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Interviewdetail i Regional Oral History Office University of California The Bancroft Library Berkeley, California John Leggett Free Speech Movement Oral History Project Interviews conducted by Lisa Rubens in 2001 Copyright © 2014 by The Regents of the University of California ii Since 1954 the Regional Oral History Office has been interviewing leading participants in or well-placed witnesses to major events in the development of Northern California, the West, and the nation. Oral History is a method of collecting historical information through tape-recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. The tape recording is transcribed, lightly edited for continuity and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewee. The corrected manuscript is bound with photographs and illustrative materials and placed in The Bancroft Library at the University of California, Berkeley, and in other research collections for scholarly use. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account, offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is reflective, partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. **************************************** All uses of this manuscript are covered by a legal agreement between The Regents of the University of California and John Leggett dated January 24, 2004. The manuscript is thereby made available for research purposes. All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, are reserved to The Bancroft Library of the University of California, Berkeley. Excerpts up to 1000 words from this interview may be quoted for publication without seeking permission as long as the use is non-commercial and properly cited. Requests for permission to quote for publication should be addressed to The Bancroft Library, Head of Public Services, Mail Code 6000, University of California, Berkeley, 94720-6000, and should follow instructions available online at http://bancroft.berkeley.edu/ROHO/collections/cite.html It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: John Leggett “Free Speech Movement Oral History Project: John Leggett” conducted by Lisa Rubens in 2001, Regional Oral History Office, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, 2014. iii Table of Contents – John Leggett Tape 1 Side A 1 Personal background — Educational background — Political Science, Sociology, and Anthropology [PSA] Department University of Michigan — Hired at UC Berkeley Department of Sociology — Students for Democratic Society [SDS] — [friendship with] Al Haber,[first president of SDS] — Receiving funding for SDS from David Dubinsky of the International Ladies’ Garment Workers Union [ILGWU] — Spring 1960 [SDS] Conference — Working with Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee [SNCC] to organize the Greensboro lunch-counter sit-ins — Working with the Civil Rights Commission on a discrimination case against Cousins Clothing Store in Ann Arbor, Michigan — Membership in the Socialist Party— Anti-Communist politics at U of M — “John Leggett and the Group” labelled in the local press — House on Un-American Activities Commission [HUAC] in Ann Arbor; professors fired — Loyalty Oath at UC Berkeley — Familial background — Mother’s childhood — Father’s work history, including an acrimonious departure from the Ford plant in Detroit — “Beer Garden” discussions between his father and his co-workers comparing policies and working conditions to the Soviet Union — Father’s involvement in the United Autoworkers Union [UAW] Side B 12 300 person strike at South Lake School, a public school funded by Edsel Ford — Taft- Hartley Act, a ban on classic picket lines — March of Time — Ethnic make-up of South Lake High School — What “French-Canadian” means in terms of ethnicity — Working in building construction after high school — International Hod Carriers and Laborers Union — Job record — Local 154 — Plane pushing on U.S.S. Midway — Korean War aboard the U.S.S. Kearsarge — Leaving the military — Central Michigan State College — Interest in Mao Tse Tung — “Passing” the football team through high school exams — Court martial for jumping ship in Navy — Discharge from Navy to earn a bachelor’s degree in political sciences at Ann Arbor — Earning a Master’s in Political Science and a Fellowship for a dissertation — Transferring to Sociology — Neo- Marxism and logical positivism — Herbert Marcuse and Reason and Revolution — Sociology and Political Science at UC Berkeley — James Petras — William Friedland — Student League for Industrial Democracy [SLID] — Hal and Ann Draper — Political Issues Club, 1956, for discussing workers’ rights issues in Budapest and Germany — Fair Play for Cuba Tape 2 25 Al Haber and “The Negro Issue” — Picketing in Ann Arbor and issues with a manager of a Kresge also heading the Human Rights Commission — Tom Hayden, editor of Michigan Daily, pulling his support for the SNCC picket lines — Community concerns and how this led to more public sympathy — Media support — ACLU Lawyer gives a iv speech in support of Freedom of Expression at the Ann Arbor police station — Dave Wellman — Port Huron — Fears of arrest by FBI for being “Reds”— SYL, SLID, and LID — James Farmer and his contributions to the FSM — Herbert Hill and Robin Williams — Deacons for Self-Defense — More on James Farmer — Stokely Carmichael — Strengthened movement in southeast Michigan —Ann Holden, leader of CORE, Ann Arbor — Social Science Research Council [SSRC] Grant to fund a dissertation on working-class consciousness in Detroit with Karel Cibulka and Marge Beth — Teaching position at Berkeley — Reflections of colleagues Seymour Martin Lipset and Herbert Blumer — Differences in cultural attitudes in Berkeley and Ann Arbor, particularly with regards to views towards blacks — Misconceptions of and adjustments to Berkeley weather — Tom DeVries — SLATE — Coming to Berkeley — — Malcolm X speaks at UC Berkeley— Comparison of students at Ann Arbor and Berkeley students — James Petras — Motivations for joining the FSM — Sociology Department culture during FSM — History of “Schachtmanites” Tape 3 49 Communism in American Politics during the 1930s and 1940s — The Popular Front — “The Browder Moment” — End Poverty in California [EPIC] Campaign — Jacques Duclos and his call for more militant communism — Adoption of the “Zhadanov Line” — C. Wright Mills, Hal Draper and others writing in Labor Action and New International about the US rearming imperial powers post-WWII, Communist revolutions, and other topics — The Great Books Club — Trucks Act of 1964, Michigan — On fellow SP member fears of upsetting Seymour Lipset — Personal grievances with the Socialist Party over reactions towards the FSM, CORE, Sheraton Palace, anti-HUAC protests in San Francisco, and other forms of direct action — Comparing John Brown to Robert Williams — Ann Draper, member of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers Union, and her efforts to organize farm workers — Paul Jacobs — August 1964 and its significance towards joining the movement — Involvement of Republican “do-gooder” students in the FSM — Goldwater and the Young Americans for Freedom — Restrictions by Clark Kerr leading up to “the Police Car Incident” — Mario Savio’s reputation — Jackie Goldberg — Group consensus as exemplified by an anti-war march from Bancroft and Telegraph to the Berkeley/Oakland border — Organizing a response to mass arrests of students at Sproul Hall — James Farmer and Jacobus tenBroek speak at Sproul Plaza in support of the FSM — December 7th Greek events at Greek Theatre, the detention of Mario Savio and the beating of other students by police Tape 4 73 More on the meeting at the Greek Theatre — FSM December 8th Faculty Vote — Formation of an Academic Senate Committee to determine most appropriate punishment for students involved in the Greek Amphitheater incident — Attorneys for arrested students — Natural History of an Institutional Arrest and the Lessons of the Sproul Hall Sit-In, a paper later published in Taking State Power — Georg Simmel and the sociology of space, time, and motion and transfer — Department divisions of space in Barrows Hall by floor — Procurement of Leggett’s FBI dossier in mid- to late-seventies — Move to Simon Fraser University after learning that Lipset would not allow tenure — Rutgers v University — Background to hiring process at UC Davis, Black Studies — Vietnam Day Committee demonstrations in San Francisco — Police and FBI undercover agents in classrooms — University of California spying on its employees — Informing Livermore Lab about the FSM and Sproul Hall sit-ins —Work with sociologist Franz Schurmann — Demographic breakdowns of participants in the FSM — Influence of East Coast Jewish intellectuals on the Midwest and West Coast — Threats by union leader Harry Bridges — — Convincing Port of Oakland Longshoremen to refuse to handle grapes — Mario Savio’s Speech — SDS and Educational Research and Action Project [ERA] — French roots and friendship with Harper’s French wife of Huguenot descent — Allende: His Exit and Our Times — John Pollock’s denial of tenure at Rutger’s — Sociologist Richard “Dick” Flack Tape 5 94 Lipset’s sociology — Current projects, including data gathering on African Americans entering the white collar workforce — Reflecting on the decline of blue collar black workers and its effects on Socialist political movements
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