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STUDENT MOVEMENT, SOUTHERN UNIVERSITY

over to see Dr. Netterville. However, he was not on campus. Whereupon the students returned to a mass meeting in the men's gym where, to show student support for Students United, they elected Ricky Hill as "Acting President of the University." About one p.m. students received word that Dr. Netterville had closed the university and had ordered students off the campus by six p.m., notwithstanding the fact that there are a large number of students from out of the state at the Baton Rouge campus. Moreover, the East baton Rouge Parish Sheriff's deputies gathered at Ryan Airport on a standby basis at noon, followed by the national guard and the state police. Netterville said that the "closure of the university was done in the interest of safeguarding students, faculty, staff and administration and the protection of lice and property."

The day before he closed the Baton Rouge campus, Netterville was faced with another crisis and another demand for his resignation. This time it was the students at Southern University in New Orleans (SUNO). SUNO is a commuter school which serves working-class students during the day, and their older brothers and sisters who work during the day but attend classes at night. Spearheaded by student government President Earl Picard and his Vice-President Irving Heard, they presented a list of grievances to Dr. Emmitt Bashful, Vice-President of the SUNO campus, a physician on campus, and a student audit of financial records. Other demands included a proposal for a departmental and executive council, and the resignation of Dr. Bashful and Netterville. Dr. Bashful received the proposals on Monday, October 30, and asked for forty-eight hours to consider them. He was given until ten a.m. Wednesday to make a decision. The students also decided to boycott classes until they heard from him.

After receiving the demands, Bashful called a faculty meeting where he discussed the proposals. Students were barred from this meeting. An editing committee was formed to draft a response for the presentation to students by ten a.m. Wednesday. Members if the faculty also met with student representatives in order to get their viewpoint of the situation. However it was apparently too late to influence the editing committee which was responding negatively to the demands.

Consequently, when Bashful failed to appear on Wednesday, students took possession of the administration building. Brothers Picard and heard explained later that the building takeover was nota spontaneous action but arose from their analysis of the conditions which

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