Mitch Daniels, as an unconventional choice to become Purdue University’s president, has repeatedly pledged his strong commitment to academic freedom. And many professors — including some who had questioned the wisdom of appointing a governor as university president — have given him high marks for the start of his work at Purdue.
But on Monday, the Associated Press published an article based on e-mail records it obtained under Indiana’s open records laws. Those e-mail records showed Daniels, while governor of Indiana, asking that no public universities teach the work of Howard Zinn, seeking a statewide investigation into “what is credit-worthy” to see that similar works were not being taught for credit, and considering ways to cut state funds to a program led by a professor who had criticized him.
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Image: “Academic Freedom 101” • Illustration by Gary Varvel • The Indianapolis Star
