If Leinhard Bergel is not reinstated to the German faculty of the New Jersey State College for Women, the American Civil Liberties Union will take the issue before the State Legislature, it was announced today.
The Union challenged the decision of the Rutgers University trustees’ committee which held that Bergel was dismissed for in-competency, in a report of the union’s observers at the hearings in New Brunswick, N.J.
In a letter to the Board of Trustees accompanying the report the Academic Freedom Committee maintained that Bergel was a competent teacher, that Dr. Hauptmann, head of the German Department who dismissed Bergel, was violently pro-Nazi, that Bergel was plainly anti-Nazi and that Dr. Hauptmann was prejudiced against him.
“We appeal to you to reject the report of your committee and to reinstate Mr. Bergel,” the letter said. “We regard the issue as of such importance in an institution of public character that in case you do not see fit to act, we will be regretfully obliged to take the issue to the committee of the New Jersey State legislature concerned with the policies of the university. We shall also refer the report, together with a copy of this letter, to the American Association of University Professors for such action as they may see fit to take.
The letter was signed by Reinhold Niebuhr, William C. Bagley, Henry R. Linville, Horace M. Kallen and Frederick L. Redefer.
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