by Sara Russo

An organized coalition of fifteen ethnic and political student groups at Brown University stole 4,000 copies of the Brown Daily Herald on Friday, March 16th. The theft was retribution for the paper's decision to print David Horowitz's anti-reparations ad three days earlier and its subsequent refusal to submit to outraged students' demands that payment for the ad be turned over to the campus' Third World Center for minority students and that the paper give protestors a full page to print a rebuttal.

The theft occurred shortly after the papers were delivered to campus. A witness said that he observed students dressed in black stuffing copies of the Daily Herald into trash bags. In place of the papers, the thieves left neon pink flyers condemning the Herald's decision to print Horowitz's ad. "We were enraged that the 'Brown' Daily Herald accepted $725 to print a page of lies and propaganda in the form of the advertisement by David Horowitz that insulted the Third World Community and the Greater Brown Community," the flyer stated.

Brooks King, one of three editors-in-chief of the Brown Daily Herald, confirmed to Campus Report that the disappearance of the papers was a carefully orchestrated affair. "On Friday we got the paper out kind of late that night so it didn't come out at the newsstands until about 11:45am or so," he reported. "Sometime between 11:45am and about 12:15am all of the papers on campus disappeared."

According to King, the time disparity between Tuesday's printing of the ad and Friday's stealing of the paper, represents the time it took for the coalition to plan the theft. "They had no way of knowing it was going to run in Tuesday's issue," King explained to Campus Report. "We distribute at about fifteen locations around campus and I imagine it took quite a feat of organization to get them all taken off the racks within thirty minutes."

King also noted in retrospect that the staff was threatened that the Herald would disappear from campus after the paper refused to submit to the coalition's demands at a Thursday night meeting. "At that meeting we told them basically we're not going to meet any of their demands," King recalled, "and they told us that if that was our decision then our paper would not be seen on campus after that."

After copies of the paper were seized from all the kiosks on campus, the angry mob attempted to fight its way into the offices of the Daily Herald to take the few remaining copies from distribution racks located within. Herald staffers were forced to barricade the door while protestors pounded on it from outside and voiced demands for a formal apology and financial redress for the ad.

According to King, two separate attempts were made to extricate the remaining issues of Friday's paper from inside the Herald's offices. "The first time the guy came in and looked around and they weren't back from the printer yet," he told Campus Report. "The second time someone came in and actually picked them up from our lobby and started to run out of the building and our business staff actually ran him down and took them back."

The staff of the Daily Herald was outraged over the theft of their papers and was initially considering pressing criminal charges against those who participated in Friday's theft. Now, King explains, they are unlikely to take any formal action unless the incident is repeated. "We are still prepared to [press charges] if, for example, they steal papers again," he told Campus Report, "but if this is really the last time, no we're not going to do that."

The coalition of student groups that stole the papers issued a press release the day after the theft stating that they will perpetuate their campaign of action against the Herald until the paper meets their conditions. The coalition also added two new demands to their previous list: that the Daily Herald excise the word "Brown" from its title and that it cease dispensing copies on campus.

"Well, that's just absurd. That's just ridiculous," King responded to this further list of demands. "Of course we're not going to take Brown out of our name. We've been the campus newspaper for 111 years."

Flyers placed around campus by the coalition refused to apologize for the theft of the Daily Herald. "Members of the coalition do not regret the necessary removal of the papers in protest and self defense," the flier said. "The Herald's decision to run the ad ... was a direct assault on communities of color and their allies at Brown."

"The coalition has never opposed free speech," the flier added.

New security measures have been put into effect by the Daily Herald to ensure that no further theft of issues occurs. Editors of the paper distributed a reprint of Friday's paper by hand on Saturday and carried disposable cameras to catch pictures of potential thieves. The outer door of the paper's offices remains locked and visitors are required to show identification to enter.

As a further security measure, the paper has reduced the number of its distribution sites. "In order to better serve the Brown community, starting Monday we will consolidate our distribution points to four campus locations," stated an explanation printed in the paper. "At all four locations we will strive to make sure the newspaper you count on is available to you."

When staffers of the Daily Herald fanned out the following Monday to distribute the paper at their new locations, protesters wearing white labels asking "Does the BDH represent you?" joined them. The protesters passed out fliers explaining their position on Friday's theft of the paper. "Friday's action was a symbolic act of civil disobedience to draw attention to the fact that Brown University does not have a daily student paper that is accountable to its student body," the coalition's flyer stated. "It resulted from repeated incidences of misrepresentation of Brown University's communities of color by the BDH."

"I'm not sure I even understand that criticism," responded King. "We don't claim to represent them. Nobody's ever said that a college newspaper has to represent the people who read it. We aim to serve them by reporting on the news faithfully and accurately in a timely way…beyond that, as far as representing, I'm not even really sure what would be involved in a campus newspaper representing someone."

King noted that there already exists a weekly alternative newspaper on Brown's campus and that students are planning to create yet another publication. He further speculated to Campus Report that what the coalition is truly seeking is a newspaper that is financially accountable to the University. "I think what they're looking for is a newspaper that actually gets its money from the university, so that they can sort of have some control over it," King said. "Whenever the newspaper does something they don't like they can say oh yeah, we'll talk to student government, we'll try to get your funding revoked, or something like that, where with us all they can really do is write letters to the editor and columns." The Brown Daily Herald is an independent corporation that receives no funds from Brown University.

Though initially critical of the coalition's act of theft, Interim Brown University President Sheila Blumstein later begged for the campus' sympathy towards minority students who were offended by Horowitz's ad. Blumstein's initial statement released the day after the theft called the coalition's behavior "unacceptable within the Brown community" and argued that "The most effective response to ideas, however-even to ideas that may be deeply offensive-is not to silence them or intimidate those who espouse or publish them, but rather to develop effective opposing arguments through the wider civil discourse."

But in a statement released three days later she wrote, "Even as we uphold our principles, we cannot deny the impact the publication of this advertisement has had on the Brown community as a whole. It was written to be inflammatory. In addition, it was deliberately and deeply hurtful."

"We have an obligation to look out for each other and to treat each other with respect," she added. "In this particular instance, supporting those members of the community who feel most hurt must also be one of our defining values."

Instructors at Brown have also defended the newspaper thieves. "This racist attack on black students sets a very dangerous precedent," one teaching assistant in the Afro-American studies department told the Daily Herald. "I have talked to students who told me that they can't perform basic functions like walking or sleeping because of this ad."

Lewis Gordon, director of the Afro-American studies program at Brown, also defended the coalition's action. "If something is free, you can take as many copies as you like," Gordon said. "This is not a free speech issue. It is a hate speech issue."

In a statement issued to the media, Gordon clarified his views on the theft. "My public position is that what happened last week reflects both questions of the parameters of responsible versus irresponsible activities on the part of the press and the question of racism," he wrote. "I was also concerned that the public spaces at Brown were being bullied into white spaces versus spaces for the entire Brown community regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, and class."

Later, at a faculty meeting, Gordon criticized his colleagues who condemned the theft of the Daily Herald. "Some of my colleagues need to have some sense of reduced self-righteousness," he said. "It is utter insensitivity to leap to certain conclusions about acts of civil disobedience."

Members of the coalition did not respond to requests for an interview for this article.

Titled "Ten Reasons Why Reparations for Blacks Is A Bad Idea- and Racist Too," the ad was paid for by prominent conservative author David Horowitz in an effort to widen the discussion about reparations on college campuses. The ad counters the pro-reparations position with a list of ten reasons why reparations are racially discriminatory and unfair. "Only a minority of white Americans owned slaves, while others gave their lives to free them," the ad states. Another more controversial section contends, "Slavery existed for thousands of years before the Atlantic slave trade was born, and in all societies, but in the thousand years of its existence, there never was an anti-slavery movement until white Christians-Englishmen and Americans-created one."

Thus far, the ad has been sent to a total of 59 college newspapers, 35 of which have already rejected it. Of the 14 papers that agreed to run the ad, three quickly issued apologies.

Daniel Hernandez, editor-in-chief of the Daily Californian at UC-Berkeley, apologized on the front page of the paper for "allow[ing] the Daily Cal to become an inadvertent vehicle for bigotry," and admitted that he allowed students to seize remaining copies of the paper containing Horowitz's ad. Eleeza Agopian, editor of the UC-Davis California Aggie also expressed contrition for the "grievous mistake" the paper made in running the ad. "It is an embarrassment not only for the newspaper, but the university community at large," she wrote.

While King hesitates to evaluate the decisions made by other university papers, he emphatically believes the Daily Herald made the right choice in running Horowitz's ad "Yes, we would definitely do it again," said King, of that decision. "For us, and as far as the mission of the Herald goes, we feel very strongly that part of our duty and responsibility is to publish a whole variety of views, even things that are controversial and things that we know the campus won't necessarily agree with."