The First Amendment; Frances Smith

The First Amendment and a free people weekly examination of civil liberties in the media in the 1970s produced by WGBH radio Boston cooperation with the Institute for democratic communication at Boston University. The host of the program is the institute's director Dr. boated Wilbur. One of the great glories in this country is our interest in and aptitude for public lectures. We like to inform each other we like to use our mass media of communication to learn about more things. And here in New England of course which is the home of this program we have had the oldest is now the oldest public lecture series in the United States 71 years old and going strong. It's the Ford hall forum and I'm delighted to have with me here today the president of the Ford hall forum Francis Smith who's going to reminisce about some of the things that have happened over the past 71 years and particularly over the

last few years. The Forum came into being because people wanted to know the truth. It remains in being today because people believe in it join it and support it. It's as I said the oldest continuing form in the United States. It is had practically everybody known to man who is not listed in either the Old or New Testament on as a speaker. For example in the one thousand seventy seven to seventy eight period there were its guests in this public lectures. Roger Mudd Larry Flynt Dr. Barry Commoner Bella Abzug I.F. Stone Dr. Edgar Berman Dr. Thomas as Ann Rand. Theodore B Calle and jury run anon. Francis Smith is the director of the Ford Hall has been a director for 16 years of Ford hall forum she's now the president she's been cochairman of the friends of the school of creative arts at Brandeis University a member of a number of college boards of directors was on the lift tower research project on leadership in metropolitan Boston. It

has been a founding member of the Doric dames is a member of the Steering Committee on dollars for Scholars and did very important work a few years ago when we had some new urban relocation needs in relocating helping to relocate minorities in Boston and other communities nearby. Francis Smith you've taken on a very big job. You define the Ford hall forum in terms of what you think about it and know about it. Well the Ford hall forum for me represents the First Amendment which is what this program is all about is the idea of permit having people who are experts in their field come on the platform and present their points of view on their particular subjects but the important part about the form is the open question period. We have a 45 minute open question period which permits anybody to challenge whatever opinion an expert may have when we have a very sensitive issue. We tried to have two speakers make the presentation. We never do a debate format as

such but then the questions go alternately from one speaker to the other such as this year we're having a debate on nuclear energy and the safety factors involved and we're having Professor Rasmussen who will of course defend I imagine his friends Masoom report. And he is head of the nuclear engineering department at MIT and Professor Kendall who is one of the founding. He's also at MIT. He is one of the founding members of the Union of Concerned Scientists now for a subject like that we have two people. We're also having two people on for a discussion on the EIA Amendment and we're having Phyllis Schlafly and Karen to crow care and a crow is past president now. And I feel that the form itself is stands for just what its symbol is let there be light. Our symbol is a torch with the words Let there be light and our idea is to shed some light on an infinite variety of subjects which concern humanity. Now that's a very broad scope because it gives us plenty of leeway in programming we can deal with national issues or

international issues as they come up or as a crisis comes up. As you guys nicer for the members of the radio audiences of the stations across the country there are going to be listening to this program. This is the year of radio and television. The Ford hall forum has endured has increased in popularity has attracted some of the most interesting speakers and as you point out some of the most disturbing questions and informed questions in the question period. People come they're interested they they see it as an important feature. How did you survive when radio Motion Pictures and Television killed off most of these public forums. Well I think the answer is very simple you cannot talk back to a television set or a radio set. And it is almost the difference between. Live theater and movies but even a more important difference in that you can ask these open questions. I mean you just raise your hand and you're called upon we do not

screen the questions and it is a condition preceding with the speaker that he subject himself to this open question period Otherwise we will not have them on. What was the most a broadly used meeting that you have ever been. Well I think that one of the most exciting meetings if you want to talk about excitement but its the wrong kind of excitement is we did have a meeting on extremist sex sect wants sex and we had the John Birch Society black Muslims and kook Klux Klan. And at that meeting they suddenly announced from the platform that the fire department said we had to stop the meeting because there was a bomb in the hall. Now this was the first time and Ive been going to the forum ever since I graduated high school and that was a very long time ago it was sort of an extended form of education for me personally that's why I'm so devoted to the form and. What was fascinating about that meeting was the reaction of the audience.

They didn't want to leave. They walked out very very slowly. They stood on the sidewalk outside the auditorium and they wouldn't leave and we finally had to get a loud speaker and make arrangements and there was a with a nearby hall which was a half a block away. And we continue the meeting and there was no bar but it was today I think we might take it more seriously but this was you know quite a long time ago. Another most of the meetings are quite reasonable. As a matter of fact one of the things I've noticed about the phone or forum is that the topics are very exciting but the whole approach of the forum is the ultimate must work a way out through the use of our minds. That's exactly right in the sense that I hate to use this very old fashioned expression but the four meetings are presented in an atmosphere of goodwill and it's traditional The forum has a tradition and we do not have disruptive meetings. MODERATOR We have very carefully chosen moderators

and the moderators have been very successful in controlling the meetings we do not allow anybody to get up and make a speech in the question period. We allow them to get up and ask a question. And it is up to the moderator if they find some person getting up and starting to make a speech to cut him off or her off and say what is the question. And apropos that I have a marvelous story the judge Laurie who was my moderator for oh about almost 50 years he used to moderate every single meeting. Twenty six meetings a year he moderated for the longest time and we had a very famous speaker I don't remember who it was that a man got up and for a five minutes praise the speaker and finally judge Laurie lost his patience and he said What is the question sir. And the man said Isn't that so. Well we presume it was in your own in your own memory when somebody asked me who was the most impressive speaker that you have heard. For some reason I've heard a

great many great men and women but I always think first of Mrs. Roosevelt. I don't know why that is. I often think then Dr. Ralph Bunche or or Trygve Lee your dog karma sure. Who is the most significant speaker that you heard as you were first going to the forum. Well I think Eleanor Roosevelt made an enormous impression upon me I was a very young girl at that time and when she spoke and she was such an imposing figure when she stood on the platform she heard her presence itself was so enormous in the sense of dignity and her presentation. And of course there is a marvelous story attached to her which just I just recalled. She was sitting on the platform waiting to be called upon when there was a long distance telephone call. And I was in the wings and they said there's a long distance call and there is a man on the phone who says it's urgent. So I walked out on

the platform and I told her and I told her the man's name and I said he said it is very important. That you come to the phone. It is urgent. And she said urgent and important to whom and she didn't take it. I remember one some years ago at Brandeis University when I was doing some work with the WGBH this was a number of years ago. Ms Rose it was on a television program beauty of a course at Brandeis and she she appeared in Ed when Amara was on the program and Arthur Schlesinger Jr. was on the program there discussing Cuban trucks for prisoners and so on and so forth and I wasn't on the program I was just standing there terribly intern What were they were saying to one another and she started to talk to me. I said something she said something and I couldn't help but ask I said Mrs. Roosevelt I'm not on the program why are you spending so much time talking to me. She said Because you raised an interesting point. Yes well she was interested in everything around her and you felt that you felt that when

she talked to you she was talking to you. She wasn't talking down to you she was talking to you and listening which is very important and I think she was sort of a listening post for the president. You have a number of people who have over the years come to hear Ann Rand who has appeared with some frequency year by year. Explain that phenomenon. I wish I could except that it is another one of those almost cult situations she has a following which is called the Objectivist group. She used to publish a magazine called The Objectivists which she no longer publishes and her following is just incredible I cannot understand it. People come from all over the country to hear her because the only place she has speaks is at the food hall forum. She did speak once at West Point and other than that the only and the reason she says she speaks at the forum is just the point that you raised before is because although there are people in the

audience who disagree with her and disagree with her violently she gets great respect from the audience and from the moderator and her point of view is right down the line she was one of the first persons I ever heard on a public platform talk about abortions. And this is consistent with her Objectivist philosophy. I take care of me and this is my body and I do what I want. And she spoke about abortions in a time when nobody even was considering them. And the phenomenon of her following. I can't explain it I don't know why people travel from Canada Seattle the Bahamas and we had one man come one year from South Africa to hear her and now her magazine is apparently circulated worldwide at least that would be my guess otherwise how would these people all know about it. And she prints excerpts of her lectures in her magazine her lectures that the borehole for because I can just see that man has a wonderful life leaving

her to say came from Pretoria. Excuse me I'm going to see you. It might have been something like that. But it is an enormous following we do have about when we have are on the program about a thousand people come in from out of state and they stay the whole weekend. Now we had about two years ago when we ran into a financial situation which we're always in I suppose because we're a nonprofit organization and we intentionally keep the membership dues low so as to permit everybody to come in our ideas to have the audience a grid audience from all economic ethnic and educational background admission has always been free and admission is free if you're a member you come to all the lectures and the advantages you get early admission so you are assured of a seat. But at that time we knew of her following and that these thousand people came in whether it rained snowed or no matter what and we ran a luncheon and it was specifically.

Said in the invitation that she would not speak at the luncheon she would just be there and without any kind of promotion. Eight hundred people came to the luncheon and got us out of the deficit that year. And then they stayed in went to the forum that night to hear her speak. We ran the lunch in the afternoon that she was going to speak at 4:00. What curious things have happened in the forum in past years. Well I have my favorite story being sort of a feminist before anybody ever talked about birth control we had Margaret Sanger coming to Boston and she was there but at least movement movement in the early days and Mayor Curley was James Michael Curley was mayor then and he issued an order to the police commissioner that she was not to be allowed to speak. Those were his specific words and the way the form this was before my time but the way the form resolved the problem was she sat on the platform with a piece of tape over her mouth. And I'm not the slightest interest senior who was a historian as

well the father of licensure Jr. the historian read her speech and that's how they circumvented the order by the police commissioner. But there she sat this imposing woman with a piece of tape over her mouth. I love that story. And we when we had the Russian ambassador come here a number of years ago now it was right after the Hungarian crisis and therefore tensions were high they were and also you would think this is not a very good commentary on the Secret Service all of the FBI or whoever is supposed to know the whereabouts of foreign ambassadors and he came in and we picked him up and took him to what was then the Somerset hotel. And he wanted to see part of Boston. He knew more about the history of Boston than I ever knew he wanted to see. Not sensitive that places but he wanted to see the Old North Church and famous historical places. And a friend and I drove him around and showed him all the places and brought him back and he spoke at the forum that night. And he

went back I think he went on the train because they were not full it was a long time ago. And what was rather shocking was about three days later about 10 FBI Secret Service agents I don't know who they were descended on the city cross-examined me cross-examined all the help in the hotel wanting to know what he did while he was here and he said they were supposed to Certainly it would seem to me that our intelligence agencies should have known that he was coming to the US and they didn't even know he had come here. Most of the people that have come on the forum have been interested in generally speaking political questions but some of them have been poets and you know and an artist who impressed you in that vein. Well of course Robert Frost obviously was a great person to have read some of his own poetry. When you look at yes he didn't like to actually read poetry most the whole evening and he did interspersed the readings with

discussions but primarily it was poetry we've had a poet other poets but nobody has ever drawn an audience the way he did. He has not been replaced. We had a meeting on where we had critics from the various. Types of entertainment like the theatre and in a panel the theater and the movies and discussing the theater we've had Judith Crist on who discussed movies and from time to time you see our subject our commitment to deal with any issue which concerns humanity leaves a such a broad area that we can periodic we go off into another tangent like the entertainment world are a poet. But generally there are people on the forum who deal with controversial issues are issues about which there are opinions on both sides like Ralph Nader and and that sort of person who can run when they're the most

important peak of their careers I go there. That's true but we've also had you know people have a very true opinion of the kind of speakers we present while we present speakers to the left. We also present speakers to the right. We've had Bill Buckley on the phone on the forum and Iran would certainly be considered a speaker to the right and William Rusher William Rusher who is the editor of Bill Buckley's newspaper we had William Loeb on. And so the notion that we just present liberals is not true at all. I will say this that there are more and it is easier to get people who have liberal thoughts on political issues to come to the forum in this. These are infinitely less for instance we have been trying for a long time to get Milton Friedman to come I would like an economist who has a right wing point of view his the is so enormous

that we just couldn't possibly afford him there is just no way we could have what I don't understand how he can claim to have some knowledge or precedence as a commentator on eliminating inflation. If his views are so angry. You say you know what they don't know about it. Well it makes it difficult and very often we are criticized for not having more people whose political opinions or whose philosophy these are to the right but we really cannot get them and they do not happen because they are phrases so high now. William Buckley we had when he was charging fifteen hundred dollars today billion Buckley wants $5000. We cannot afford that. There is just no way and I'm not sure that a speaker any speaker is with $5000 if you break it down into the fact that the program is an hour and a half a 45 minute talk in a 45 minute let you know open question period. It seems incredible that anybody would judge if it was alright for a public forum that is providing such a public service as the four hole form it seems to me that a speaker that gets

five thousand dollars ought to come with two bedrooms. That wouldn't be a bad idea another speaker who impressed me enormously was R. Buckminster Fuller. And yes I know him. I sit with him in Malaysia and he just absolutely enraptured the audience. He is an incredible person he seems to know everything he is my idea and he was 80s now as yes I would call him a real renaissance man. And the last time he spoke he spoke sitting down and it was about three years ago. I've seen him speak twice and each time his lecture was absolutely delightful and scintillating invigorating all the rest that you want to say along those lines. But he has this habit of closing is our eyes I don't know if he did it with you throwing his head back and going through about the first 12 minutes without ever opening his eyes. I mean audience by that time is captivated there in his hands and then he opens his eyes and says he says something startling like

he told us he did you realize how little attention has been given to the structural strength of this hotel. When I came to this country Malaysia on an airplane where it was only skin was only a millimeter thick and I put my full faith and had my cocktail. We were all shocked that none of us knew this question The None of us had ever thought about before. Well the thing about I don't remember his doing that I didn't observe that but the thing that I did like was the first time he spoke. The moderator at 45 minutes when the 45 minute period was up tried to stop the lecture part of the presentation to go into the question period and he said there's no point having a question period because I can continue to talk for another hour and say everything that you could possibly ask me about. And he didn't want to go into a question period now very often we have speakers who do just the opposite instead of talking the full body of my minutes will cut it short and talk about 25 minutes and say they prefer a question period. But do speakers who say that actually Iran semi prepare

that's been my experience when they want to go too quickly into the question period I don't think they spent enough time gathering their notes for that evening. Well I wish you would. Not on the photo normal level of speaker. Well but we have had speakers who haven't come prepared and I would have to say that there is often we have had speakers where the question period is much more interesting than this speech. And only once do I remember and I will not name the person where the author the speech was so poorly prepared and so boring. And the man had just written a book and the book was a bestseller. The audience walked out and I only remember that having once in maybe 25 30 years of my being the form that he was he really did not prepare what he did was he talked about the next book he was going to write it was almost like he was there to promote a book he hadn't even started and it was really offensive to the audience and they just walked out. But of course that would be in the vein of the photo already and that if it comes to

listen to good lecturing should walk out if somebody is not prepared or goes off on an ego trip. Well we can't control it you know we hope that they never do that again. We presume that they will not we did also once have a speaker come from New York and he was editor of Black magazine and York. And I don't remember the name of the magazine. And for some reason which I cannot fathom he decided to come on the bus instead of taking a train all lined up and judge Laurie was the moderator that night fortunately for us. And when the time came to start we start promptly at eight o'clock because we are broadcast on WGBH live in this area and then sometimes picked up on tape in other stations across the country but when he didn't show up. Judge Larry got up and he told about the history of the form and he the audience stood up but she kept them absolutely captivated. And this man

showed up at 20 minutes of 10 at that time we used to have two hours an hour in an hour. And he showed up 20 minutes before the meeting was to close he made a five minute presentation and then he said he wanted to take the question period and by this time it was last about three minutes of 10 between the introduction of who he was and so forth. And Judge Laurie who was really smooth got up and said We have rented the hall until 10 o'clock the meeting is now closed. And he walked off. And that ended it. But you paid that man no we did not or you did not know he was somebody we had gotten through an agency. And when I told him the story they were really chagrined and very embarrassed. And we did not pay him. Sometimes different we ran a conference we invited as one of the many speakers of Robert Maynard the celebrated journalist and he we had a fog in New York so he finally made it through by bus from Connecticut and he came only about six hours late but he plowed his way

through and he did everything to get there and he said when he saw me he said Bernie I missed my forum I've missed my panel. I said no you haven't. You're on the one that's all. So he said I don't know anything about the subject. I said if I thought that I would have invited you to the conference that also he went on I was the hero of that panel as it turned out we had to. Most similar situation happened when we had an economist come and talk about what multinational corporations and fortunately our moderator for that evening had just delivered a lecture on multinational corporations in at Harvard University. And he went ahead and delivered the speech because the man was like he did not take the plane he said he was taking and he came late and I think the audience liked moderator as well as he liked this economist who was coming to talk on multinational corporations and fortuitously on him too we did not pay him the full fee because he arrived three quarters of an hour late. Unfortunately

I had all the information we ask our speakers to telephone us to telephone me personally at home when they arrive in Boston and we warn them that weather can be foggy and treacherous and that they ought to arrive early enough in the day. It's always on a Sunday they could come in you know a few hours earlier so they're not trapped. But if you're in charge of waiting for the speakers it's a good way to get grey hairs. This is when the bell rings. Yeah well I always say that I too was speaker walks into that auditorium are into the way into the adjacent room Frost lounge where we meet. When he walks in and then I can breathe easier. I don't worry about what he's going to say as long as he arrives and the moderator arrives. We have alternate moderators so that I'm not. Never been that concerned about the moderator but I am about the speaker. Well the photo forum has a certain style to it. Maybe that's one of the reasons is not only surviving but very healthy and vigorous has panache about it.

It is the Ford hall forum. Yes and I'm not just another form. And I'm very proud to be president and I want to mention that I'm the first woman president in the 70 year history of the form. And as somebody said yes but with no Most deficit. And I suppose that comes with the territory. Well the Ford hall forum is in very good hands with a very stylish and good woman and I'm delighted to have as my guest today Frances Smith President for this edition Bernard Ruben. The First Amendment and a free people weekly examination of civil liberties in the media. In the 1970s the program was produced in cooperation with the Institute for democratic communication at Boston University. Why didn't you GBH radio Boston which is solely responsible for its content. This is the station program exchange.