Radical and Militant Youth: A Study of Columbia Undergraduates

The confrontation between students and the administration at Columbia University in the spring of 1968 was not only profound in the level of its intensity but representative of similar struggles in other universities in this country and throughout the world.

Until April 23rd, the Columbia Administration had successfully managed the growing student unrest—at least manifestly. Despite the rumblings of student opinion and a few changes in practice, such as terminating class rankings, the structure and policies of the University were essentially static. Then, on April 23rd, the critical temperature was reached, and through a series of spontaneous actions and on-spot decisions, students seized the primary classroom and administrative office building of Columbia College, Hamilton Hall. By sunrise the next morning the white students had been evicted from Hamilton Hall, and the black protestors—including about half the black students in the college—had emerged as a militant political group, with Hamilton Hall established as an all-black protest base. Over the next two days, white students “liberated” and occupied four other University buildings, including the President's office. In the predawn hours of April 30th, 1000 New York City policemen cleared the five buildings of 1000 students. In the course of this action, 712 arrests were made and 150 people required medical treatment for injuries resulting from police violence. A student strike followed, and formal classroom

instruction in the College ended for the remainder of the semester.

The period from April 23rd to June third was a phase of the active struggle between a significant faction of this generation of youth—and the University, which had come, in their view, to represent the training ground for a place in an unacceptable society and a powerful structure