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Professor questions validity of celebrating leader's birthday
Editor’s note: Each Tuesday this
semester, the Daily Nebraskan will
print an opinion column from a uni
versity faculty or staff member. Each
works at the University of Nebraska
or is involved with an issue that
afreets our campus or our students.
GERRY HARBISON is a
professor of chemistry at
UNL.
A university like UNL does two
main things: scholarship and educa
tion. Scholarship is, in essence, the
discovery of new facts and truths
about the world. Education is passing
on these truths, and the methods of
their discovery, to students, so that
they can make use of them in the real
world, or themselves contribute to the
process of discovery in the future.
The two great crimes against this
academic enterprise are fraud and
plagiarism. Fraud corrupts scholar
ship by contaminating the true with
the false. Plagiarism debases educa
tion because it robs credit for discov
eries from those who merit it, and
gains the plagiarist unearned creden
tials.
Both fraud and plagiarism are
grounds for dismissal from the
University of Nebraska-Lincoln,
since they corrode the integrity of
what we do.
Martin Luther King Jr., whose
birthday we celebrated yesterday, was
a serial plagiarist. From his days in
Crozer Theological Seminary to his
doctorate at Boston University to his
later books - most of the writings to
which he attached his name were the
work of others.
King’s plagiarism was a pre-elec
tronic kind of “cut-and-paste.” In the
library, he identified useful passages
in the work of others, which he tran
scribed onto index cards. Writing a
paper was simply a matter of arrang
ing those cards in an appropriate
order, with a few words or phrases of
his own to link them together.
When King completed his doctor
ate, away from Boston University, he
took the cards with him, and Coretta
Scott King typed their contents into
the final version of his thesis, inter
spersing a few phrases of King’s to
make the text flow better. King stole
from theologians, philosophers, but
1 most unforgivably of all, from his fel
low students.
Much of his thesis is cribbed ver
batim from the earlier thesis of Jack
Boozer, an army chaplain who came
back to Boston University after World
War II to earn a doctorate.
The Matin Luther King Papers
Project has meticulously catalogued
King’s “borrowings”; I have their
annotated copy of his doctorate. There
are whole swatches in which not a
single word is King’s. Moreover,
King’s plagiarism did not end at
Boston University. Large chunks of
his first published book, “Stride
Towards Freedom,” were manufac
tured in the same way.
America responded to the wide- j
spread revelation of King’s plagia
rism, in fall 1991, in three ways - the
same three ways we always respond
when confronted by racial issues. The
first response was denial. Both the
director bf the MLK Papers Project
and theacting president of Boston
Uniyefsity attempted to conceal the ;
discovery, and admitted it only when
the facts forced them to do so.
The second response was silence.
Even though a reputable British
newspaper, the Sunday Telegraph, had
reported King’s plagiarism a year
before the story broke in America, our
mainstream media ignored it, and
only a couple of fringe conservative
publications ran the story.
Even now, as we celebrate King’s
birthday annually, one can in vain
scan the MLK Papers Project Web
page, or the American media, for any
mention of King’s plagiarism.
And finally, and most pernicious
ly, our third response is to lower the
bar - faced with the reality that a lib
eral hero was academically dishonest,
we lower our standards of academic
honesty.
Already, within a few months of
the revelations, Keith Miller, a white
academic, was claiming that what
King did was not really dishonest, but
was an example of “voice merging,” a
tradition in the African-American
Church where, Miller says, one adds
originality to die words of others by
repeating them in one’s own “voice.”
Because black preachers tradi
tionally borrow from each other’s ser
mons, Miller claims, they don’t have
the same concept of plagiarism as
white society. In the same way, rap
artists “sample” the work of others.
If we take Miller’s view seriously,
then academic honesty is a white -
standard to which it is unfair to hold
non-whites accountable. How insuf
ferably patronizing!
Lowering or abolishing standards
that are fundamental to the integrity
of the university, to accommodate
white liberals’ patronizing opinions of
the inadequacies of “underrepresent
ed” groups, is a theme which recurs
again and again at UNL.
We see it in our multicultural cur
ricula, where we incorporate conjec
ture and downright falsehood into
course materials to exaggerate the
contribution of these groups to con
temporary civilization.
We see it when we set aside facul
ty positions specifically for members
of such groups, fearing that they can’t
survive open competition with white
males.
And, most obviously, we see it
when we celebrate our only named
academic holiday in the name of a
man whose entire academic career
was a negation of our most cherished
principles.
So, on the one hand, we try to per
suade our students what an abhorrent
practice plagiarism is, and on the
other, we revere one of the most cele
brated plagiarists of all time. What a
joke!
When we debase our university in
the name of representing “underrep
resented” groups, we are destroying
what made the university worth enter
ing in die first place.
When the curriculum is a hodge
podge of half-truths and falsehoods,
designed to make people feel good
rather than teaching substance; when
skin color and sex count more than
merit; when our academic integrity is
something to be shrugged off when
)t’s inconvenient, what have we left to
offer any student, white or non-white,
man or woman?
The saddest thing I heard during
1998 was in the question-and-answer
period after Ward Connerly’s lecture
in September. One of Connerly’s
questioners was a young, articulate
African-American woman. She had
scored 24 on the ACT, and had a high
school GPA above 3.7, and was sure
she was only at UNL because of affir
mative action.
Her “friends” had convinced her
that her own achievements (which of
course were far above our admissions
standards) were worthless, and she
owed her education to racial prefer
ences.
On this, the day after Martin
Luther King Jr. day, please think
about that young woman, and about
where our mindless pursuit of “diver
sity” is taking us.
Justice isn’t blind
With a switch of roles, most Americans can spot the truth in court
i A.L. FORKNER is a junior
*5 news-editorial major and a
io Daily Nebraskan columnist
“Lawyers are like nuclear war
heads. I have them because the other
guy has them, but the first time you
use them it (screws) everything up.”
- Danny DeVito, “Other People’s
Money”
Now, I’m not one to randomly
bash others’ professions (OK, maybe
a little), but am I the only one who
feels the legal system has gotten a bit
out of hand?
Most people feel that the courts
are hog-tied by legal loopholes uti
lized by crafty lawyer types.
Don’t believe me? (Normally, not
a bad idea.) Let me give you a hypo
thetical example.
A highway patrolman (let’s call
him Ponch) pulls over a van for
speeding. As Ponch writes the ticket,
he notices the driver acting strange.
Upon further investigation,
Ponch finds 125 pounds of cocaine,
32 illegal assault rifles and the dis
membered body of Officer Jon
n Baker hidden in the body panels of
the van.
Later on, in court, we learn that
Ponch never had cause or a warrant
to search the van. Therefore, the
. drug, weapon and mutilation of a
sidekick charges are all thrown out.
Granted, the example might be a
bit overblown, but it’s not that far
from the truth.
This columnist is sick of lawyers
citing a precedent set back in 1875 in
order to determine that I owe a
stranger $2 million dollars because
he caught a cold from me.
Hence, my call for legal reform.
Who can we turn to in these
strange, confusing times to guide us
down the road to legal nirvana?
Why, me of course. Strange con
fusing times require strange, con
fused people to figure things out.
Let’s analyze the system to find
the problem.
First, there’s the judge. Except
for Judge Judy and Ed Koch, there
are no real problems there.
How about the jury? Possibly.
Twelve people who aren’t smart
enough to get out of jury duty might
be good enough to try shoplifting
cases.
However, if it comes down to
roasting me rotisserie-style or giving
me probation, I want an educated
panel flipping the proverbial coin.
Finally, there are the lawyers.
Could they be the problem? ...
Hmm, could be.
! We have people like Johnnie
Cochran convincing a jury that O.J.
was actually on Star Search at the
time of his ex-wife’s killing.
Then there’s the president’s legal
team, led by David Kendall. This
crew of legal beagles is trying to
prove what Clinton did to Lewinsky
was not a sexual act.
Actually, they want to show it
was just Bill’s way of protesting the
cancellation of NBC’s “Encore!
Encore!”
These sharks, and their like, are
the reasons I propose sweeping
legal reform. /-.
Now, I don’t want to totally / ,/
remove lawyers from die court. ML
God knows I don’t want that
many over-educated people com- ^
peting with me for a job. '
I just want to flip-flop lawyers '
and jurors.
We still pay lawyers, but they
become professional jurors. That
way their legal expertise gets put to
good use, without it turning into a
game of “Who’s Sneakier?”
Then, instead of drafting 12
jurors, we just have to draft two
lawyers.
Of course, we’d have to up the
pay scale a bit. What do jurors make
now? Three shillings and a shiny
rock per day? (I know, I know - peo
ple dig the rock.)
I’m sure some of you don’t think
this would work. You’re probably
right, but work with me here.
Let’s face it, the basic require
ment of an attorney is to explain why.
or why not the accused is guilty. All
that’s required is a little common
sense.
So, let’s all get on
the little red trolley ftj
and take a ride to the \
Neighborhood of
Make-Believe.
A plumber named Joe
represents the state. A house- j
wife named Beverly represents
the defendant, Chris. TTie
charges are manslaughter and grand
theft.
Joe
gets
up
J 5
testing proves the blood belongs to
Chris’ wife, who was found carved
up in the
couple’s
» home.
1 When
Chris was
arrested,
he cackled
that his
wife
would never yell at him to turn down
the TV again.
Joe rests his case.
Beverly gets up, then, after a
moment’s consideration, sits back
down to tell Chris he’s toast.
Our distinguished and knowl
edgeable jury considers the case and
sentences Chris to a long jail sen
tence.
5 Once again, all is well in the
legal system, and justice reigns
.supreme.
Damn, I’m good. I fixed the
whole legal system in 24 inches.
Whew, how do I top that?
Maybe next week I’ll solve
JET? the trade deficit and straighten
f/ out campaign reform.
% It’s either that, or
I’ll systematically
compare and contrast
Jesus and
Spiderman.
I “The justice sys
tem mmes swiftly,
now that they ve abolished all the
lawyers- Christopher Lloyd,
“Back to the Future II”
AjJ ,
