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Furman University | Text

Group Attacks School Gleefully

An editorial appearing in Furman's student newspaper, The Paladin, dated November 16, 1963. The author is very critical of the South Carolina Baptist Convention and it's reaction to the Furman trustee's resolution authorizing Furman to admit all qualified applicants regardless of race or color.

Group Attacks School Gleefully -- Once again the many messengers to the South Carolina Baptist Convention got the only "kicks" of their usually drab lives by attacking Furman University and its policies with sadistic glee. This opinion was also aired by Dr. Edward L. Byrd, of Florence, on the Convention floor. He said that many members of the assemblage seem to get some sort of "left-handed glee" out of a Furman controversy each year. He went on to say that there are "better ways of mending Furman's flaws." Some of the thick-headed delegates did not understand the simple solution which Byrd recommended. One or two of them thought the most constructive glue for mending the school's cracks was John Birch paste, labelling everyone connected with the school or supporting it a "Communist" or an "NAACP" backer." Since gripes from the country hog wallows usually result in witch hunts (piously led by the radical right wing of the Convention), next year's messengers will undoubtedly introduce a ban to prohibit the performance of all works by Russian composers on campus. The infantile Big Brothers must protect our Christian minds from such "progressive Russians" as Rachmaninoff, Bartok and Shostokovitch. All of Right and Truth have been crucified and are buried in a Cave, covered by a rock too big to be rolled aside for a second coming.