The Columbian University Siege of 1968 occured on the campus of Columbia. Students occupied Hamilton Hall, which was where all the undergraduate classes were held. The siege lasted from April 23, 1968 to April 30, 1968 (Brinkley, The Unfinished Nation).

 

Leaders and Goals 

There were two main radical groups involved in the protests at Columbia University. The first was the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), and the other group involved was the SAS, which was a political activist group made up of blacks. The groups had similar but slightly different goals. Both groups expressed disaproval of the Vietnam war, racism, and desired to have better relations with neighboring communites. Both the SDS and the SAS wanted to stop the construction of the Morningside gym that would seperate Columbia from Harlem, but these two groups wanted this for different reasons. The SDS wanted to rile up the student and faculty bodies in support of their activism, but the SAS was primarily interested in simply stopping the construction of the gym. SAS eventually asked the SDS to start their own protest because their goals did not completely align. SDS, which was predominately made up of white radicals, then occupied President Kirk's office, and formed a second protest (www.columbia.edu, "Columbia University 1968").

 

Summary 

Columbia's campus during the 1968 was full of young activists determined to change the state of the world, so when the new gym being built between Columbia and Harlem only offered access to natives of Harlem through a back door, a group of hundreds of Columbian students attempted to take action. These same activists were the ones speaking out against the war in Vietnam. However, the attempt to tear down the fence outside of Morningside Park ended with the arrest of some of the activists. The backlash of the arrests included the other activists marching to Hamilton Hall. The siege began on April 23, 1968 and lasted six days. Protestors also took over President Kirk's office and three other academic buildings on campus. Police showed up on April 30 and infiltrated the siege, beating and arresting around 700 students and faculty members. Many more students and faculty members went on strike and Columbia was shut down for the remaining of the spring semester of 1968 (www.columbia1968.com, "Columbia University 1968").

 

 

Effectiveness of the Protest 

The protest was effective when speaking of immediate goals. The Morningside gym was never built (www.columbia1968.com, "Columbia University 1968"), and the anti- war effort presented in the strikes led to the end of Columbia's weapons research contract (Stefan M. Bradley, Harlem vs. Columbia University). One immediate consequence of the protest was that Columbia was temporarily shut down (www.columbia1968.com, "Columbia University 1968"). On a bigger scale, the Columbia siege had a domino effect on student activists across the country (www.columbia.edu, "Columbia University 1968").

 

Big Picture 

The Columbia Siege was so significant because of the split between the SDS and the SAS because of the difference in rationale of the protests and strikes (www.columbia.edu, "Columbia University 1968). The Columbia Siege was significant because it paved the way for students not only across the country but around the world to stand up as activists within their community and fight social injustice. 

 

Works Cited

Bradley, Stefan M. Harlem vs. Columbia University: Black Student Power in the Late 1960s. Urbana: U of Illinois, 2009. 162. Print.

 

"Columbia University - 1968." Columbia University - 1968. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Apr. 2015. <http://www.columbia.edu/cu/computinghistory/1968/>.

 

"Columbia University 1968 | History." Columbia University 1968 RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Apr. 2015. <http://www.columbia1968.com/history/#more>.

 

Brinkley, Alan. Ed. Michael Ryan. The Unfinished Nation. 6th ed. McGraw-Hill Humanities Social, 2006. Print.

 

Picture Bibliography 

http://www.columbia.edu/cu/computinghistory/1968/68-09.html

http://oldnewyork.tumblr.com/post/11276193259/columbia-university-protest-1968

http://www.thestickingplace.com/projects/projects/columbia/

http://www.icarus.info/home/attachment/columbia-university-crest/