The records of the Academic Freedom Lecture Fund (AFLF) begin in 2000, and mainly consist of videotapes of lectures from the University of Michigan Senate's annual Davis, Markert, Nickerson Lecture on Academic and Intellectual Freedom. There is no documentation of the fund itself.
The annual Davis, Markert, Nickerson Lectures on Academic and Intellectual Freedom are organized chronologically. In addition to the videotapes, documentation includes some transcripts of the lectures, and event programs. The printed program contains background on the lectures, including the resolution establishing the lecture and biographies of the three professors. The 2000 lecture folder also contains a memorial for Clement L. Markert which appeared in The Journal of Heredity.
Adam Kulakow's undergraduate documentary Keeping in Mind, focusing on the University of Michigan's handling of the Davis, Markert, Nickerson cases in the 1950s during the McCarthy era, contributed greatly to the development of the AFLF and the annual lectures. The video was shown publicly for the first time on April 9, 1989. An upgraded 2001 copy of this video is included in these records. For more information about the documentary, and the interviews conducted in support of the project, researchers may consult the Adam Kulakow Papers. The Kulakow collection consists of interview transcripts and videos, and notes which Kulakow generated while producing the documentary. It also includes a copy of the original documentary. Note: The 1989 conditions governing access to "Keeping in Mind" are presumed to remain in force. Please see the finding aid for the Adam Kulakow papers for access and use conditions.
In 2000, the University of Michigan Press published Unfettered Expression: Freedom in American Intellectual Life. The book, edited by Peggie J. Hollingsworth, contained essays originally given as lectures in the annual Davis, Markert, Nickerson Lecture on Academic and Intellectual Freedom series at the University of Michigan from 1991 to 1999.
In 1955, during the height of the McCarthy era, the University of Michigan suspended professors H. Chandler Davis, Clement Markert, and Mark Nickerson for their refusal to give testimony before a U.S. House Committee on Un-American Activities panel. Davis and Nickerson (a tenured professor) were terminated. Markert was later reinstated. The national American Association of University Professors (AAUP) censured the university for its treatment of these professors in 1957. After a new Regents' Bylaw (5.09) was adopted, censure was removed in 1958.
In 1988, emeritus professor Wilbert J. McKeachie published an article, "Reminiscences of the 1950's," in the University of Michigan AAUP Chapter Newsletter that detailed the treatment of Davis, Markert and Nickerson at Michigan during the 1950s. David Hollinger, a history professor, also wrote an account of those events for the 1988 Centennial Celebration Bulletin of the Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studies. Those accounts prompted student Adam Kulakow to prepare a video documentary on the Davis, Markert, Nickerson cases for his undergraduate honors dissertation. Kulakow's documentary Keeping in Mind - The McCarthy Era at the University of Michigan, was shown publicly on April 9, 1989, to a large audience that included the three professors.
Following the presentation of Keeping in Mind, a member of the audience suggested that the university be asked to make amends for its treatment of the three professors in 1955. The University of Michigan Chapter of the AAUP pursued the matter, hoping to encourage the Regents to take appropriate action. A proposal was sent to the Senate Advisory Committee on University Affairs (SACUA) in October 1989. The proposal was endorsed in February 1990 by the Senate Assembly. When the Regents did not take action, the Senate Assembly passed a resolution in November 1990 that deeply regretted "the failure of the University Community to protect the values of intellectual freedom" in 1955. The resolution also established the annual University of Michigan Senate's Davis, Markert, Nickerson Lecture on Academic and Intellectual Freedom. The first lecture was given on February 18, 1991. The three professors were present and participated in a panel discussion after the lecture.
The Senate Assembly established an Academic Freedom Lecture Fund (AFLF) to encourage and support the academic freedom lectures. AFLF was subsequently established as an independent non-profit organization in 1991. The goal of the AFLF being, to support public lectures on academic freedom wherever they might be given.
Source: Program for the University of Michigan's Davis, Markert, Nickerson Symposium on Academic Freedom, October 7, 2000. Also available online at the following URL: http://www.umich.edu/~aflf
List of Lectures
- 1991 - Robert M. O'Neil
- "Academic Freedom in Retrospect and in Prospect"
- 1992 - Lee C. Bollinger
- "The Open-minded Soldier and the University"
- 1993 - Catherine R. Simpson
- "Dirty Minds, Dirty Bodies, Clean Speech"
- 1994 - Walter P. Metzger
- "A Stroll Along the New Frontiers of Academic Freedom"
- 1995 - Linda Ray Pratt
- "Academic Freedom and the Merits of Uncertainty"
- 1996 - Avern Cohen
- "A Federal Trial Judge Looks at Academic Freedom"
- 1997 - Roger Wood Wilkins
- "Opportunity and Academic Integrity"
- 1998 - Eugene L. Roberts, Jr.
- "Free Speech, Free Press, Free Society"
- 1999 - David A. Hollinger
- "Money and Academic Freedom a Half-century After McCarthyism: Universities Amid the Force Fields of Capital"
- 2000 - Symposium on Academic and Intellectual Freedom
- 2001 - Vartan Gregorian
- "Universities of the 21st Century: Perils, Challenges, and Prospects"
- 2002 - Catherine A. MacKinnon
- "From Powerlessness to Power: The Uses of Academic Freedom"
- 2003 - David Cole
- "Freedom and Terror: September 11th and the 21st Century Challenge"
