Letters to the Editor
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‘Harvard Free Speech Battle Called an Anti-Israel Tactic’
In regard to “Harvard Free Speech Battle Called an Anti-Israel Tactic” by Annie Karni, my motion at the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences meeting in favor of “civil dialogue” about difficult issues in difficult times was tabled not because the meeting lacked a quorum but because its critics did not like the fact that I had mentioned the Israel/Palestine issue [New York, “Harvard Free Speech Battle Called an Anti-Israel Tactic,” November 30, 2007].
They did not like to hear it suggested that the discussion of this issue has been encumbered by fear and censorship, though there is copious evidence on Harvard’s campus that it has been, and they would have felt embarrassed about voting against such an inherently reasonable and non-issue-specific motion.
These were the reasons enunciated by the colleague who moved to “table” (that is, to cut off discussion of ) the motion. Moreover, at the time of the vote, the voters had not been informed that the meeting lacked a quorum.
Ms. Karni failed to mention that Robert’s Rules, which the faculty of arts and sciences parliamentarian had read from to authorize the tabling motion, actually forbids the use of such a motion for this purpose.
“The motion to Lay on the Table … violates the rights of the minority and individual members if it is for any other purpose,” says Robert’s Rules, than “to lay the pending question aside temporarily when something else of immediate urgency has arisen,” such as the early flight of a key participant in the assembly or the need to investigate the matter further. No immediate urgency was either present or asserted at the time.
The fervor of their convictions blinded 74 Ph.D.s to the fact that they were proving my point — that the Israel/Palestine debate has been subject to a unique, and sometimes shamelessly illegal, degree of censorship on this campus.
Ms. Karni speculates that I accepted an invitation to address the “Justice for Palestine” group at Harvard Law School in order to “round up support for [my] motion.”
Law School students have no vote in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences meeting and therefore have no substantial means of supporting my motion.
J. LORAND MATORY
Cambridge, Mass.
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