Another academic purge

 When I was at the University of Texas 50 years ago, people were still talking about the conservative purge of the 1940s.

In 1944, the regents fired President Homer Rainey. Among the many complaints was that he refused to fire economics teachers who were discussing the 40-hour week and other features of the New Deal. In the 1970s, people remembered that some of the teachers the university was proud of had mixed feelings about the place. I’m a fan of the writer J. Frank Dobie. He taught a famous course on the literature of the Southwest before being run off in 1947. 

When I was a student, the university was still conscious of that blight on its record. It took a hands-off approach to what could be taught in the classroom. Those who say all the teachers were liberals then were cutting classes. I wasn’t. I heard an astonishing range of views.

At the time, people had confidence that the university would defend academic freedom. Teachers taught as they should — without looking over their shoulders.

I’m mourning the damage that’s being done today to the university — and many others.

It almost seems to be a natural law. State universities that have resources attract talent. Politicians notice the influence of learned people, see it as dangerous and try to dismantle it. 

It seems to happen in cycles: Every so often, people who can think are purged from public universities by people who can’t.

• Source: This has been a long-running story, but you can get a sense of it by reading Vimal Patel’s “The Conservative Overhaul of the University of Texas is Underway”; The New York Times, Dec. 10, 2025.