Columbia President Lee Bollinger was invited, but he did not come.

During a special session at the Center for Jewish History in downtown Manhattan, Stephen Norwood of the University of Oklahoma castigated Columbia University for its position vis-à-vis Nazi Germany in the 1930's. The event was organized by the David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies.

In 1936 Columbia University sent a delegate to Germany in honor of the University of Heidelberg's 550^th anniversary. When some students, led by Robert Burke, protested, then-Columbia President Nicholas Murray Butler expelled Burke.

Advertisement

Nancy Wechsler, 91, who attended a 1933 anti-Columbia protest, recalled to The Jewish Press that Butler was "a highly egotistical man, not to be disobeyed."

Wyman Institute director Rafael Medoff said he regrets that Bollinger declined to come and offer his perspective.

"Avoiding this event will not resolve the lingering moral stain on Columbia university's record," he said.

According to Norwood, Columbia's actions reflect those that most American universities held at the time.

"They have fairly ugly histories," Northeastern University's Laurel Leff said.

Leff cited a letter of then-Harvard President James Bryant Conant regarding the possible hiring of a German-Jewish professor escaping Nazi Germany. "He is certainly very definitely of the Jewish type," Conant writes, "rather heavy as I recall."

Leff said that while Conant did not stop department heads from hiring German-Jewish professors, Conant himself made little effort to do so.

Melissa Jane Taylor and Susan Subak also delivered lectures on Sunday, on U.S. diplomatic responses to the Anschluss and American Unitarian rescue efforts respectively.

"Every generation faces challenges similar in some ways to what Americans faced in the 1930's," Medoff told The Jewish Press.

"So learning from the mistakes that were made by American institutions and the American government in the 1930's can help prepare us to respond more effectively and appropriately in our own time."

In the question period, Norwood was criticized for having adopted a morally charged tone. He responded by saying, "What's the point of studying history if you're not going to apply it for the benefit of humanity?"