"The Promise Of American Higher Education"- Harvard's Powerful Response To Trump
Simon Rosenberg
Morning all. I will be sending a more traditional daily Hopium post later today, but I thought it important that we spend time this morning with the courageous and powerful letter that Harvard President Alan Gerber sent to the members of the Harvard community yesterday. As we’ve been discussing in my call for Congress to craft A Letter To America, these kinds of statements - clear, muscular, passionate - can really matter in fights for freedom, like the fight we all find ourselves in right now.
Here is how the NYT is reporting on the letter this morning:
Harvard University is 140 years older than the United States, has an endowment greater than the G.D.P. of nearly 100 countries and has educated eight American presidents. So if an institution was going to stand up to the Trump administration’s war on academia, Harvard would be at the top of the list.
Harvard did that forcefully on Monday in a way that injected energy into other universities across the country fearful of the president’s wrath, rejecting the Trump administration’s demands on hiring, admissions and curriculum. Some commentators went so far as to say that Harvard’s decision would empower law firms, the courts, the media and other targets of the White House to push back as well.
“This is of momentous, momentous significance,” said J. Michael Luttig, a prominent former federal appeals court judge revered by many conservatives. “This should be the turning point in the president’s rampage against American institutions.”
https://www.hopiumchronicles.com/p/the-promise-of-american-higher-education