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Salient. Victoria University of Wellington Students' Newspaper. Volume 31 Number 16 July 16, 1968

Confusion

Confusion

Sir—Your reporter's account of my talk on radical tradition at this university (Salient 18 June) has certainly captured the spirit of what I said with admirable accuracy, but he's not quite so hot on facts. I don't want to quibble, but there's one point where he gets so confused between the Von Zedlitz case and the Hetty Weitzel case (1915-1916 and 1921 respectively) that I must plead permission to straighten the record for the sake of my reputation with posterity. Prof Von Zedlitz was removed from his post as Professor of Modern Languages by Act of Parliament solely because of the witch-hunt on persons with German names; it was Miss Weitzel who was accused of having disseminated literature designed to provoke lawlessness and violence, and whose conviction in the Magistrate's Court for this offence was followed by another celebrated witch-hunt, this time on "subversive influences" on the campus. This witch-hunt, sparked off by a demand by the Minister of Education for a full-scale Inquiry, was contemptuously rebuffed by the College Council which conducted its own "Inquiry", exonerated the good name of the institution, and affirmed the fundamental principles of academic freedom.

It would be well if this generation of students became more aware of these positive traditions of VUW, and I would heartily recommend a perusual of John Beaglehole's jubilee history published in 1949.

Yours etc.,

Conrad Bollinger.