University of Virginia Library

RICHEY STATEMENT

The Rector presented the Richey statement, which was discussed, and the Rector was asked
to insert the modifications agreed upon and thereafter to file a report in the minutes of the Board,
the time for filing to be left to the discretion of the Rector. Whereupon the statement was accepted
by the Board.

FURTHER STATEMENT UPON THE PETITION OF ASSISTANT
PROFESSOR HOMER G. RICHEY TO THE BOARD OF VISITORS
OF THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA

On April 25, 1951, Mr. Homer G. Richey, Assistant Professor of the Woodrow Wilson School
of Foreign Affairs of the University of Virginia, filed his petition with the Rector and Members of
the Board of Visitors of the University of Virginia making charges against the Woodrow Wilson School
and certain requests for action by the Board. Hearings were conducted on four separate occasions.
In addition, numerous briefs and memoranda have been filed and carefully read by the Board members.
All interested persons having been given a full opportunity to offer evidence and to be fully heard,
the Board on September 14, after careful consideration, rejected the prayer of the petition and now
further sets forth the reasons for its action.

This petition was filed in opposition to a report of Professor Gange, Director of the
Woodrow Wilson School of Foreign Affaits, made on May 10, 1950, to the President of the University
in the discharge of the official responsibilities imposed upon the Director of the School. The
report of Mr. Gange contained recommendations for the promotion of Assistant Professors Fernbach and
Micaud to Associate Professorships in the School and recommended that Professor Richey be appointed
an Acting Associate Professor for a period of one year, or, if Mr. Richey were not agreeable to this,
that he be appointed a lecturer on an annual basis. Mr. Richey declined both of these proposals, and
elected to serve to the termination of his present contract, which expires on June 30, 1952. The
report set forth in some detail the reasons for the recommendations made.

The President of the University appointed a committee of the faculty to examine the complaints
of Mr. Richey. This committee was composed of Dr. Ivey F. Lewis, Dean of the University,
Chairman, Dr. Lewis M. Hammond, Professor of Philosophy, Dean F. D. G. Ribble of the Department of
Law, Professor T. R. Snavely, Chairman of the School of Economics and of the School of Business
Administration, and Professor George W. Spicer of the School of Political Science. It conducted
seven hearings investigating the complaints of Mr. Richey, on substantially the same points now
presented to the Board, and subsequently submitted to the President its report unanimously rejecting
the complaints

The petition of Mr. Richey requests the Board to take action in two respects:

1. "To remove Mr. Gange for cause, as Director of the Woodrow Wilson School and from
the faculty of the University of Virginia," and

2. To make Mr. Richey "A full Professor in the Woodrow Wilson School of Foreign
Affairs."

The request for the removal of Mr. Gange "for cause" is predicated upon a charge that
he lacks "integrity and common honesty". We find that the charge is unsupported by any evidence
adduced before us and it is unanimously rejected.

The second request, that the petitioner be promoted to a full professorship against the
recommendation of the Director of the school is likewise rejected. This request is predicated
upon a charge that the recommendation of Mr. Gange in respect to the promotion of Mr. Richey was
controlled by prejudice on the part of Mr. Gange against Mr. Richey by reason of differences in
their economic and political views. The evidence adduced before the Board demonstrates to the
satisfaction of the Board that the recommendations of the Director of the Woodrow Wilson School of
Foreign Affairs in respect to the promotion of Mr. Richey were made after careful consideration
upon the basis of teaching ability, training and other professional qualifications in the field of
Foreign Affairs and upon consideration of his past performance and prospects for future professional
growth and leadership in that field

It is apparent from the testimony offered that Mr. Richey's views upon political and
economic subjects are different from the views of Mr. Gange, Mr. Fernbach and Mr. Micaud. It
does not appear that any of the latter three either hold or defend any political position with
the intensity and emotion which Mr. Richey displays in regard to his own

The mere fact that Mr. Gange may hold political views differing from those held by Mr.
Richey does not justify the inference that the official recommendations of Mr. Gange to the President
were affected by those differences. Especially is this true where the recommendations are
justified upon an appraisal of professional competence which appears to have been fairly made
upon the basis of considerations heretofore mentioned. We find that the evidence does not support
the charge that the recommendations of Mr. Gange in respect to Mr. Richey's promotion were controlled
by political prejudice or other improper considerations. It follows that it is the duty
of this Board to reject the second request of the petition

Having reached the conclusion that there has been no discrimination against Mr. Richey
because of differences in political and economic views, this report might well be concluded. We
deem it appropriate, however, to take particular notice of the charges contained in paragraph 4
of the petition. This paragraph is in the following language.

To the average layman, the characterization of a man as "left wing in fact pink" or
"pink, if not a dark hued red" nowadays means that he is a communist - one who seeks to overthrow
our form of government by violence or otherwise. But Mr. Richey has declared in his discussions
before the Board that he has no proof that any one in the Woodrow Wilson School is communistic

Taking Mr. Richey's statements at their face value, the best that could be made of them
is that the members of the Woodrow Wilson School staff, other than himself, were socialistic in
their views.

Students appeared before the Board at Mr. Richey's instance and told the Board that Mr.
Gange favored the F.E.P.C. (denied by Mr. Gange), the TVA Act, and the Point Four Program. Even
if these charges were true, we could hardly dismiss Mr. Gange on account of these views. Some of
these students said that Mr. Gange had indicated a strong friendship with the present Secretary
of State, Dean Acheson, and with Leo Pavlosky, one of the drafters of the charter of the United
Nations. Mr. Gange does not deny his friendship for the Secretary of State and for Mr. Pavlosky,
and in fact, rather proudly admits it. One of the students said that the members of the Woodrow
Wilson staff other than Mr. Richey were Internationalists. Several said that the faculty members
of the Woodrow Wilson School supported the national administration in its policies quite vigorously,
and there were other isolated criticisms, but they do not seem to us to form the ground for a
dismissal of any one of the three faculty members. From other students there came letters of confidence
in Messrs. Gange, Fernbach and Micaud, and of criticism of Mr. Richey.

With the exception of Mr. Richey's own statements, and the statements referred to in the
preceding paragraph, no evidence was introduced to support the assertion of Mr. Richey that members
of the staff, other than himself, entertained left wing views.

Messrs. Gange, Fernbach and Micaud denied emphatically that they were socialists. On
what is really the critical point as far as this Board is concerned - that is, whether a biased
one-sided and improper view has been presented to the students - there was little or no evidence
that would support this charge. What the students told the Board, and which has been detailed
above, certainly would indicate only that some of the political views expressed by certain of the
faculty members did not meet the views of the students - not that the expressions were improper.
We might ourselves disagree with some of these views, but that would not mean that we would be
justified in dismissing the faculty member on this account

The reading lists, the list of speakers, of which there were many and quite a few outstanding
ones, and the statements of each of the three members of the staff other than Richey,
indicated that both sides of controversial questions were presented.

Mr. Richey produced no evidence that he had ever attended Mr. Fernbach's classes. The
latter said that it was not his custom to do so. While Richey had attended some few of Micaud's
classes, Richey himself pronounces Micaud a proper person to teach as a member of the Woodrow
Wilson School faculty in a document filed by him with President Darden on February 10, 1951, entitled
"Thoughts on the Future Development of the Woodrow Wilson School." In paragraph 21 of
this document he says, "The writer's conclusion is that Charles Micaud has a contribution to make
to the Woodrow Wilson School." He adds that his recommendation is that Micaud be retained on the
Faculty.

In this same document Mr. Richey accuses Gange of being a socialist, but expresses the
opinion that "the mere fact of Mr. Gange being a socialist is, to the writer's mind, not sufficient
necessarily to disqualify him as a teacher, but it is a question of prudence whether he should occupy
a key administrative and policy making post."

Thus we have a pretrial acquittal by Richey of both Gange and Micaud insofar as the fitness
of these men to teach is concerned.

Mr. Richey had been associated with Messrs. Micaud and Fernbach for a full four years beginning
with 1946, and with Mr. Gange ever since he became Director of the Woodrow Wilson School. Yet
there was no report from him to any person in authority, or to this Board, of the serious condition he
now states exists in the Woodrow Wilson School until Mr. Gange filed his recommendation to Mr. Darden
that Mr. Richey not be advanced to an associate professorship. Thus the charges appear to be connected
with the disappointment of Mr. Richey that his advancement was not recommended. This is not a background
which would tend to calm, fair and deliberate judgment on the part of Mr. Richey.

It should be apparent that in a school dedicated to training young men to cope with the tremendous
and complicated problems arising from the ideological conflicts of this generation, all concepts
both economic and political upon which the societies of the world are organized, must of necessity
be understood. This involves not only a treatment and understanding of the mechanical organization of
each country, but of the ideology and history from which its organization and system has sprung. The
usefulness of the Woodrow Wilson School would be largely destroyed if the freedom of its faculty to
present and to discuss with its students all shades and degrees of political and economic opinion and
theory were impaired. The evidence produced before this Board shows that all such views are presented
in the Woodrow Wilson School of Foreign Affairs objectively, and that the student has been left free
to form his own conclusions and his own political and economic views and philosophy.