While playing billiards with a small group of students,
Reagan discussed minorities, small government, and how to win in Vietnam.
Reagan succeeded in opening the minds of some of them to other points of view:
When the all-white male students in the billiards room complained to Reagan
about how society was treating blacks, Reagan pointed out that in California,
there was a different minority group, Americans of Mexican descent, that had
far worse problems; he said that he was trying to help them. When the students
wondered where Reagan was getting his Vietnam advice and why had he not sought
out elite thinkers from the Ivy League, Reagan answered that he had been
discussing the war — with leaders from Cal Tech, California’s aerospace and
defense leaders, and Stanford. The students seemed shocked that there might be
other points of view besides those originating from within liberal eastern
academia.
The high point of Reagan’s weeklong visit was his final
speech, at the Yale Political Union, where there was an overflow crowd. Reagan
did not deliver his usual campaign and fundraising speech about bringing small
government to Washington, D.C. Instead, he analyzed the entire controversy of
his visit and the intolerance of the Left. Reagan addressed the issue head-on.
He looked directly at the few professors in the audience and forcefully told
them and all the students that their job was not to indoctrinate. Their job,
and the mission of the university, was to expose their students to many
different points of view and to let the students decide for themselves.
Reagan clearly saw that if conservatism were allowed the
chance to compete freely in the arena of ideas, its major tenets of individual
freedom and small government would almost always win. But if young minds were
exposed only to leftist ideology, then conservatism wouldn’t have much chance.
At the end of his speech, Ronald Reagan indeed had succeeded in changing minds:
He received a standing ovation.
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