treasure the mural plate from Tobey titled “The Promised Land.” Tobey created it in honor of Israel’s 30th Anniversary of Statehood.

His memory will be an inspiration and blessing to our family, our community, Americans and the world. We are honored to have known him.

CLAIRE MEADOW
Larchmont, N.Y.

NYCLU’s Curious Disposition

Isn’t it strange that the professed “paragon defender” of civil rights, the New York Civil Liberties Union, has rushed to the defense of anti-Israel Columbia University staff in their confrontation with their students, and prejudged the issue in favor of Columbia University faculty without investigating the facts [“Civil Liberties Union Defends Columbia Faculty,” Josh Gerstein, Page 1, December 28, 2005]?

Wouldn’t their credentials be more legitimate if they had asked for an investigation rather than a priori condemned the students’ intentions?

LEONARD KLESTZICK
Queens

---

Please address letters intended for publication to the Editor of The New York Sun. Letters may be sent by e-mail to editor@nysun.com, facsimile to 212-608-7348, or post to 105 Chambers Street, New York City 10007. Please include a return address and daytime telephone number. Letters may be edited.